WWE Superstar Kofi Kingston recently talked with Newsweek on a handful of topics ranging from his new podcast to his new five year contract extension. Check out the highlights below.
How he feels about his new podcast:
It’s cool to be able to have control over what we talk about and allow people to come in and listen to us as we talk amongst ourselves. We are all happy that it’s doing so well. We don’t go out of our way to be entertaining or creative by any means. It’s just us, and that’s what people like. We are all excited about it, and, to be able to put out our stories and give people an inside story of how some of the goings on in the business, it’s pretty cool.
On developing topics for the show:
We had a producer, which was Emilio Sparks, but it’s now Dan Ryckert going forward. They’ll give us a sheet, almost like a guide, and we sometimes go off that and other times we don’t and just kinda go off on our own. That’s why it feels so natural because it’s just us talking. I think eventually down the line we’ll open it up and have people send us questions and topics they want to hear.
On New Day signing a contract extension:
If you look at the history of factions in our history, there’s always someone who is going to turn on the other and we get that all the time on social media. We don’t want to do that in any shape or form. We’ve all been singles competitors before, and we know how strong we are and the special bond that we have. We look at ourselves as more of a faction where all three can hold singles titles or one of us can go for the King of the Ring while the other two support. Or two holding a tag championship while the other is holding singles. Signing that contract together was very important to all of us because without one of us the group doesn’t exist. There’s something that’s missing.
On possibly retiring at the end of his new five year deal:
Five years is such a long time away, but you’d be a fool if you didn’t plan ahead. Being away from my kids is very difficult. We had to go an extra day last week and we had a live event and then media day in Minneapolis, and then we had TLC and then I came home Monday and then back on the road Tuesday. I’m doing the WWE holiday party in Stanford. And then I’ll go back home and come back to New York early on Friday to do a whole bunch of interviews and the live taping. I’m considering hanging them up at the end of this five-year period, but you just don’t know. I don’t know what’s going to happen next week, but it has crossed my mind for sure. I’ve been doing this for a long time, over a decade. It’ll be 12 years on television in January.
On what his successful 2019 meant to him:
It’s been a phenomenal year for me in so many ways. I’ve said in multiple interviews how it’s been serendipitous in so many ways. Lucky for me and unlucky for Ali, he ends up getting hurt, and I end up replacing him. And then it was off to the races from the Elimination Chamber to the gauntlet matches all the way to WrestleMania and “Kofi- Mania.” I say it like that because it’s not cool when I say it, but when everyone else says it it’s very cool. You want to touch people emotionally, you want them to be ecstatic or you want to take them on an emotional ride. You want them to remember how this guy made you feel. On top of that, the president of Ghana declared this year the “Year of Return” where he invited the Ghanian Diaspora to come to Ghana and be reintroduced and re-familiarized with their heritage. That’s the year I win the WWE Championship, and I get to take the belt over there to show the kids and inspire them and show them anything is possible if you believe in yourself.
You can read the interview in its entirety by clicking here.
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