Kofi Kingston discusses his longevity with WWE and looks back on how much has changed.
Kingston has been a member of WWE’s main roster since 2008, and he has become one of the company’s most accomplished stars. He is a Grand Slam Champion, and he memorably won the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 35 in 2019.
Speaking with Graham “GSM” Matthews for WrestleRant Radio, Kingston looked back on his lengthy run with WWE and noted that a lot has changed. He described how he was watched some fans grow up, and he has also seen the WWE roster change a lot.
“Time flies so quickly,” Kingston said. “We were in Detroit last night. We went to Dick’s Sporting Goods, and somebody pulled me aside and [goes], ‘Oh I met you 11 years ago.’ I always hate when people say that because it’s like man, I’ve been doing this for so long. He said, ‘Yeah, I have the picture.’ We took a picture, I put it on my Instagram page with a side-by-side with him when he was this tall, now he’s this tall. There are people we see, even in airports, they move been coming to the airports for years, they’re such big fans, we sign autographs and take pictures and all that. I literally like watched people grow up. People were like kids and all of a sudden, they come and they have facial hair, they’re actually growing up.
“It’s wild to have been around for so long. I look around the locker room and it’s like man, I don’t know really any of these guys. You know what I mean? I know them, but as far as knowing them intimately and personally, there’s a lot of new faces, which is a good thing. So I’m just blessed to be able to still be hungry, be healthy and be having fun, and being able to do this on a full-time basis.”
Kingston also discussed the way being a WWE fan has changed, as he pointed out that, with social media and other platforms, superstars are much more accessible now.
“It’s a crazy world that we live in,” said Kingston. “I think being a fan of WWE now is so different than it was back in the 70s, 80s, 90s where you didn’t have access to your favorite WWE superstars. Now, granted we’re not in conversation with everybody, we can’t be, there’s so many people. But you get to see like behind the scenes.
“We were talking about UpUpDownDown, like being on the gaming channel. We have a lot of people who play video games and it might be a totally different persona then you see on television, but it’s very relatable because people like games. So it’s cool to be able to identify and relate to people on a very personal level in so many different ways.”
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