Kingston opens up about the ongoing storyline.
On the Day 1 edition of WWE Monday Night Raw, there was a tag match that saw Kofi Kingston and Jey Uso take on Imperium’s Giovanni Vinci and Ludwig Kaiser. The match was thrown out after Vinci took a dropkick to the face from Kingston and the ringside doctor had to intervene.
Vinci suffered a concussion and that has resulted in a program between New Day (Kofi Kingston & Xavier Woods) and Imperium. While on Busted Open Radio, Kingston feels the program opened the door for Kaiser and Woods to show a different side of themselves.
We were just talking about this, storyline-wise, me and (Xavier) Woods, we weren’t involved in a storyline for almost a year. Still on TV, doing stuff, having great matches, being able to do all that. But from a storyline perspective, it wasn’t — it was NXT when we went there and we had a whole run with the titles and all that, which was great. It wasn’t until… the time period between that and what we are doing now with Imperium, that just happened, because when me and Giovanni (Vinci) were in there… he ends up getting hurt and getting concussed and we have to stop the match mid-match. They would have never written that into a storyline and only because that happened, allowed for me to go in there and go against Ludwig (Kaiser) and allow him to show a different side that you didn’t think that he had. You always look at Ludwig and Giovanni as GUNTHER’s side pieces, you know what I’m saying? That’s what you visualize them as and now you give them a chance to step up and be their own people and level up. So, that only happened because me and Gio were in there and he ended up getting hurt so, then that happens and then Woods comes in the next week and he’s allowed to show a different side and now all of sudden it’s like, oh my God, New Day’s turning up and then we have this match this past week and we’re out in the stands and we’re fighting and we’re going through tables and all of sudden, people are like, ‘Oh, this is great. This is an aggressive side of New Day that we haven’t seen before.’ You’ve seen it before, but it’s really one the situation warrants for it to happen, and I take a lot of pride in being able to do that and be able to adjust based on what the situation demands.
Elsewhere in the conversation, Kingston spoke about reuniting with CM Punk now that he’s back in WWE. He said he lights up every time he sees Punk backstage and told him there’s going to come a day when he’ll get used to seeing him around and will not be as excited.
So, time is always weird when you’re on the roster. It flows differently because everything feels like it was just yesterday but at the same time, feels like it happened decades ago. So, it does feel like a long time (since I’ve seen CM Punk). But, I told him actually, this week — so every time he comes around the corner, I legit light up. ‘Hey! Hey!’ I don’t even say anything. I just, ‘Yay! Aye!’ I’m happy to see him back there because nobody ever thought that he would be back. There was such animosity between him and the company and all the stuff that he had gone through. You just never thought that you would see him here, let alone in a ring. So I am ecstatic, I’m happy because he went through whatever he went through and he came back and now, this is the next step in the journey. You always wanna see people happy with their lives and where they’re at with their lives and you wanna see them go through what they go through and overcome that and I think it’s great, I think it’s awesome. For the fans, they get to see CM Punk back, you know? You never thought you’d see that but yet, here we are. For me, it’s just a joy to see him. I said, ‘You know, one of these days, I’m gonna get used to seeing you around here and I’m not gonna pop every time I see you. It’s not gonna be any time soon but eventually, we’re gonna get tired of seeing you around here.’ But yeah, it’s great to see him back.
Kingston is scheduled to partake in the 2024 men’s Royal Rumble match, as is CM Punk. POST Wrestling is going to be reviewing the Premium Live Event after the show concludes.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Busted Open Radio with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
