Kevin Owens has enjoyed a very successful career in WWE. He has won several singles titles since debuting in 2014 and at WrestleMania 38 in 2022 he had a once-in-a-lifetime moment as he main-evented night one with his childhood idol ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin.
But according to the Wrestling Observer’s Dave Meltzer, Owens was penciled in at one point to add one more title to his collection.
Kevin Owens replaced by Kofi Kingston in WrestleMania 35 WWE Title feud
According to Meltzer, Kofi Kingston’s sudden surge in popularity forced WWE to change their long-term plans. It was Kevin Owens, not Kofi Kingston, who was scheduled to face Daniel Bryan for the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 35:
“In the case of Kingston, in 2019, because there were two champions and his match was not in the company’s idea as the main event (they had Seth Rollins vs. Brock Lesnar for the other title and that was the year to build around the first women’s main event in history with Ronda Rousey, Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair), they ended up giving him the Smackdown title match with Bryan instead of the previously planned Kevin Owens, and gave him a full summer title run before getting the belt on Lesnar.”
With Daniel Bryan preoccupied with Kofi Kingston, Kevin Owens no longer had a match scheduled for WrestleMania 35.
Although he didn’t wrestle on the show, he took part in an angle after Kofi’s WWE Title win in which he congratulated Kofi in his big win. The storyline implied that Owens was turning into an honorary member of the New Day.
However, those plans were scuttled when Daniel Bryan, then SmackDown’s top heel, suffered an injury. Thus, to give Kofi a major villain to feud with going into the summer of 2019, Kevin Owens turned on Kofi and the New Day. However, he never managed to win that title.
Kevin Owens will get another shot at WWE’s top title later tonight as he challenges Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at the Royal Rumble PLE.