Having signed with WWE back in 2006, Kofi Kingston is now firmly in the veteran stage of his career but he remains at the top of his game.
The star is currently one half of the NXT Tag Team Champions with Xavier Woods and is still incredibly popular with fans. Kingston is a former World Champion and has racked up a number of other championship wins. Meanwhile, his run as part of the New Day has cemented his status as a tag team legend. Naturally, this has led some to wonder whether he might be looking to wind down his career.
Kofi Kingston Comments On His New Role As WWE Elder Statesman
Speaking on Cheap Heat with Peter Rosenberg, Kingston said that his WWE deal has a two years left to run and has no timeline for his retirement.
“I don’t know. I have a couple of years left on my contract. I never say, ‘In two years I’m going to be done.’ We always get on Mark Henry about this because he said he was going to retire for 12 years. ‘I’m gonna be done after this year,’ and all of a sudden he comes out in his stuff, ‘Vince (McMahon) told me that they needed me, so I signed for another five years.’ Mark, come on man, you ain’t never retiring! We get on him about that.
This industry is so unique and so fun and such a short period of time in our lives, and I know it’s very hard to walk away. What a lot of people miss about it, and from being on the roster and what I’ve been told, they miss the camaraderie in the locker room. Even now, I see the transition happening where myself, Dolph (Ziggler), Miz, Randy (Orton), we’re kind of the elder statesmen.
Everyone else has gone through NXT, people who I didn’t come up with, so you see the natural transition happening, but the camaraderie in the locker room, it’s still there. Once that’s gone, you don’t really get it back. I’ve always said, as long as I’m having fun, I don’t want to be the guy who comes to work every day and is complaining about being there, ‘I’m not happy with a storyline, I’m pissed off about this.’
This job is so amazing that you should be feeling elated about it every single day. Obviously, there are ups and downs, we all know that, but overall, you shouldn’t be coming to work and having it weigh on yourself and you take it home and you’re mad about what’s going on at work and now the quality of your life isn’t what it should be.”
When asked whether Xavier Woods and Big E have ever told him he can’t retire because it’ll break up the group, Kingston said he hopes they can all work together when they’re no long wrestling.
“I told them this, and they’re starting to come around, once you get past 30, it’s all the same age bracket. Are they younger than me or are we all the same age? They might even be older than me. Woods has been working has been working in the industry for a very long time. He’s got like 27 years in the business. He’s the real veteran of the group. Am I older than him or not? Who is to say?
When it’s all said and done, we definitely want to continue to work with each other on an entertainment platform, whatever that looks like, we’re figuring that out. We take it one day at a time. We’ll see what happened when the contract expires and we’ll cross that bridge when it comes.”
Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods will defend their NXT Tag Team titles at Vengeance Day against Gallus.
H/t to Fightful