Former WWE Writer Explains Why Brock Lesnar Squashed Kofi Kingston to Win the WWE Championship
Brock Lesnar defeated Kofi Kingston in a mere seven seconds on the Oct. 4, 2019 episode of Friday Night SmackDown. The win brought an abrupt end to Kingston's six-month reign as WWE Champion, and WWE's decision to immediately pivot Lesnar to a feud with Cain Velasquez and push Kingston back down the card only enraged fans even further. Former WWE Writer Chris Dunn was a guest on The Public Enemies Podcast this week and discussed that infamous booking decision, saying WWE (under the leadership of Vince McMahon) felt Lesnar needed a dominant win heading into his match with Velasquez. That bout wound up lasting a mere two minutes before "The Beast" won in Saudi Arabia.
"I think the feeling was that Brock wasn't going back to Kofi," Dunn said (h/t Sportskeeda). "He was going [to face] Cain and they wanted to build the Cain match, and they felt like that dominant of a performance was the way to do that. I think it sucked."
He also noted that Kingston was supposed to get some sort of follow-up the next week, only for it to get cut for time. Kingston would not get a one-on-one shot at the WWE Championship again until July 2021 at the Money in the Bank pay-per-view, which saw him get squashed by Bobby Lashley.
"He was gonna have an interview the next week on SmackDown and be able to respond to it. Those types of promos are kind of make-or-break promos. Due to time, because it was at the end of the show, it was cut for time," Dunn noted.
Kingston talked about the match with NBC Sports last October — "I don't really dwell on the why. There are a lot of things in the industry that you look at sometimes and go woah, 'why did that happen?' You just move on, and the wheel keeps on turning. For me to dwell on what happened in that match with Brock Lesnar doesn't serve me any purpose. It's not going to make me better or change what happened or do anything besides make me feel bad, and I'm not going to let it do that. I have a lot more career left to handle. I think it's a scenario where it's a rare and unique opportunity to be on this roster. As far as my run, being WWE Champion, I got to go six months almost to the day so that is a very long reign. To be able to button that up was great. I enjoyed my title run. I enjoyed every single moment of it because I know how rare it is to be in that championship role. You embrace it."