Watch: Kofi Kingston Celebrates Pinning WWE Champion Bobby Lashley

Kofi Kingston shocked WWE fans during this week’s Monday Night Raw when, after already beating Randy Orton earlier in the night, he pinned WWE Champion Bobby Lashley in the show’s main event. Kingston previously held the WWE Championship for six months back in 2019, but was squashed by Brock Lesnar in mere seconds to lose the title and had been stuck in the tag team division ever since. But Monday’s win (even if Drew McIntyre gave him the assist) suddenly gave fans hope for a second KofiMania push to the main event. Kingston and Xavier Woods then appeared on Raw Talk after the show to celebrate.

“When you stay ready, you ain’t got to get ready,” Kingston said. “That’s why you always stay in the game. You never know when you’re going to get your shot.”

“Kofi’s been doing this,” Woods said. “He’s been beating multiple people a night since he’s been here, this is not new. This is not something that Kofi’s just found he can do. He’s been crushing this, he’s been rolling through people night after night after night.”

Kofi ended the celebration by looking into the camera and saying, “I’m going to be in a lot of pain, I feel like I got hit by a Mack Truck and somehow I survived. And the adrenaline is going to wear off, I’m going to be in a lot of pain tonight. But for right now we doing it, we feeling it and I’ll say it one more time… Kofi Kingston just pinned the WWE Champion baby.”

One of the biggest frustrations surrounding Kingston was how he was never given the chance at a rematch for the WWE title, nor did his character get the opportunity to react to the crushing loss on television.

“This is weird too, a lot of people will be on my social media like, ‘Well Kofi, you’re acting like you don’t care, man. Did you forget that you were the champion? Well look, you’re asking my onscreen character to be angry like he’s my real character,” Kingston said on the After The Bell podcast in December 2019. “I just feel like it’s one of those things where it just is what it is. And the reality [is] onscreen I’m a good guy who lost in eight seconds so as far as making a case for a rematch, what would my character have to say? ‘Give me another shot, Brock! I lost in eight seconds but I’ll get you next [time]!’ You want my real-life character to take on this anger and be mad with the way what happened onscreen. It’s this weird conundrum.

“I appreciate the passion people have, but I’m puzzled by the anger people have towards me because I’m not the one making all those decisions,” he added.