Freddie Prinze Jr. Recalls Kofi Kingston’s Angle With Randy Orton In 2009, Kingston’s Push Being Scrapped

On a recent edition of Wrestling With Freddie, Freddie Prinze Jr. discussed Kofi Kingston’s angle with Randy Orton in 2009, Kingston’s push being scrapped, and much more. You can read his comments below.

Freddie Prinze Jr. on Kofi Kingston’s angle with Randy Orton in 2009 and Vince McMahon’s reaction to Kingston: “All this happened because Kofi had this crazy scene on live television. Hey, maybe it was Monday Night RAW and it was the U.S. Title. But one of the NASCAR guys, and I don’t follow NASCAR, so I don’t know their names the way some of you would. So forgive me for not knowing. One of these guys gave Randy Orton a NASCAR, like an actual NASCAR race car. And it’s shiny and it’s got all the logos. It looks like straight out of Tom Cruise’s Days of Thunder. Maybe not with a good of hair as he had, but still, the same vibe, and it’s glistening the way they have the lights on it. And Kofi’s going just ballistic for something that happened.

“But he takes a fire axe to this NASCAR while he’s cutting the promo. So there’s a ton of effort and breath behind it and it doesn’t sound like the standard babyface promo or babyface trying to be a tough guy. The man is holding an ax and he’s cutting holes into the hood of what looks like, and it’s clearly not, but of what looks like a two million dollar car. However much a NASCAR costs. I have no idea. And he’s like, ‘Is this what you wanted?’ And he’s yelling every time the ax hits. And I’m watching Vince’s reactions to this and he’s just lighting up like a teenager watching it. You just see when he sees something in somebody. He’s like, ‘That’s it dammit. Yes!’ He’s just behind him all the way and then Kofi finally puts the axe through the windshield, and he just jumps off the car and storms off, and Vince is like, ‘Dammit. Yes! This kid’s gonna be a star!”

On Orton yelling at Kingston for a blown spot: “The whole team was motivated. We [the creative team] finished the whole thing up, and everybody thinks we have this great run to the title. We bring it and it gets approved by Steph [McMahon]. I don’t think Shane was back in the company at that point, I think he was over in China at that point in time. In the meantime, Randy Orton and Kofi have a match. This is a week later [after the NASCAR segment]. In the match, a spot gets blown. So a spot gets blown and Randy gets pissed on live TV and you see him yell ‘stupid’ with that deep Orton booming voice….so this spot gets blown meaning the technique, a stunt in the match gets blown. You can tell something doesn’t look good. I don’t know what it is because I don’t see the spot when it happens. I don’t what happened, I just know something is not good, right?”

On Kingston’s push being scrapped: “I’m sitting through this two-hour, three-hour production meeting. My story is dead. I tried to save it for about 10-15 minutes. When I say my story, I mean my team’s story. It’s my job to sell their crap. It’s my job to put it over. That’s my job is you’re a salesman on production day. And when I say crap, I don’t mean bad stuff. I was behind this, I believed in this story. But 10-15 minutes, I’m fighting for it and there’s just no winning this battle. Now I’m trying to fix it. I’m offering alternative solutions, other people are offering alternative solutions. The whole thing is just gone and dead. So finally, I just shut up and we move on. And I don’t even think Kofi even worked that night, and I get out and they tell me what happened. They tell me about this blown spot and Randy’s pissed at it. It got shut down. And they ended up, for those who aren’t in the know, they ended up using that real moment of why Randy sort of held Kofi down in the actual story of Kofi winning the title after winning the Gauntlet match that I saw ten years later off of Randy Orton. They literally put that into the story.”

If using any of the above quotes, please credit Wrestling With Freddie with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.