Xavier Woods Says He Didn't Know Kofi Kingston Would Win WWE Championship At WrestleMania 35
WWE star Xavier Woods sat down with Chris Van Vliet to talk some pro wrestling. Among the most interesting highlights was Woods revealing he didn't know what would happen with the Kofi Kingston-Daniel Bryan match at WrestleMania 35. According to Woods it was by design, as he didn't want to know the result till the end of the match.
"I didn't know it was going to happen," Woods said. "I said 'don't tell me.' If the outcome changes mid-match I don't know what I am going to do. I said 'don't tell me a thing.' I knew what we had to do at the end, but I didn't know anything after that. I assumed. But it was all so real, not that it wasn't real before, but this was the thing that said it's not just us having fun and having a good time. We've created something worth what we believe it is worth. Now everyone sees what it is worth.
"It's for everyone who walks into work and they do everything in their power to possibly move ahead. But you just can't. As you're crushing it, you see people with little or no experience, they haven't been through what you have, they are flying past you with no one saying a word to you. At that point in that moment, it made every decision I've made in my life correct. You never know if you are making the right choices. You have an idea but you never know."
Months after WrestleMania 35, Woods would sustain an Achilles injury that would keep him out of action for almost a year. He detailed to Van Vliet how he handled the situation, and why the first thing that popped into his mind was being unable to do things with his kids.
"I guess it was to not stress things I could not control," Woods said. "I am a big perfectionist and a big control freak. Before I tore my Achilles, I was at a birthday party with my 3-year old at a trampoline park. We were doing flips and it was so much fun. We were planning to do it every Saturday. The next week I tore my Achilles, I immediately thought I can't go to that trampoline park. Then it's I can't dance in my kitchen with my kids. The third thing was not being able to wrestle. That's how much having kids has affected me.
"Before it was I want to wrestle everywhere and I want to have my name in lights and help change the industry. That was my focus and my motivation. I realized that my motivations changed when my kids were born. You feel that when you see them, it's a crazy experience. But to have a life changing injury happen to you, everything rushes forward for you. This is what is most important, it's cool to see that change happen. By the time I was jogging again and playing with the kids, it hit me that I would be able to wrestle again. Some months later I got to come back to wrestling and everything felt great. Learning that wrestling is not the be all and end all is the biggest takeaway. I filled up my diary with conventions to keep my busy. I had surgery on the Thursday and did a convention on the Saturday."
You can watch the full interview below.