Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods may not be planning to bring The New Day fans remember straight into AEW forever. Behind the scenes, the pair have something completely different they finally want to try.
Speaking during the August 11 edition of Self Made Sessions, Self Made Pro separated what he’s actually heard from his own prediction about how Kingston and Woods could initially arrive. His gut feeling is that AEW will lean into the familiar New Day presentation at first and give fans the reunion they’ve been waiting for.
“My gut feeling—this part is an assumption. My gut feeling is that when they debut in AEW, they will do something that closely resembles the New Day that we are familiar with, right?”
What comes after that is where things get considerably more interesting. According to Self Made Pro, he’s been given the impression that Kingston and Woods want to use AEW as an opportunity to reinvent themselves and explore something they weren’t able to do during their WWE run.
“But long term, I’ve been given the implication and impression that they want to try something that they haven’t been able to and basically reinvent themselves.”
And apparently, those ideas aren’t being invented now. Self Made Pro said Kingston and Woods had several concepts and different presentations they wanted to explore in WWE but never got the opportunity to put on television. He specifically pointed to The New Day’s heel turn, claiming the pair realized relatively early that it wasn’t working.
“I know that the New Day really wanted their heel turn to work and they knew pretty early on that it was not working. And I know that they have a number of ideas of things that they wanted to try and presentations that they wanted to do that they never got to. I’ve been given the impression that they have a new presentation that they want to test in AEW.”
Exactly what that presentation looks like wasn’t revealed. Self Made Pro speculated that AEW could initially ride the nostalgia surrounding their arrival before eventually turning them heel several months later, but he stressed that part was his own prediction rather than something he’d been told.
“It would not surprise me if in three to four months, once that nostalgia is worn off, they turn heel and do some things that they wanted to do the entire time.”
Whatever direction they take, Kingston and Woods apparently aren’t arriving without some ideas about who they’d like standing across the ring from them either.
“I also was given the impression that there’s some guys that they already have on their list of people that they want to work with.”
That adds another piece to what Self Made Pro reported in July, when he revealed AEW had already held creative discussions about how to use Kingston and Woods once they arrived. At the time, the biggest news was simply that the former WWE stars were expected to come in and AEW wasn’t waiting around to start pitching ideas.
Now there’s a better idea of what those conversations could eventually produce. AEW may get The New Day everyone knows when Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods first walk through the door. But if the impression Self Made Pro has been given proves accurate, nostalgia isn’t the endgame—they’ve got unfinished creative business from WWE, a new presentation they want to test and apparently already know some of the people they’d like to test it against.
What kind of reinvention would you want to see from Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods in AEW? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
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