10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About Kofi Kingston

10. His Early Middle Name

Kofi Kingston
WWE.com

As the Road Dogg might say, "Oh, you didn't know?".

Back before he leapt onto ECW screens as a Caribbean cool cat with high-flying moves and bags of potential, Kofi Kingston was actually known as something else. Alliteration be damned, because his original WWE name in then-developmental territories Deep South and Ohio Valley Wrestling was Kofi Nahaje Kingston.

That's right. In 2006-2007, Kingston would bound to the ring and have his three-pronged name announced in full. We're not 100% sure why WWE decided the middle moniker was necessary though. It hardly fit in with the Jamaican gimmick (more on that later), and Nahaje actually has West-African heritage, not Caribbean.

Some African flavour definitely works with Kofi's real-life Ghanaian roots, but not with the character WWE bosses wanted him to play 13 years ago. Weird, and not something the promotion are ever likely to bring up again.

Advertisement
Contributor

Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.