The advice carries extra weight coming from a duo that just went through the biggest upheaval of their careers.
On Tuesday’s Close Up with Renee Paquette, Kofi and Austin Creed said wrestlers need to cultivate interests outside of pro wrestling — and that doing so shouldn’t be seen as a lack of ambition for their in-ring careers.
“For me, it’s have interests outside of wrestling. And that’s not to say don’t lock in and try to climb the ladder and climb the ranks, and be the best professional wrestler that you can be. But there’s also so much else to life… you just have to have other interests. Most people have more in their lives than just wrestling, so don’t be afraid to feed those things,” Kofi said.
Creed brought up the financial side and recalled advice from his trainer, Rob Adonis:
“I dove into that tenfold because I was always fearful from the things I saw in wrestling. Especially my mentors would tell me, ‘Save your money. Make sure you’ve got something else.’ My trainer, Rob Adonis, he told me one time, and I didn’t understand it then, he said, ‘Don’t chase wrestling because you’ll never get out of it what you feel in that chase. Understand what it is. Enjoy it. Love it. Cherish it. Harness what you have to give to it, but make sure that you have something else.’ And that has honestly saved me.”
Creed can speak from experience. While still in WWE, he turned his passion for gaming into UpUpDownDown and built an identity of his own outside the ring.
Their words carry even more weight given what the New Day went through over the past few months. Kofi and Creed left WWE after being offered a pay cut of more than 50%. Months later, they debuted in AEW at All In and captured the AEW World Trios Championship alongside Swerve Strickland.