During his appearance on WINCLY, Kenny King was quick to praise Kofi Kingston for his achievements as an African American wrestler, but noted that Jay Lethal doesn’t get the credit that he deserves for breaking through the racial barrier at an earlier date. Here’s what he had to say:
Jay Lethal was ROH World Champion in 2011 or 2012 and he was a double champ. He held both singles championships. So, what I mean by that is when people justly give Kofi his due for being the first black champion in WWE history and that’s a huge thing in itself, but Jay Lethal was doing it in ROH. I wouldn’t say it was to a little fanfare but it was less fanfare as what Kofi Kingston got. ROH never had an issue with that – Xavier [John Jirus] was the first ROH world champion. I think Xavier is Puerto Rican; he’s someone of color. It’s not a situation where you have to go back years in the history books to find anything like that. It’s always kinda been the culture.
You can listen below:
Credit: WINCLY.