By now, it’s no secret that WWE superstar Xavier Woods has at least a passing interest in fighting games. When he’s not breaking faces and playing trombone as part of two-time tag team champions The New Day, he can be found producing content for his video game channel UpUpDownDown, which frequently features professional wrestlers slugging it out in our favorite competitive genre.
But while he’s been known to belt out the Final Fantasy victory tune on television, Woods has never (to the best of my knowledge, anyways) paid homage to fighting games in the same way. Never, that is, until tonight.
Earlier this evening, Woods and New Day teammates Big E and Kofi Kingston opened Raw with a segment dedicated to the WWE’s current heavyweight champion, Sheamus. This, of course, included some jabs at previous title-holder Roman Reigns, who lost the belt to Sheamus only a few minutes after being crowned champ. His reign (wink) was so brief that The New Day missed it entirely while they, as Woods put it, were preparing for Evo and Final Round.
That’s right, he gave a shout out to two of our community’s largest events in front of nearly 20,000 people in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, not to mention countless fans watching the segment from home.
Does this mean we’ll see Woods at fighting game tournaments next year? Will Evo feature an appearance by WWE 2K16? Maybe not, but you have to admit this is pretty cool.
Source: WWE via Joel Ortiz