10 Best Wrestlers Of 2019
7. Kota Ibushi
Kota Ibushi tends to divide even his ardent supporters, in that he is great, but he betrays that greatness by taking unnecessary risks that drive the drama - but also the anxiety - of his matches.
2019 was such a quintessentially Kota Ibushi year that it's a wonder Kenny Omega nor an errant firework had nothing to do with it. He committed to New Japan Pro Wrestling for life - afters years of reluctance to commit to anywhere - and wrestled a series of matches with Tetsuya Naito that weren't fought under a formal stipulation, but were in effect Last Neck Standing bouts. Gut-punching, accelerating spectacles that were genuinely hard to watch, Ibushi mastered a style that he probably shouldn't have.
He also mastered the most timeless, unifying still there is, after an exceptional run in the G1 Climax, in defeating Jay White. Ibushi was sensational in this match, and he didn't perform one unhinged neck bump: he sold his shoot hurt ankle with palpable, deeply sympathetic agony before mounting a perfectly timed, totally believable comeback and entering unflinching, glowing, vengeful God mode by beating the absolute piss out of the man who most deserved to have the piss beaten out of him.
Ibushi worked great matches with everybody, and the best match of the year with White.