20 Absolute Best Wrestlers In The World Right Now
9. Tomohiro Ishii
The slow decline of Tomohiro Ishii is sad and real, as years and years of working one of the most punishing styles imaginable appears to finally be taking a toll on the Stone Pitbull.
This was inevitable. Time waits for no man, particularly those who've spent the past 24 years getting dropped on their head and neck, and it's particularly tough to take when it starts happening to someone with Ishii's universal popularity. Move by move, match by match, however, the 45-year-old is being chipped away. And it sucks.
Don't mistake the former NEVER Openweight Champion for a spent force, though. Ishii is still the best comeback wrestler in the world. His selling is the industry standard, nobody draws such support from getting the p*ss kicked out of them, and when he decides he's had enough, scowls, grunts, rises to his feet, and smashes his opponent with forearm after forearm, it's like nothing else in modern wrestling. Ishii's formula is immortal.
The Stone Pitbull will surely have a blistering G1 Climax later this year and just delivered an excellent performance opposite Jay White. It'll be years before his power is truly drained and until then, he'll be a fixture on lists like this.