Predicting What The Entire Wrestling World Will Look Like In Five Years
7. Who Will Be The Best Wrestler In The World?
The obvious temptation here is to predict greatness for Wheeler YUTA.
He's currently wrestling's most promising breakthrough act, having successfully completed an incredible spreed run from prospect to star with his gradual grasp of fire, emotion and violence. There are several more viable candidates; HOOK has a presence as tremendous as his unique, explosive athleticism, Ren Narita fully embodies everything great and legitimate about New Japan, and if the big stage counts more than any other, Ms. WrestleMania, Bianca Belair, is on course to own it like precious few others before her.
There are two choices here, both of whom are already fantastic and neither of whom are approaching their primes: MJF and Hangman Page.
MJF is the most complete wrestler on the planet. "In the ring, on that microphone" there are none better at maintaining interest in their episodic direction. Every single time the man appears on television, he delivers a home-run of an angle.
But Hangman Page is the one; crafting a career-long arc comparable only to Kenta Kobashi's, Page's odyssey transcends the usual pattern, and his highly intelligent approach to in-ring storytelling is richer than most. He will be 35 - i.e., the wrestler's prime - in 2027, and it is staggering to think what the legend of the Hangman will look like by then.
What he's doing is art, an unreal continuing story of unparalleled depth, and it will continue to connect him with audiences on a level just as deep.
If it isn't Page, it will be somebody nobody has heard of yet. The young, unbelievably great prodigy is somehow an archetype now - YUTA, Lee Moriarty, Daniel Garcia - and that is because the wrestling curriculum has never been more vast nor accessible.