J.R. gives his pick.
WWE Hall Of Famer Jim Ross has been involved in the pro wrestling industry for nearly 44 years and having worked as a talent relations executive for WWE for a number of those he has seen and worked with a load of up and coming talent--some who turned out to become superstars in the business. Among doing his own personal podcast, Ross also commentates for NJPW on AXS TV alongside former UFC Heavyweight Champion Josh Barnett.
There is one individual who Ross believes will indeed be the next breakout star in wrestling and he shared his thoughts on said superstar while speaking with Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated.
"Ospreay is the next breakout star, but only if he can stay healthy,” said Ross. “He has a great upside, without any question, but the questions concern the style and how he works. Calling his matches, I’ve seen him get up after I thought he hurt himself or broke something in his body. At some point, you don’t need a medical degree to figure out the fact that when you take bumps on surfaces that were never intended to be bumping surfaces, and you do it for too long, the cumulative effect is going to be negative. He has a great imagination and he’s a great improvisationalist, and he’s really good with strikes and submissions. So if he leaned a little more on the other aspects of ‘The Aerial Assassin’–he doesn’t have to do a moonsault to the outside to be an aerial assassin, he just needs to land on a surface that will half-ass welcome your body to it."
Ross feels that the former two-time IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Will Ospreay is the next big thing but worries about Ospreay's constant effort to go one-hundred miles per hour in all of his matches. At the age of 25-years old Ospreay is covered in kinesio tape and has had his fair share of injury scares which is the only thing that worries J.R.
“He’s got some size, he’s a real keeper, but I do worry about the number of risks he takes on any given tour. I hope I’m wrong, because he is so entertaining and wonderfully creative, and he’ll be a big, big star if he stays healthy. It’s up to guys like myself and Josh Barnett, or Don Callis and Kevin Kelly, to make sure we don’t make him known for only one thing in taking risks. Sometimes the talent believe what you say about them, and they continue down that road, which has a very unfortunate but inevitable destination.” Ross said.
Will Ospreay lost the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship to Hiromu Takahashi at NJPW's 'Dominion' event earlier this month. To view Fightful's coverage of that, click here.
