Wrestling Predictions for the Decade (2020-2030)

[Spens1]

Well i posted the 2020 predictions thread, but what about predictions thread for the decade of 2020-2030 and what will happen

I'll start (and try not to go overboard)

Best Wrestlers in the world (Consensus):
- Shota Umino (NJPW), Ren Narita (NJPW), Tiger Mask V/Yuya Uemura (NJPW), Kaito Kiyomiya (NOAH), Kento Miyahara (AJPW), Pete Dunne (WWE), Tyler Bate (WWE), Flip Gordon (AEW), MJF (AEW)

Most Popular Wrestlers:
- Velveteen Dream (WWE), Flip Gordon (AEW), Shota Umino (NJPW), Ren Narita (NJPW), Kento Miyahara (AJPW), Tyler Bate (WWE)

Japan:

New Japan:
- New Japan will have transitioned to Shota Umino (who has developed into a Kota Ibushi/Hiroshi Tanahashi hybrid type wrestler) as the Ace and Ren Narita as his number 2 just behind him (who becomes a ZSJ + Shibata hybrid) with Ren being the more popular out of the two. Jay White is still the top heel and #3 (getting as high as #2 earlier on) and is still very much in good shape.
- Will Ospreay will have won the IWGP world title (and get a decent 6 month reign) along with a few IC title runs, a couple more Never openweight runs, a few us title runs and a run with the tag team titles before retiring halfway through the decade. He is recognised by the end of the decade as one of the best in ring performers of all time. He'll also be Bullet Club leader (probably the factions last leader).
- Yuya Uemura takes over as the new Tiger Mask in a few years, for most of the decade being the #2 guy behind Hiromu. Quickly recognised as one of the best junior wrestlers on the planet.
- Tsuji, Finlay and Henare never get out of the midcard, with all peaking at about Never Openweight and U.S title contenders, all solid in the ring but lacking character to make the jump. Finlay is the most successful, with FinnJuice having a hold over the tag team scene.
- ZSJ gets a short IWGP title run (3 months), Taichi, Moxley and Juice peak as IC champs (Mox cause of AEW committments, the other two cause of ability).
- Shota's arc will be similar to Okada when he took over as Ace, with him losing a WK main event but taking over ace duties it about 6-7 years from now (at the tender age of about 28). Ren Narita will win a world title before Shota Umino.
- Kazuchika Okada has another fantastic decade of wrestling, though he hits his ceiling as a performer in about a year or two and just maintains, even at 40 is in much better shape relatively than Tanahashi was at the same age.
- Tetsuya Naito and Kota Ibushi are both retired by this stage (Naito within the next 3-5 years, Ibushi towards the end of the decade). Both retire in New Japan (though Ibushi's official retirement show is independent, featuring a mix of New Japan, DDT and AEW talent). Kenny Omega retires alongside Ibushi.
- Sanada signs full time with New Japan, beats Naito for the World title and becomes the Ace of LIJ (with Naito still leader until his retirement) and the #2 guy for most of the decade, though starts sliding slightly and goes to WWE in a mega acquisition (not before winning between 3-5 IWGP titles). Will be for a time the most popular wrestler in the company. Tag team partner EVIL gets 2 IWGP title runs as well but has a much more rounded CV (multiple time IC champ, Never champ, tag team champ etc).
- Tanahashi, Romero and Taguchi all have long retired and have joined the front office in booking decisions (though Gedo remains head booker). Goto also joins but more as a trainer.
- Hirooki Goto wins his world title on shot #10 (against Jay White) at a minor PPV (going for 2022) in a last chance type match, quickly loses it at the very next PPV (Goto getting that Nakanishi 'thank you' run).
- Bushiroad buys another Japanese promotion (i.e. Zero-1 i think) and turns it into a New Japan subsidiary to send their L.A dojo guys on excurision to get japanese experience. Mainly headed up by Yuji Nagata, Tiger Mask IV, Masako Tanaka and a few others on the booking committee. Karl Fredericks wrestles with them for a fair while (3 years) and actually becomes the ace of the promotion.
- Bushiroad also officially buys ROH from Sinclair as well as the ROH tape library which gets put onto new Japan world. They rebrand the promotion to New America Pro Wrestling (or NAPW for short).
- New Japan enters into a working arrangement with AEW (sometime this year) and cancels the arrangement as well (with the growth of NAPW making the partnership somewhat redundant) in the middle to later in the decade.
- Kenny Omega returns to New Japan, goes up against Okada, Naito, Sanada and ZSJ and main eventing one double dome show against Ibushi in a best 2/3 falls, concluding their arcs in what ends up being called the best match of all time. He leaves New Japan again though to go to DDT before calling it a day.
- Top Talent acquired: Konosuke Takashita (DDT - next year or two given he's a failed ace more or less), Eita (Dragon Gate), Jun Tonsho (Wrestle-1), Daichi Hashimoto (BJW), Katsuhiko Nakajima (NOAH), Jake Lee (AJPW)
- Top Talent leaving: Sanada (WWE - towards the end of the decade), Hiroshi Tanahashi (retirement)
- Faction Fates: CHAOS (dead within 2 years), Bullet Club (officially retired after Tama Tonga's retirement as the last OG is gone), LIJ (retired after Naito's retirement), Suzuki-Gun (dead before the end of this year)
- Faction leaders/aces come 2030: Shota Umino (Seki-Gun leader), Ren Narita (face), Konosuke Takeshita (tweener), Jay White (heel), Katsuhiko Nakajima (heel) and Jake Lee (tweener)

Noah:
- Kaito Kitayama will be the Ace and will have really grown into the role nicely after this years false start, it does take him a bit of time however from now.
- They get their streaming service underway finally
- KENTA eventually does return to NOAH, continues in a similarish vein to his current New Japan run as a top heel, is an absolute prick and goes on the warpath.
- Suzuki also goes to NOAH and finishes off his career there, he takes Kanemaru and surprisingly enough, Lance Archer with him (as Archer gets put in a prominent position in NOAH). Archer and Elgin are the 2 main gaijin in the promotion.
- Noah replaces New Japan on AXS tv, with Noah partnership with Impact becoming strong. Thus making NOAH the other promotion that at least has traction in North America (still not much traction outside the U.S elsewhere in the west). They're the 2nd most popular japanese promotion in America (but not the 2nd most popular japanese promotion overall in the west).
- Kenoh gets a sustained push, Nakajima does not and leads to him leaving the promotion (a bad mistake on NOAH's part as he goes onto be amazing in New Japan).
- Masa becomes the #2 guy for a while and Kaito's main rival and they draw nicely.
- Elgin holds the GHC world title multiple times himself (and even gets a long reign and even does a dual champ thing). Archer also gets to hold the belt once.
- Noah by 2030 is in a similarish position to New Japan in 2012ish, basically on the cusp of greatness with Marafuji's full time booking being fantastic, only difference being the lack of a Nakamura to Kaito's tanahashi.

Dragon Gate:
- Dragon Gate holds that crown, they're the 2nd most popular japanese promotion overall in the west, with them doing tours in South East Asia, Australia + NZ, the UK+Europe and North America.
- They do not revive DGUSA or DG Europe. They do get some foreign guys through their Dojo however.
- Dragon Gate actually goes through an era without an official ace cause theirs no clear #1.
- T-Hawk and El Lindleman return to the promotion after a few years and even bring along Shigero Irie after Cima retires.
- Masato Yoshino takes over as head booker of the promotion and does a pretty selfless and good job of maintaining the promotion.
- Doi Darts is still a thing and they still have some of the best factions in the world (with proper factions returning in 2021 and a whole new world there with R.E.D the only surviving faction out of the old lot).

All Japan:
- Kento's Ace run is fantastic, bad news is that its so good that they don't have a replacement at all in the making.
- Nomura is the closest thing to a main rival that they have to him, with Jake Lee leaving the promotion due to poor booking (and New Japan coming with that sweet money).
- The promotion doesn't really see all that much growth despite Kento being the best ace and one of the best wrestlers in the world. Miyahara does stay incredibly loyal however but the lack of proper opponents hurts them.
- Yuma Aoyogi and Nomura are the only other two proper main eventers with Suwama, Ishikawi and Zeus all retiring.

Stardom:
- Mayu Iwatami becomes the promotions ace for the first half of the decade, then Hana Kimura takes over that mantle for the second half
- Hana Kimura becomes a household name in Japan, becoming the first proper crossover star for the company.
- Other key players being Arisa Hoshiki, Guilia, Starlight Kid and Utami Hayashita
- Momo Wantanabe never really fully connects the way Bushiroad and even Rossy intends, peaks as Upper mid carder and multiple time white belt (i.e. wonder of stardom) holder, she never holds the World of Stardom belt again.
- Io Shirai returns to Stardom after her NXT run (cause family/EVIL reasons), Kairi Hojo/Sane only returns later on (and wrestles like a year or two before retiring). Shirai wrestles for about 3 years before retiring at around 32-34ish.
- Bushiroad signs a ton of money to get Meiko Satomura in as trainer/wrestler. She eventually takes over from Rossy after he retires.
- Stardom starts to host its own annual tokyo dome show on its anniversary (averages about 25-30k towards the end of the decade). Hosts the 5 star grand prix and cindarella tornuament finals at Sumo Hall before the end of the decade due to strong growth.

U.S:

NJOA/NAPW:

- Becomes the #3 promotion in the country, scoring a pretty good tv deal (maybe Spike or Paramount).
- Karl Fredericks and Clark Connors are its top 2 faces, Alex Coughlin is the big bad heel here. Other notable names include Bandido, Rush and Dragon Lee (after his big junior run in New Japan as the #2 guy behind Hiromu).
- Rocky Romero is the head booker of the promotion and is absolutely fantastic in his role here, quickly being recognised as the top booker.
- Somehow, Karl Anderson also lands a role with Romero as another executive here, with Romero, Anderson, Gallows (of course) and Shibata all involved in booking.

AEW:

- Flip Gordon is the wrestler of the decade of AEW, quickly becoming a top fan favourite and face of the company. He has a feud against a heel cody rhodes which is memorable. Hangman Page is the other top face, Sammy Guevara and MJF are the top heels.
- MJF is the closest thing we've gotten to Ric Flair since the man himself.
- Adam Cole joins AEW in a shock move, establishes himself as a top heel and gets a 7 figure salary to jump over. Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa are also headhunted (and WWE/Vince are unwilling to match the ridiculous WCW numbers offered to them).
- Marty Scurll goes to AEW and wrestles out the rest of his career there as well (with the odd appearances on New Japan and for the NWA). He joins with Brodie Lee and Brody King being villain enterprises (and him joining up all the heel factions under one umbrella, with My Hero Academia being the inspiration there).
- Matt Hardy leaves WWE and joins AEW as Broken Matt Hardy, he wrestles and retires there and joins the front office and becomes manager to his own faction (thinking it would include Darby Allin). Jeff Hardy eventually joins him in AEW as well as some of his students (Cameron Grimes, Andrew Everett etc).
- Kenny Omega holds the AEW title for more than a year, but becomes unhappy with his situation and goes more towards New Japan and part time with AEW (resigning as EVP).
- Tessa Blanchard eventually joins AEW and becomes a top womans wrestler, holding the belt for 12-18 months before finally dropping to Kris Stanlader (who by that point is one of the best in the world). Blanchard is the top heel with Stanlader the top face.
- One of the four horsewoman (Sasha Banks most likely) jumps to AEW and wrestles for 3-4 years before retiring
- the Revival do join AEW and become the top heel tag team, getting a famous manager (Cornette maybe despite the controversy). They become the top heel tag team and them and the Bucks go back and forth for the next 5 years.
- Whilst the NJPW and AEW alliance only lasts around 6-8 years, one good thing is the hottest angle in nearly 2 decades, Bullet Club invades AEW and feuds with the Elite at the start of the alliance (after the Dark Order thing is sorted). Bullet Club eventually wins the feud and sees the split of the elite on TV (with White pinning Omega, Hangman pins KENTA however). Other notable things include Okada holding the AEW title and defending it at a wrestle kingdom and then at a MSG show.
- They somehow get the Starrcade name and that becomes their main arena show (they host at wembley before WWE do).
- Chikara becomes affiliated with AEW. Cesaro (Claudio Castagnolli) and Chris Hero (Kassius Ohno) both leave WWE and rejoin Chikara to help run the school alongside Quackenbush. Chikara becomes kind of like the PC for AEW (or similar to New Japan's Dojo setup). Kings of Wrestling get a tag team title run in AEW as well. Also enter an official partnership with MLW.

WWE:
- Smackdown gets moved to FS1 cause of poor ratings on Fox's main channel. Fox does not renew and goes back to U.S.A for significantly less, with the brand split ending.
- Financially, things start coming to ahead, due to the Saudi deal finishing off and big tv deals not so forthcoming (mainly cause the networks themselves are forced to become more shrewd). WWE's stock suffer greatly
- NXT either ceases to exist or is forced to substantially change the way it operates (i.e. focus more on PC talent and being incredibly selective on who they buy). NXT UK is folded within the next 3 years.
- Velveteen Dream takes on the Cena role and actually is the first somewhat successful FOTC.
- HHH takes over from Vince in a hostile takeover and that mostly has to do with Vince's stubborness actually hurting business.
- XFL flops yet again with this another factor which leads to his removal of official duties.
- Booking doesn't improve to a fantastic level, but its at least back to being average (with most shows you can at least say is around a 5-6/10 instead of the 0-2/10 it is now).
- WWE by the end of the decade is worth less than it is now mainly cause of the smackdown deal and saudi deal.
- Cena officially retires in a title vs career match which sees him remain tied to Flair at 16.
- Roman Reigns is long retired by 2025 (going for a retirement in about 3 years, even without the cancer i think he's a guy who will retire early), remembered as a good guy out of the ring, but in wrestling a guy who was overpushed and a victim of Vince's booking at the same time (i.e Luger). Goes on to play some minor bad guys in movies and the muscle but has a bigger impact on TV.
- Rollins wrestles for a time after but gets worse and worse due to his body deteriorating on him.
- All 4 horsewoman are retired by the end of 2027 (with Sasha Banks the only one to retire outside of WWE).
- Punk is convinced to return to the ring by WWE in a big main event, ultimately the main event flops, mainly due to Punk's ring rust and his opponent not being able to carry him to a good match. Punk leaves WWE afterwards, money in tow to live the good life (though he may become a booking consultant for AEW or NAPW).
-

Impact:
- Somehow survives but is in the #4 position in north america.
- They see a bit of an exodus in the early decade as AEW and New Japan come around for some of their talent (Blanchard, Callihan, Swann, Rascalz, AR Fox and Mack to AEW, Edwards and Cage to NAPW).
- They are able to replace their talent however with some unknown names and nurture them.

UK:

RevPro:
- Bushiroad buy majority stake in the promotion but not much changes (Andy Q remains in charge etc).
- RevPro title rebranded to IWGP British Heavyweight Championship, mainly defended by European wrestlers and the odd japanese wrestler.

[RonMexico915]

Very, very detailed. I don’t follow a lot of Japan wrestling like you do.

My only prediction is that the WWE will be the only major promotion by 2030. Some small ones might stick around, but there won’t be a credible number two. NJPW will never be #2 here.

[Spens1]

Very, very detailed. I don’t follow a lot of Japan wrestling like you do.

My only prediction is that the WWE will be the only major promotion by 2030. Some small ones might stick around, but there won’t be a credible number two. NJPW will never be #2 here.

I can agree with that, i do think AEW will still be around though so maybe they might count as a #2 (only cause they've been very conservative in their approach thus far, so i think they've planned this out even if the initial impact has not been all that good). Guessing they'll probably be averaging just over 1 million (then again, i think WWE by 2030 will be in the mid to high 1 million range).

My predicition for New Japan is less #2 and more that the american subsidiary will be a #3 which is below WWE and AEW but is still averaging around 500-700k per episode (so above the likes of Impact, MLW etc).