411’s Wrestler of the Week 4.09.13: Year Eight Winner and Final Standings

Welcome to YEAR EIGHT FINALE of 411’s Wrestler of the Week. A quick overview of the rules to kick things off for us as a reminder…

Each writer chooses FIVE wrestlers from any promotion and each wrestler gets a point total attached to that ranking. It looks a little like this…

1st – 5
2nd – 4
3rd – 3
4th – 2
5th – 1

Then we tally up the votes and the official 411 Wrestler of the Week is crowned. But wait, there’s more! Each week the top SIX vote getters get a points value for their ranking which looks something like this…

1st – 15
2nd – 12
3rd – 9
4th – 6
5th – 3
6th – 1

…and they go towards the 411 Wrestler of the Year award to be announced each year around WrestleMania. This will be posted every Monday (the voting week runs Monday through Sunday). Let’s see who wins this week…

Larry Csonka
1) Kazuchika Okada and Hiroshi Tanahashi
Many times I have written about the greatness of both Kazuchika Okada and Hiroshi Tanahashi. They are, well, the new hotness right now in wrestling. Hiroshi Tanahashi is simply having great matches with everyone, and Okada is right there with him. They did it again this past weekend, on iPPV, where they put on a tremendous match and Okada won the IWGP Title.

2) Jay Briscoe: Jay Briscoe shocked the wrestling world last weekend when he defeated Kevin Steen, against all odds, to become the ROH World Champion. The boyhood dream has come true; a chicken farmer from Sandy Fork Delaware is the ROH Champion…
3) John Cena: Your new WWE Champion, winning the main event of WrestleMania 29.
4) AR Fox
5) Cheerleader Melissa

Michael Ornelas
1) John Cena
Won the WWE Championship and ended the down chapter in his career in a match that…well, it wasn’t bad…and the People’s Elbow fake-out to the end was great.

2) Jay Briscoe/AR Fox (tie): Won their first world championships in Ring of Honor and EVOLVE respectively.
3) The Undertaker/CM Punk (tie): WrestleMania match of the night participants.
4) The Shield
5) Fandango

Michael Benjamin
1) John Cena
Won the WWE Championship in a pretty awful rematch, all things considered. If it was a B show, I don’t think it would have been as big of a deal but I digress. The quality of the match doesn’t take away the fact that John Cena walked out of the main event of Wrestlemania 29 as the WWE champion.

2) The Undertaker: Comes back, steals the show, defeats CM Punk, and walks away with the streak intact.
3) CM Punk: It takes two to tango and CM Punk did a marvelous job getting the crowd to believe that the streak may very well be broken.
4) The Shield
5) Jay Briscoe

James Wright
1) John Cena
Well my predictions were way off! That’s what I get for hoping for some interesting occurrences at the ‘Showcase of the Immortals. Bar the success of some new talent this show was pretty dry. Still Cena is champion again, good for him I guess. Yes I have massive beef with the WWE right now.

2) HHH: I don’t care.
3) The Undertaker: Same old shit.
4) The Shield
5) Fandango

Ryan Byers
1) Kazuchika Okada
I haven’t read enough feedback to know whether I’m in the minority on this point or not, but I thought that Wrestlemania really under-performed as what was supposed to be the most important and exciting wrestling show of the year. New Japan, on the other hand, did not under-perform and if anything exceeded my expectations of what the show would be. It was awesome, and it was capped off by what is currently my match of the year, which saw Kazuchika Okada become a two-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion by defeating rival Hiroshi Tanahashi.

2) The Rock / John Cena (tie): Even though I found Wrestlemania a bit bland, these two still do deserve some credit for headlining what will go down as the biggest money making card in pro wrestling history.
3) Mark Henry: The biggest surprise win of Wrestlemania for me was probably Henry going over the Ryback, essentially clean in the middle of the ring. I saw it as a nice way to reward Henry’s years of loyalty to the company (and to hopefully end the failed Ryback experiment).
4) Cheerleader Melissa
5) Prince Devitt

Jack McGee
1) Jay Briscoe
Since day one he has been with ROH, and was always a challenger as a single, but never the champion. I got quite the surprise this past weekend as Jay Briscoe went from “just filling a spot” to winning their title and ending the long run of Kevin Steen. The best part is that they made it feel like a very special moment, one that their fans will not forget, and that is awesome.

2) John Cena: Your NEW WWE Champion, winning the main event of WrestleMania.
3) Kazuchika Okada: Your NEW IWPG Heavyweight Champion.
4) The Undertaker
5) The Shield

TJ Hawke
1) Kazuchika Okada
RAINMAKERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! Seriously though, this dude is one of the ten best in the world, and NJPW absolutely should be making him the guy in their promotion for years to come. Congrats to the new IWGP Heavyweight Champion.

2) Jay Briscoe: I’m probably being a little bit biased since I was in the building, but Jay winning the ROH World Title was the most emotional moment of the weekend.
3) The Undertaker/CM Punk: They saved the biggest wrestling show of the year.
4) CIMA
5) AR Fox/Cheerleader Melissa

Jeremy Thomas
1) John Cena
Won the WWE Title in the main event of WrestleMania against the Rock. Many have said that there’s no higher that Cena can go in his career but if there was such a possibility, this would be it.

2) Fandango: I know people were somewhat under whelmed with the match, but the fact remains that Cena beat a former World/WWE champion in his first official WWE match on WrestleMania. That’s huge.
3) Kazuchika Okada: Won the IWGP Heavyweight at New Japan’s show, becoming a two-time champion.
4) Jay Briscoe/AR Fox (tie)
5) Cheerleader Melissa

THE WINNERS~!

Year-End Rankings Key:

WWE, Raw, SmackDown and NXT-Contracted Wrestlers are represented in BLUE.

TNA Contracted Wrestlers are represented in GREEN.

ROH Contracted Wrestlers are represented in RED.

US Independent Wrestlers are represented in MAROON.

Japanese Contracted Wrestlers are represented in BLACK.

Mexican Contracted Wrestlers are represented in MAGENTA.

Other International Wrestlers are represented in INDIGO.

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**PREVIOUS WINNERS** Year One Winner: Ric Flair Year Two Winner: Samoa Joe Year Three Winner: John Cena Year Four Winner: Chris Jericho Year Five Winner: CM Punk Year Six Winner: The Miz Year Seven Winner: CM Punk Year Eight Winner: CM Punk

Come back next week as we enter year nine of the 411 Wrestler of the Week column!