Which competitor do you think had the most wasted potential?

[darthvaderlim]

Which Sasuke competitor do you think had a lot of potential but never get to show it due to injury, making mistakes early on the course, etc. ?
1- Akiyama, this one is kinda obvious, since he had good upper body strength, but his eyesight has constantly hindered him on Stage One.
2-Nagasaki, I think if he competed more often during Shin-Sasuke, he could have been a strong contender for Total Victory.
3-Kenji Takahashi, this one is also quite interesting, since if he competed during the All-Stars era more often, he could have made a few Final Stage appearances, as the course wasn't that hard at the time.
4-Ryo, pretty obvious, but I think if he trains more often like Yusuke, he could have achieved Kanzen by now.
5-Takeda, you should know this by now.

[m4tt3r0x]

Shingo could had made it into the second half of Shin Sasuke’s Stage 3 often. He beats slightly easier Crazy Cliffhanger renditions at his gym at age 46 now. He could had made the final by the time 24 ran around. He’s a classic mental case competitor.

Kanno some might say but I think he was too young to win Shin Sasuke and too heavy to ever beat the VL after 27. 25-27 he wasn’t trained enough for the UCH but I think had he trained like he did from 28-33 then he could have won then.

[tns8597]

I don't think Shingo would've made the Final in 24 given that he hadn't even made it more than halfway past the older, much easier Stage 3 in years. There's also a massive difference between doing an obstacle in practice and doing it in competition. Even now where competitors literally train on entire stage replicas, they'll still fail the same obstacle due to fatigue, pressure, a simple mistake etc. Also, Shingo can only do the Crazy Cliffhanger jump because he trained for it as a function of its existence; what I mean by this is that his ability to do the Crazy Cliffhanger jump isn't anything to go by when considering his ability to do well in a much easier Stage 3, because his training back then would've been on much easier obstacles like the normal Cliffhanger and Body Prop, which for the record he still failed miserably on in competition despite training for.
I think he would've gone out on the Shin-Cliffhanger in 23, and possibly even 24 as well; he certainly wouldn't have made it farther than Takeda did given that Takeda consistently went farther than Shingo did from Sasuke 12-24, with the only exception of Sasuke 22.

Back to the wasted potential. Mine are:
- Shinya Kishimoto
- Keitaro Yamamoto
- Ryo
- Shinji Kobayashi
The similarity between all of these competitors is that all are serious threats to Kanzenseiha based on their Stage 3 and Stage 4 abilities, but for one reason or another they've not been able to display that level of success because they don't get there enough or even at all, and their runs have been riddled by silly mistakes. Kishimoto was a real threat in Sasuke 30 but has always had serious troubles with Stage 1 such as failing the first obstacle twice, Ryo basically gave up after being robbed of Kanzen by Morimoto, Keitaro has completed Stage 3 in practice and has the speed for Stage 4 but constantly chokes on Stage 2, and Shinji's Kanzen-level speed and upper body strength are shrouded by several mental and physical errors that choked him on most of his runs (one of his Pipe Slider swings in Sasuke 11 would've likely allowed him to reach the platform, but he just didn't let go).

[subtleagent]

Naoya Tajima definitely comes to mind. We'd have had 6 finalists easy in 24 if he didn't f*** up the Gliding Ring. He never quite hit that mark again sadly.

With Akiyama I think more than his eyesight contributed to his lack of success. He'd often gas out at the wall which shows his endurance wasn't quite as strong as it was after he achieved Kanzenseiha. I also think much like Nagano and Yamada his legs just sort of gave out, he could never quite get that pump up the wall especially in Shin-SASUKE. Not to mention after 12 he didn't train as much as he used to and by SASUKE Rising you could tell he was just ready to hang it all up.

[GlobalNinjaFan]

There are soooo many, but here are some of the biggest I can think of.

Kazuhiko Akiyama - pretty self explanatory given his eye condition. Was a strong competitor but wasted so many runs because of co-ordination related mistakes. Would've been a Total Victory contender in Nagano's era otherwise.

Katsumi Yamada - the ultimate example of mental mistakes. Wasted several runs in his prime because of dumb mental mistakes (Sasuke 8, Sasuke 12 and his break from Sasuke 13 being key examples). From there, even as his chances of clearing Stage 1 began to decline, he arguably could've cleared Stage 1 multiple times if not for silly mistakes. Also, his arrogance arguably costed him a total victory in Sasuke 3 (not using his feet from the get-go).

Bunpei Shiratori - Easily a Kongu/Shunsuke/Takeda level contender, but his back issues retired him nearly as soon as his All-Star career began.

Kouji Hashimoto - Left the show in the Rising Era, but would've easily been a Stage 4 contender otherwise.

David Campbell - Came so close to clearing the Ultimate Cliffhanger in Sasuke 27, and given the relatively easy back half of Stage 3, he could've realistically made the Final Stage. From there, he never got to compete in Sasuke again, despite ANW competitors these days eating Ultimate Cliffhangers for breakfast.

Ragivaru Anastase - Incredibly strong and powerful right out of the gate, and was becoming a mainstay after just 3-4 tournaments. Unfortunately, his career on Sasuke got artificially cut short when he competed on KuroOvi, which somehow forbade him from returning due to TV show politics BS.

Yamamoto Hiroshige - Was the first Black Tiger to do well and clear Stage 1, and looked to only be getting stronger as time progressed. Unfortunately, due to the controversy surrounding another Black Tiger, the team got completely reset by production and he hasn't competed since. The Black Tigers today are more successful than ever, and it's such a shame that their old-leader doesn't get to be a part of that, essentially being taken out as collateral damage.

[PsychoDelusion]

Jan 3, 2021 16:12:32 GMT -5 GlobalNinjaFan said:

There are soooo many, but here are some of the biggest I can think of.

Kazuhiko Akiyama - pretty self explanatory given his eye condition. Was a strong competitor but wasted so many runs because of co-ordination related mistakes. Would've been a Total Victory contender in Nagano's era otherwise.

Katsumi Yamada - the ultimate example of mental mistakes. Wasted several runs in his prime because of dumb mental mistakes (Sasuke 8, Sasuke 12 and his break from Sasuke 13 being key examples). From there, even as his chances of clearing Stage 1 began to decline, he arguably could've cleared Stage 1 multiple times if not for silly mistakes. Also, his arrogance arguably costed him a total victory in Sasuke 3 (not using his feet from the get-go).

Bunpei Shiratori - Easily a Kongu/Shunsuke/Takeda level contender, but his back issues retired him nearly as soon as his All-Star career began.

Kouji Hashimoto - Left the show in the Rising Era, but would've easily been a Stage 4 contender otherwise.

David Campbell - Came so close to clearing the Ultimate Cliffhanger in Sasuke 27, and given the relatively easy back half of Stage 3, he could've realistically made the Final Stage. From there, he never got to compete in Sasuke again, despite ANW competitors these days eating Ultimate Cliffhangers for breakfast.

Ragivaru Anastase - Incredibly strong and powerful right out of the gate, and was becoming a mainstay after just 3-4 tournaments. Unfortunately, his career on Sasuke got artificially cut short when he competed on KuroOvi, which somehow forbade him from returning due to TV show politics BS.

Yamamoto Hiroshige - Was the first Black Tiger to do well and clear Stage 1, and looked to only be getting stronger as time progressed. Unfortunately, due to the controversy surrounding another Black Tiger, the team got completely reset by production and he hasn't competed since. The Black Tigers today are more successful than ever, and it's such a shame that their old-leader doesn't get to be a part of that, essentially being taken out as collateral damage.

I agree with your picks, except Anastase. While he was a Stage 1 & 2 monster, he was simply too massive for the Cliffhanger. Don't think he could ever get past that so I believe he fulfilled his potential.

Some names I'd throw here would be:

Travis Allen Schroeder (if it wasn't for the Pipe Slider, given his explosive energy, you could make a case for him achieving Total Victory)

Takuya Kawahara (his body could carry him deep into Stage 3 but Stage 1 would always peak out in Stage 1. Also seemed to do well in the worst Stage 1 layouts so that's a bonus)

And a very unpopular opinion but it's worth to be discussed:

Nagano. One Kanzenseiha is more than enough and he'll always be a legend and my favorite ever competitor but I feel that, even with his record, he underachieved. 3 near misses in Final Stage, only 1 Kanzenseiha in 5 appearances (Yuuji has 2/3, Akiyama has 1/1, Morimoto has 2/4), wasted tournaments like SASUKE 24 and the mental block that ensued. Nagano could have easily been a 2-3 time Grand Champion but it wasn't meant to be.

[tns8597]

While I agree r/e the Anastase comment, I did notice he did get a fair bit bulkier and bigger comparing Sasuke 34 and his debut run in 31.

Maybe he just didn’t train enough, which is why his first run was arguably his most impressive despite the fact that he didn’t train for Sasuke at that point. His extra weight is what caused him to fail on the first ledge in Sasuke 34 (if you see his dancing videos now you’ll notice he looks a bit out of shape compared to his first run).

[m4tt3r0x]

I still stand by my Shingo comment. I was saying had he trained during Shin Sasuke like he started to in recent years he could had excelled. That goes for most competitors because people operate at low capacities when they actually have the potential for so much more when the bar is low. And on top of that I think Shingo in many ways is better suited upper body wise than Takeda. He's got better endurance and power on the Salmon Ladder as we saw in 25 and 30. I think Shingo largely suffered on the Body Prop and Cliffhanger from his shoulder. On top of that Shin Sasuke's Stage 3 became easier than Sasuke 17's Stage 3 imo. I don't think it was that hard. Takeda failed 3 times because his endurance was lackluster.

Yes I'm advocating that Shingo should had trained more than he knew he was capable of, but the thread is about missed potential. His shoulder also contributes to that.

[tns8597]

m4tt3r0x I get what you're saying but the fact of the matter is that he didn't and neither did anyone else based on the bar that was set at the time, so by that regard there's no way he would've made the Final. 'Natural' potential can easily be overcome by training for a lot of people so the same applies to all of the other competitors as well.

Also, r/e the Shingo vs Takeda comment, it depends what time period you're talking about. We're all well aware that Takeda's post-hiatus performances have never been that great while Shingo did quite well in 29 and 30, while Shingo was top dog in early competitions prior to his shoulder dislocation.

However, during both the main All-Star era AND Shin-Sasuke, Takeda's performances were way better than Shingo's. He was faster, more consistent, and just went further on Stage 3 than Shingo had for years. Especially Shin-Sasuke showed Takeda's much higher resilience to difficulty increases, where despite the Stage 1 being perhaps the hardest its ever been, Takeda still managed to run along with the much younger Shin Sedai. By comparison, Shingo was already regressing on Stage 3, then failed Stage 1 on Shin-Sasuke in 6/7 tournaments.

Back to the matter in hand though: I think both had a lot of wasted potential, Shingo due to his injuries, and Takeda also due to his injuries but additionally how we knew that a Stage 3 clear was pretty much an automatic pass for a Kanzenseiha given his firefighter background. A 13 for 13 loss against Stage 3 is just painful to think about. Shingo's runs have also been riddled by stupid mistakes; he could've made Stage 3 in SASUKE 25, though I'm not saying this is much of a wasted potential given that this arguably represented the most brutal Stage 3 renewal in history and he would've probably gone out early like everyone else.

[m4tt3r0x]

People did exceed the necessary training required or what was thought possible at that time though. That's why the Unlimited Cliffers became so prominent. They were doing insane moves in training which inspired the UCH later on. The reason I see as to why they did go beyond natural potential was because of their youth and love of the sport. We knew All Stars like Nagano and Takeda were losing heart with Sasuke starting in the Shin era, as Takeda almost retired before 18 and Nagano lost his passion around 24. But that doesn't negate the fact that those same All Stars in their mid 30s couldn't have done the same. Look at what Yuuji does at 42. I think now that they're in their 40s they regret that wasted time.

I also never would say Shingo has ever been pound for pound above Takeda's match on Stage 1. Takeda's more consistent and arguably faster especially pre Shin Sasuke, but Shingo has always had better power imo (see Rolling Hill in 31 and Warped Wall attempts in 2020 training videos) and often times had better upper and lower body endurance post 17 (save for Sasuke 24)--Takeda always cleared Stage 1 in the red. Shingo did barely clear Stage 2 in 23 also but it was his first time tbf. Anyway my original point was most of Shingo's Shin Sasuke Stage 1 fails were laregely mental anyway.

The reason I said Shingo anyway is because he has definitely showed signs of being Takeda's upper body superior from 25 on. I think if Takeda could make Spider Flip so could had he.

[wrestlingfan55]

Akiyama for sure. His upper body was (and perhaps still is) superb, but he didn't really work on his lower body strength.

Bunpei had bad luck in Sasuke 17- who knows how far he could have gone if he didn't randomly fail the Body Prop.