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#3 Samoa Joe
In a year where WWE has struggled to protect many of their new stars, Samoa Joe’s ever-growing reputation as one of the company’s most aggressive heels has most definitely remained intact.
“The Samoan Submission Machine” is one of the few believable characters in modern-day WWE and, despite losing clean to Brock Lesnar at Great Balls of Fire, he has still had one of the best first 12 months on the main roster out of any recent NXT call-ups.
The only major disappointment from Joe’s year was his absence from WrestleMania 33 – a card he didn’t feature on, not even on the kickoff show Battle Royal, despite debuting on Raw in January.
After such a strong 2017, the former NXT champion deserves a featured match at WrestleMania – an event he has never competed at – and a huge victory over the returning Goldberg would go a long way to legitimising Joe as a present and future star.
