besides medina who do you like?

Well ya, JJ is the best younin on the tour in my opinion. Whether it be his surfing, hi humble personality, or where he is from, he is the best.

 

This dude. Don't know what he's ranked and don't much care. Solid, fast, Power surfing.
http://www.surfermag.com/videos/aritz-aranburu-keramas/

Sick barrel rider and can handle Size. Check 1:24- backside snap when most would be running for their lives. Just Rad.
http://vimeo.com/89664506

 

nat is definitely my favorite of the young guys...really like the way he surfs & he seems very comfortable mixing it up w/ all the guys on the tour. i mean, he almost won his second event in his first year on tour (& some, including me, think he should've won). i think he gets overlooked a lot in the medina/jjf/kolohe hype, but that's starting to change. he's a consistent competitor, & that's really what wins titles.
i'd like to see owen wright return to his 2011 form, when he was going back & forth w/ slater trading wins for a few events. i think he ended up #2 that year.

 

Kelly (of course at the top of the list)
Kolohe Andino
Nat Young
Jordy Smith
John John

Those are the 5 guys I enjoy watching surf. They have the best style, the biggest bags of tricks and are all well rounded as far as wave size and locations. Not all of them translate into magical scoring, but I think these guys, in a free surf environment are the best ones in the game. They don't look they are about to drop a deuce at any point in their waves/heats. Style, Grace, Imagination and Power. You need all 4.

 

nat young has what it takes to win.he just needs to pick better waves but regardless hes been doing well every contest.its amazing how much he grew lol,he was the ugliest kid before his body stretched.now u cant even tell he has freckles

 

Mick
Kerzzy
Reynolds

 

anastasia ashley

 

I like Joel Parkinson's surfing but he's getting old too. The ASP without Slater is going to be worse than the NBA without Jordan.

 

My favorite surfers would be Kelly, Mason Ho, Brett Barley, Filipe Toledo, Jeremy Flores and Ramzi Boukhiam.

[video]http://player.vimeo.com/video/86693356[/video]

 

Depends so much on what wave they're surfing for me, conditions, etc....all around I really like watching Josh Kerr surf.

In that younger crowd, Nat is obviously a really polished surfer and competitor. Felipe Toledo is one of the more electric aerial dudes I've seen in a long time, and he can toss airs in anything.

I think in terms of championship aspirations, the next crew of year to year favorites (once Kelly, Mick, and Parko fade) will be Medina, JJF, and Julian Wilson. Jordy rips but I don't think he has the competitive mindset to win a title, or at least not multiple (JJF doesn't seem to have the warrior mentality either, but he's so freakishly talented in so many types of surf he'll always be a threat, like the Lebron of surfing but much less douchey). If Dane ever decided he wanted to surf contests again things could be really interesting.

 

I agree. Surfing without Kelly is like NBA without Jordan, PGA without Tiger Woods... It just, plain sucks... I had this conversation on the surfermag forum and a bunch of little am-sponsored kids argued the point. But I agree with you. Its more Kelly's household name and branding. The whole world knows him and 90% of the world loves him. He is THE REASON I would say more than half of the viewship actually tunes into these events, that typically only stream online.

This years masters in golf had the worst rating in the last 20 years. 70% of people that watched last year and the year before DIDNT TUNE IN! Not once. Last time rating were ever close to that low was when Tiger playde poorly in 2004 and didn't make the cut. Weekend ratings dropped like 80%....

The PGA and the golf world talked for MONTHS about how life will go on, how they don't need Tiger and how all this young talent is so much fun to watch. BOGUS. They were wrong. The masters sucked. Bubba played SICK golf, but no one cared. Who give a sh** how well you do if the best guy on the planet isn't even playing.....

Remember the 1994 and 1995 world Champion Houston Rockets? No? I didn't think so. Thats because they won two titles while Jordan retired and was playing baseball. Those were the sh**iest two years in modern day NBA history. Two **'s next to both of them...

It's different, cause Kelly is going to have to retire...

What happens next? The ASP will create a "Champions" tour like golf has. It will feature Old Dudes, on weird boards out having fun and competing...

I don't care about the young kids. Unless one of them re-defines surfing as we know it, or just shows to be a better talent than Slater, I will not watch the tour as much.

You have to have a Hero. Without Kelly, there are no heroes.

 

Im my favorite surfer, I love seeing me get tubed

 

An ASP Champions Tour. Now there is something I'd tune in for.

 

Ariz caught my eye recently, liking his style. Not the biggest fan of Johny boy.

 

I wont be watching contests once slater retires.i only watch a few heats per contest.i don't care for the bottom 34,only watch the heats that have slater,parko or jjf.now since the new asp webcasts rarely load on my computer I don't even get to see a heat.im lucky if theres a contest review I can see afterwards.the first few contests sucked.fiji was a disappointment,australia is rarely epic.looking forward to france and Portugal,the only 2 contests that resemble home.except for rio