Chris Joslin #2.

Champion Matador.

Now that the dust and hot takes have settled, we can evaluate Chris winning Thrasher's SOTY for 2025. I feel he picked up the honor for a career body of work, along the lines of when Anthony Van Engelen won. Add into that one amazing 360 flip with a great backstory and it's a done deal. That said, he's still an oddly surprising choice. I had the frontrunners as Antonio Durao, Greyson Fletcher, TJ Rogers, and Tom Schaar so Joslin wasn't on my short list. I figured Tom would win because of two ridiculous vert parts and knowing that Michael Burnett has a soft spot for the tamers of giant halfpipes.

Joslin has been out there hucking flip tricks down massive stairs and gaps for over a decade now in the skateboarding spotlight. He isn't somebody I keep up with. I'll watch a video part here or a contest run there and that's about the extent of it. He's great at what he does, it's not the type of skateboarding I'm into. And that's fine.

I remember when he turned pro and how popular he was with certain skaters. Joslin was also on nearly every other page of the mags back in the middle 2010s. His part in Album, the Etnies video from 2018, is a tour de force of big gaps, ledges, and handrails. He even does a couple of no-complies and 43s in the section.

I am curious about how Plan B is doing these days. I can't imagine they have the draw they once had. I think they probably do have a fan base that keeps buying the boards. I live in a poor area to do market research on what is popular, but I've seen more Hardbody decks than Plan B for whatever that is worth. I'm also curious what the average skater thinks of the new version of Lakai. My guess would be they are oblivious to all the behind the scenes ownership changes that cost the brand most of its supporters. I'm just wondering aloud about all these things since we don't have Transworld Business publishing the numbers like we used to back in the day.

The photo is by Sam McGuire.

Thrasher - August 2017 Volume 38 Number 8