Levan Saginashvili has a strange problem for a man who keeps winning. Every challenger now arrives with a ghost army attached.
Vitaly brings the lever. Ermes brings the back pressure memory. Devon brings the hand games and the annoying survival instinct. Kamil brings the press threat that makes defensive pullers sit up straighter.
Fans have stopped asking for one man. They want a composite monster.
The Fantasy Champion Killer
The perfect Levan opponent exists mostly in comment sections. Give him Vitaly’s length, Ermes’ ability to make Levan work late, Devon’s table IQ, and Kamil’s flop press. Then maybe add Denis Cyplenkov’s forearm for nostalgia and poor taste.
That fantasy says more about Levan than it says about the field. One normal elite trait feels too small against him. A great hand alone gets contained. A great hit alone gets absorbed. A press alone gets denied if Levan owns the height first.
This is why the Devon-Levan debate keeps looping even after two clear losses. Devon supplies the brain part of the imaginary solution.
Each Contender Owns One Useful Piece
Vitaly’s appeal survived his right-hand loss to Devon because his body gives Levan a different geometry. That 2019 first-round stop still lives rent free in the sport’s memory. Long levers make people dream.
Ermes gave Levan the most uncomfortable optics of the modern reign. The caution matters. Those late rounds came after the match had moved beyond the live result, but the image stuck because Levan looked human for a minute.
Devon has the strongest recent ranking argument after beating Vitaly. Kamil has the style nobody wants to deal with when open-arm defense becomes too comfortable.
Each piece is real. The complete creature remains imaginary.
Levan Forces Better Thinking
Dominant champions can make a sport boring when the field gives up. Levan has done something more useful. He has forced everyone to become a theorist.
People talk about riser survival now. They talk about whether a stop matters if the champion can press through it. They talk about schedule, bodyweight, straps, and whether Devon’s kind of strength can ever scale high enough.
That is the hidden value of a reign like this. Levan turns challengers into arguments. The field keeps failing, then returns with a better excuse to believe.
One day someone may bring enough pieces in one body. Until then, Levan keeps beating men and fighting myths.
I was born in the 1980s, so like a lot of fans, Over the Top was my first introduction to pro arm wrestling. Years later, Devon Larratt’s YouTube channel pulled me back in, and I’ve been hooked ever since. Rewatching classic matches, following the modern supermatch hype, and keeping up with the personalities, rivalries, and culture that make arm wrestling so addictive.