I don't know what to make of any claim being outlandish anymore.. 3k Ethereum isn't even the highest I've heard and some people that you talk to have no idea why. That being said, I do like Vitalik Buterin's mind and the increased funding toward solving Ethereum's scalability issues. It seems like once a week there is positive news coming out of the Ethereum camp. I think that moving through 2018 it will be important for Ethereum developers to continue to solve problems and push out dApps for users to use. The more dApps that are useful, user-friendly, and efficient the more Ethereum's market share will grow.

The alts that you mentioned are interesting to watch as well and I'm in no way putting them down by focusing on Ethereum; I honestly don't know much about the ones i've listed.