Wrestling Scholar

Im speculating, but maybe Gable is at a MMA gym learning some Boxing, Brazilian JuJitsu and Muay Thai.

They had ten weight classes in 84 also. There was no womens's wrestling to offset. But 20 weight events vs 18 now.

Stevenson with late points to win Gold. Dake gets Bronze. Hildebrandt gets tough loss on a late throw, but still has shot at Bronze. Match of tournament with Snyder vs Sadulev tonight. USA with best showing ever at Olympics in wrestling (not other sports like track and field).

So these are pull through wrestlbacks, which shows that wrestlebacks are an important part of the sport. Which thus gives me an idea. We all know the wrestling community has been trying to influence the IHSAA board to implement wrestlebacks, I say we design a proposal to insert wrestleback into the IHSAA tournament, but not use the term wrestleback. Instead well use the more exotic international word "repechage". It will sound cool, and the board will be influenced by our purity and dedication to the Olympic sport and maybe influenced. You got to know how to influence people sometimes, and it comes down to the words you use.

David " the Magic Man" Taylor pulls out the gold. Beat Irans #1 world wrestler Yazdanicharati with late takedown. American wrestling has been solid.

Are you saying we didn't have a request to add wrestlebacks to the state tournament series? We should have that every year.

So how does Russia select their team? This whole weight class setup was interesting in it self. I suppose its some criteria, but why did Snyder get the better seed over Cox and get placed straight to the finals? I guess it was the prior Olympic Championship carries more weight than Cox winning the last World Championship and placing 3rd in previous Olympics. Cox has done more lately than Snyder, I suppose there's Criteria that favors Snyder.

I still think USA wrestling screwed up on this. There obviously was some form of miscommunication. I really think the smart thing to do would have the tournament director make an arbitrary exception and give J'Den a few more minutes to weigh in. Ive seen lots of times were weve had exceptions to weigh in times because a bus driver showed up late or a kid showed up a little late to a sacnticoned tournament. I dont think anybody would have complained under the circumstances. I bet Snyder was even disapointed he didn't get the chance to wrestle Cox. IMO, You look at it, of all the guys on the team and look at it P4P perspective, I think Snyder and Cox are #1 and #2. And I not sure which one is #1. The point is we should build and promote our sport. J'den Cox arguaby is the hottest and maybe best wrestler in the USA, we need this guy on the mat as he's an exciting wrestler and we wrestling really needs promotion and celebrate guys like this. Lets build this sport and try to get more TV time and viewership. We dont need to toss aside and embarass a great athlete that has dedicated his life to this sport. Wrestling almost got thrown out of the olympics, we need to be careful that might right decisions and get good PR for our guys. Sometimes you need to use judgement instead of just following the rules to the letter. The ironic thing is its an advantage to weigh in earlier so he could more time to recoup. Did J'Den Cox gain an advantage by doing this. Thats why this is a silly ruling. I think its time for Cox to go pro and do some MMA. He'd be exciting and hopefully make some money for all his had work. If he can get past getting punched in the face, I say forget the amateur stuff and go Pro.

Thats pretty substantial evidence. Always two sides to a story, but at any level, weigh in times are pretty important and most people double check and are aware. Just doesnt add up. Its very unlikely he gets some recourse out of this. One of the best things about wrestling is you control your destiny, it doesnt matter what everybody else thinks, you beat the guy, you go forward and it doesnt come down to a vote or decision of a coach. A wrestle off with Snyder would go against that concept. I suppose you could say were lucky for our qualifying process in wrestling when you compare it to USA gymnastics. Where if you make a complaint about getting molested by a Doctor on staff, then leadership in some backroom decision uses that to stop you from making the team.

Thats messed up that Cox was so close. Its sounds like the bell has been rung, and how do you unring the bell. Lets say hypothetically J'Den could prove he got the wrong times from USA wrestling, could there be some recourse? I know unlikely, but if his appeal worked, could they do something like the 2012 Beat the Streets with the Shawn Bunch vs Coleman Scott match. Maybe it was a 3 way tournament were Reese Humprey barely lost to Scott. They had it in New York after the Olympic Qualifier because Bunch and Humprey were at an Olympic Qualifier and couldn't wrestle the Trials. They could have a 2 out of 3 with Cox and Snyder and wrestle somewher cool on the streets. Maybe Snyder only needs one win and Cox has to beat Snyder twice to make it more fair. It would be a good PR for USA wrestling. I think it would be cool. Coincidentally, Just like Shawn Bunch, J'Den Cox is an African American wrestler from the Kansas City area. Also, on another perspective. Could have USA wrestling made an exception and gave Cox and extra half hour. I know it could look bad, but sometimes a in the moment compromise would have saved a lot of headaches.

Biggest surprise of the tournament. I read J'Den's coach Kevin Jackson (1992 Olympic champ) got the wrong times for the weigh ins and that created a big problem. Was this was a mistake on Jackson or if the tournament administrators screwed up. As J'Den was saying there was some missed communication. I kind of curious how that went down and if J'den was close to weight and if he had a little more time, he would have been good. Kind of a shame as he's been wrestling well and is in his peak. Not sure if he would have gotten Snyder but those are two juggernauts. This is under appeal. Does USA Wrestling or whoever oversees the US wrestling team make a decision to have a wrestle off with Snyder? This is the wrong time not to make weight, but this leaves somebody with a tough decision. I think Cox normally would have some recourse, but it hurts having Snyder win the weight class. Snyder, a returning Olympic Champion is definitely a favorite at Tokyo, leaving Cox no room to argue as an upgrade. If there was a less ranked wrestler win it, you could make the argument that USA is better with Cox. But you cant make that argument with Snyder winning. I feel bad for Kevin Jackson. Im sure he feels terrible about the situation.

Good point Uncle Jimmy, He is from Carmel. Lets give him a test to see what type of Car he drives and how much his average mixed drink cocktail costs? Then we'll know?

I would say the biggest weakness of the Indiana State tournament is that you dont truly get the best 8 due to the randomness of the draws, some guys just get lucky. Throw wrestlebacks into this format, and I think you would be closer to the top 8.

Greg, I like this idea and i think the report and presentation you made helps sell this idea. Ive actually mentioned something similar to this in prior years on the board. I called it the "Grand State" concept. I got the idea back in my home state of KS. Back in the 70s, they actually got the KSHAA to buy into this for a few years from 76-78, and they had a "Grand State" extension to their tournament. Of course Kansas implemented classes back in the early 70s, but their State tournament concept was just an individual state tournament with four classes that took two weeks. For the Grand state tournament, they took the top 4 from each class and the 1s wrestled 4s and 2s wrestled 3s and the class placers were randomly drawn into the bracket. For 3 years, KS had a single state champion or called Grand State Champion. A guy from my school ended winning it one year. Unfortunately, the Grand State tournament stopped due to a few reasons. One reason was the additional time required by the coaches as it added another week to the season. The 2nd reason was it required another two day tournament (they had wrestlebacks), and this resulted in the kids to miss another day from school as they also did in the prior week for the state tournament. And 3rd, this tournament even though held at a central location, it required travel costs and a lot schools needed hotels. One advantage of your concept that in Indiana, it doesnt really add time to the season as Indiana already has a ridiculously long state tournament. Also, this would require two weekends in a row to travel to Indianapolis for the tournament, which is a centralized location, but still would require more travel funds for most schools which seems a small price to pay. And also again, it would require to miss another day of school for the wrestlers, which is IMO is not a big deal, but the IHSAA is an organization strongly against missing school and would be a possible road block. I think a good idea and might some tweaks and compromise, but the cool idea would be that Indiana wrestling could have its cake and eat it to.

If you look at some posts earlier in the thread, it was established on reliable data that California wrestling participation has been seeing a consistent decrease in participation.

This is the most ironic statement on the whole thread. This has become become the most complex post on the thread. Actually the simple answer, is lets have wrestle backs instead of trying to quantify how unfair it is to not have wrestlebacks.

I think its admirable what small schools like Rensalear Central, Bremen, North Posey, Garrett, Prairie Heights and others i might have had missed. Obviously there's some positive leadership there with coaches that energy and great knowledge. But on the flip side, Ive seen some small school programs be built, then the coach becomes very marketable to ADs looking for a good wrestling coach at a big school. The coach most often leaves to the bigger program. Cant blame them. A lot of times the small schools are stepping stones. I wont name names, but look at the resume's of the successful wrestling coaches and often you see they started with that small program. Then an opportunity came, and these coaches have ambition and jump on the new opportunity.

We kind of mentioned that earlier that we need to engage and corroborate with the Class Tennis, Class Golf, Class Track, Class Cross Country and the Class Swimming community to change things. I suppose the question is there really a subset of people in these communities that would be strongly interested in changing the format. I know some tennis people that arent happy with the current format and would be up for change. Does anybody know people in the Track, Golf or swimming that would change this. My thought on swimming is that most small schools dont have facilities to have a swim team, so they are affected less by the single class because they dont compete.

From my analysis of your very colorful and pretty charts, the two states with the most marked decrease are California and Indiana (both single class states). The other states with class wrestling seem more stable.

I dont think they limited at Southport last week. There were a lot of people in the stands. Probably the same this week.

Im glad to see some tennis players on the list with 4. Tennis players surprisingly make good wrestlers. My son was a tennis player and wrestler. He once mentioned in a wrestling practice that a coach was unhappy with theteams effort and criticized them that this wasn't a tennis practice. My son was pissed. Tennis players have to be intense and fit. Tennis players are some of the worlds most fit athletes and extremely mentally tough.

Are the rodeo guys really tough on top? I always figured if you ride a Bull or Bronco, that riding a guy in wrestling would be quite a bit easier. Thats awsome to see. I think to succeed in wrestling today, the wrestling coach needs an alliance with the Football coach. Looks like you guys have that.

Joe, Does New Jersey have a Prep School state championship that is seperate from their state championship? They have a lot more prep schools there . I kind of remembered something like that.

There's not a message board for the tennis. I dont know why, but the tennis parents are less combative and less likely to get on board and talk smack about how bad their kid is going to beat youre kid, and have less opinions in general. But they do have a coaches website that has all the info and is pretty good. Maybe reach out to them to see if their is interest from the head coaches. https://www.ihsteca.com/

Matty B. I dont think the academies are to blame, but maybe part of the larger problem. Im saying a big problem is "Specialization of sports". The Academies appear to be doing well and they have a high rate of participation in HS wrestling which is good. But the kids that arent wrestling any more are the good athlete footbal;, track and baseball players that used to play two or three sports but only play one now. These kids have chose to specialize in Lacrosse, baseball, football, track,CC etc and chose not to wrestle. They dont have to time to wrestle now because they're going the other sports lessons, practices and competitions. Also, on the flip side these kids are aware that that the club wrestlers are improving, and to compete against them would take more offseason work that their specialized sport will not allow. So they dont compete. Of all the reasons kids arent going out, this is the biggest. Class wrestling, video games, girls, Doritos, piano lessons, hot rod, and the a job that pays money are some other reasons.