doctorWrestling

The American Wrestling League will have their first event tomorrow evening on trackwrestling. It is $15 to watch the event if you don't have a gold membership I believe ( correct me if I am wrong please ). As much as I would love to see a pro league of some sort in the US, I am concerned people won't pay to watch it and it will die like the others. I will do it just to try to support the cause but I really wish it were on flowrestling with the subscription instead. I think I heard 4-6 events a year which will add up at $15 each. I am not sure what the gold membership costs on trackwrestling so maybe that would make it worth purchasing the gold level. With all the stupid "sports" that make it on TV now ( I can watch spikeball on demand ), I would have hoped that a TV contract could have been made to pay the athletes.

If you are really willing to put a little time into it, the Attack Style Wrestling podcast with Daryl Webber did a really good job of talking about strength training for wrestling. He did a 3 part podcast series on it that was really good. I found the second podcast in the series, but do a little searching and you can find the others. I remember Weber ( NCAA champ at Iowa ) saying during the season he did very heavy lifts in sets of 1 to 3 to keep his explosiveness. His guest is or was the strength coach for Rutgers - Even Esh. https://www.mattalkonline.com/podcast/attack-style-wrestling/asw31-part-2-strength-training-for-wrestling-with-zach-even-esh/

I just thought I would mention that you should extremely careful with cutting weight and using creatine. I have heard it referenced every time when people discuss the 3 deaths that occurred in college in 1997 with wrestlers dehydrating while using creatine. I cannot say it was the reason for the deaths, but I believe all 3 wrestlers were using it. I personally would not let my son take it ever but that's just my opinion. I am sure there are articles that say it is safe if you want to find them. I just believe a healthy diet, maybe a multi-vitamin, and protein if you insist are probably more than enough. I a lso should add that I am not a medical doctor, I just have just awarded myself a doctorate in wrestling for the years I have spent studying it. https://www.nytimes.com/1997/12/19/sports/wrestling-collegiate-wrestling-deaths-raise-fears-about-training.html

I think it is getting a lot better. If there are only a few doing it, that is better than it was back in the dark ages. I would agree that coaches should be held accountable if it is extreme, but not sure a new parent understands that 3-5 lbs is not horrible so you may have to trust your coach. Hopefully you have a good coach. In a perfect world, kids would not make themselves miserable and coach's wouldn't ask them to / tell them not to. I wouldn't have a problem with a parent saying they are concerned even if it wasn't their kid they were concerned about. Cutting weight is the worst part of our great sport and the number one excuse parents don't want their kids to try wrestling. Encouraging kids, like XCard said above, to feel good at all practices and show up at competitions able to perform at their best possible level is the real solution. I hope that some day mat side weigh-ins or not having set weight classes and grouping by nearest weight ( there is a name for this, but it escapes me) are implemented at a youth level when the focus should be on learning and getting better instead of wins and losses.

It would do wonders for the area to have a D1 program available. Especially if the staff and wrestlers were available for camps or instruction at ISWA RTC's. Michigan for example offers training through their Olympic level RTC for youth who qualify. I actually don't know where the nearest D2 or D3 program is to South Bend - probably Manchester which isn't exactly close. I know it will probably never happen, but there is a real need in the area for that level of instruction and opportunity. With more programs adopting women's wrestling when starting their programs it seems money and effort are all that are missing and they have the money. I wouldn't care if they got every kid from NJ if it benefited the kids in the area.

You think they will ever be financially stable enough to field a wrestling team?

I was saddened to see that Micic had to drop out of the world championships due to injury. Hopefully it doesn't keep him from any college matches.

Are you literally looking for someone from Indiana who qualifies to wrestle for a country that would be at Euros and could place top 3?

Can we get a review? Do they run narrow or wide? Hopefully not the next cage fighter shoes.

There are a lot of great points on here, but the one thing wrestling still has going for it is that kids do value a high school state championship and your best kids in the state are participating in the high school programs. Maybe soccer is a better comparison than gymnastics and what you should fear. From what I hear and see, HS soccer kids value and believe their club teams are much more important than their high school teams and they don't play for their school. That takes the best kids out of the high school programs and the level of competition at the high school is not close to what they get in the club. While the best kids in HS wrestling know they will need to compete at a national level for a scholarship opportunity, so far there are not in season opportunities for kids to go wrestle all over the state against better kids during the HS season. Are some super top level kids skipping their senior year to go the OTC or go their college's RTC, yeah. So far it is a very small number which is a good thing. I think what would make me even sadder about schools dropping teams would be the loss of a chance to help kids. The older I get, I worry much less about winning a team state and much more about just getting participation up so you can get more kids involved and give them good role models, reasons to study, reasons to want to go to college, experiences with their teammates they won't get in other sports, camps, etc. Basically life lessons and a chance to help them. A small kid just is not going to get that in football at a lot of schools for example. Every other sport has become so political, where I live at least, that it seems that wrestling offers these kids a chance to earn a spot and participate where they can't fit in otherwise. I hope that other coaches would stick with smaller programs for this reason even though it is discouraging to lose good kids to other programs sometimes. While it is very difficult to find a D1 starter to come back and coach your local HS, I am encouraged by the young D3 and D2 coaches that seem to be much more available than they were 30 years ago. Manchester has turned out a lot of good coaches for example. Wabash has turned into a power house. While these guys may not have placed at the US Open, they are more than capable to coach a kid to a HS state championship and ( while young anyway ) offer some great partners for your kids. I don't even dream of finding a D1 coach in a rural area but there are D3 guys out there if you are lucky enough to get one.

- I really hope you are not a parent, surely you can't be. Actually, hopefully not a coach either.

Former Ohio State wrester Michael Rodriguez was on last week's "The Inside Trip" podcast and discussed his time there. He was one of the wrestlers who was interviewed for the NY Times article. I am not 100% done listening to it, but nearly done. It is definitely worth listening to if you are interested in this discussion. While it is hard to believe what was going on there, it is very easy to believe once you hear him explain the situation that existed at that time and how 18 year old kids just don't know it isn't normal. I think its safe to say he didn't like that it was turned into a way to attack Jordan even though he said he strongly disagrees with Jordan's politics. I am sure everyone can hear what they want to hear, but that's what I took from it. Hopefully kids are more aware of predators at universities now a days.

That's fine, just something to think about. Div 2 in Michigan isn't bad. Not saying he is better or worse than Manzona. Just saying I think he is worth the consideration. 1 loss in 2 state tournaments isn't bad.

Manzona's accomplishments are above, but Riley Bettich is a two time finalist, a state champ, and two years left. I think Manzona probably has better national accomplishments, but if you are just looking at credentials I think he is in the discussion for biggest transfer this year.

Absolutely. Just think we need to keep our minds open to considering other moves just for fun. I am sure more are coming and not all schools have started.

I Lets just say hypothetically, would you consider a state champion transferring in a bigger move since Manzona is leaving without a title? Or do you look at it from a national results perspective?

You could assume that, but if you read the article Coleman says "This has absorbed my life. Since I've said that, it's consumed me 24 hours a day, and I didn't like the way it was heading, the direction it was heading." To me, that doesn't sound like someone got to him. That sounds like he knows he messed up when he made the first statement and he knew it. I think you either believe Coleman or you don't. I can't see believing his first statement but not this one because Helickson texted a convicted felon to see if they wanted to clarify their statement.

Someone's conscious has been bothering them. https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/09/us/coleman-interview-jim-jordan-ohio-state-abuse/index.html

Jordan and his team of people digging up dirt on Yetts were probably behind this to take the heat off him. Stay woke. https://www.projectveritas.com/2018/08/02/an-unfair-game-urban-meyer-a-history-of-abuse/

While I agree it is easy to make it look bad and the media seems to have chosen to run with that full steam, I would like to think Hellickson knows these 2 better than almost anyone and is encouraging them to quit lying. For Yetts to say he dug up stuff on him to attack his character is laugh out loud funny. Its not like everyone didn't know he was in prison and Jordan hired a team to find it. I can't believe this story has legs in the first place. It has been so over the top with the focus on Jordan that it blows my mind. Even if he weren't fully honest about knowing, in today's environment of politics and the stuff politicians have done and gotten away with this seems like the smallest of small in comparison. I am not saying what he did is right or even wrong, I don't know what he knows. All I am saying the effort to blame him for more than saying he didn't know is mind blowing.

Just a joke. I can't stand listening to them whine about everything. I am sure it was interesting, just having some fun at the expense of a podcast that a lot of people listen to but I can't stomach. It would be great if more people were informed. Do you have any other shows that might cover the topic?

- you just lost all your credibility, we know that isn't true.

Good to see that this whole thing is totally legit and not political at all. I am sure they are greatly, greatly concerned about Jim Jordan being a horrible person. The Ethics Watchdog Going After Jim Jordan Helped Kill The Sex-Abuse Case Against Kevin Johnson https://deadspin.com/the-ethics-watchdog-going-after-jim-jordan-helped-kill-1827554693

There is no way he faces legal ramifications. This is just about him saying he didn't know about it and being a high ranking Congressman, period. Nobody thinks he helped the guy do it or covered for him. He was asked about it and he said he didn't know about it and that's what its all about. The fact that it sounds like there were 12 other head coaches who would be above him involved and that Hellickson asked the admin to get the doctor out of there would surely absolve Jordan here. This is other wrestlers speculating that he had to know and feeding his political enemies. There is no justice that can be served other than the administration at the time possibly being punished. The fact that Jordan is the headline here is messed up. By the way, I don't like my forum name much anymore.