doctorWrestling

It didn't seem like it was raining there. I couldn't figure out how they were so slippery. I only caught the end and I know J'den Cox wrestled there but they couldn't have just made the mats that way right? Had to be moisture in the air or something?

It may actually be a money maker for the Michigan RTC. According to the Real Sports episode they did about the OTC in Colorado, more foreign athletes train there than American athletes and they charge the other countries to train there. Maybe Michigan RTC gets money from Serbia for having him in their program. Doesn't matter to me who he competes for, I love watching him wrestle and will be pulling for him. One of my absolute favorites to watch.

It appears Micic isn't entered. I think I have seen where he can wrestle for another another country. Anyone know if that is what he intends to do this year?

Indiana has excellent coverage of their events on trackwrestling I have been told. From a person who is outside of Indiana, I think they both serve a purpose. Grandma wants to watch her grandson wrestle in a tournament - trackwrestling is made for that. Low cost equipment, camera may or may not work, and if camera does work you aren't going be able to see most of the mat anyway ( again outside Indiana ). You don't have to travel to see someone you know wrestle. There's also a pretty good chance you will get your money back because you can prove you didn't get to see half the matches ( outside Indiana ). College level and beyond event with great production quality is Flo all day. If you are really a fan of watching that level, you would cancel Netflix, premium cable channels, or any other service to afford it. I know I would.

How long until IndianaMat has their own podcast?

Reason #7. The Michigan coverage is lacking. Very biased toward Indiana.

Not disagreeing with you Fabio, but who needs to care and in what ways? Are you just saying the AD needs to care enough to get a better coaching staff? They already wrestle in the best conference and don't seem to be at any disadvantage with scholarships or travel budget. I am unclear if the new facility is for practicing or just competitions, but to me the missing piece is a better coach.

The Lock Haven coach is someone who came to my mind. Young guy. Big improvement and results at a smaller school. You would think IU would be seen as a step up for him. I don't agree its just on the kids or the conference. I am not saying they should win Big 10s. I do think they could do a lot better though and I think it has gone on too long with results I think of as under performing.

I think this has come up in previous years, but don't you think its time for IU to make a change? Other Big Ten schools have made changes recently, even Michigan State finally got a new coach last year. Purdue is noticeably better after their change. Goldman has been there 25 years. It doesn't seem like they are in better shape or even headed in a better direction. Surely there would be a young coach out there ready to take on the challenge to make them competitive in the conference. I think top half of the conference would be a big improvement. Humphrey and McFarland had success before him. I think the right coach could get it done.

With today's technology and how travel teams are built, its too bad that you couldn't have a pool of JV kids available to borrow from other teams that border your school to fill holes in your line-up. Even if you didn't get to count the points for your team's dual score, you help JV kids get matches and help the other team not get forfeits. The kids might even make some friends nearby they could continue to train with in the off season. Would probably open up issues with teams recruiting but just an idea that may be worth exploring some day.

Seems like scheduling all duals so that there are 4 teams ( so 2 duals for each team ) would take care of most of the problems. If a kid is making weight, they want to wrestle. That would double their chances of getting at least one match. I think the proposals to condense weights are asking for more problems in the future.

Yes, each of the 4 divisions had 5 mats. Not sure why they chose that number. There was room for more if they wanted. Made it hard to watch other divisions, especially before the finals when they brought 4 mats together and ran all divisions at the same time. Even then, a human can really only watch and pay attention to 1 match at a time.

I know you were all dying for an update. I thought it went pretty well with the 20 mats on Ford Field for the Michigan state finals. Started wrestling at noon on Friday and started the finals at 3 on Saturday. It is impossible to match Indiana's pageantry which is what this thread asked, but to finish up the tournament WITH WRESTLE BACKS that fast was still a lot of fun. Any state with multiple classes in one location is going to make you really feel like you are missing something that is going on. I would be super bummed if I had a kid lose 1 match on Friday night and be out though.

I have used Addix and Compound. I prefer Compound. I think it is better quality and personally think better designers. The shorts I ordered from them this year are shorter than the Addix I ordered a couple years ago, but that may have been to meet the uniform requirements for competition. They are good for matches and the kids wear them around for warming up so I don't think they are too short.

Watch what you say on here about trackwrestling. Indiana has great trackwrestling experiences. It is probably because you were in Arizona. Michigan's is not very good either.

Michigan moved their state finals to Ford Field this year which I think is a pretty neat idea ( March 2nd and 3rd ). They increased the number of mats so that even with 4 DIVISIONS and WRESTLE BACKS, they will start the first round on Friday at noon and start the finals on Saturday at 3PM. This was a 3 day tournament in the past. The morning rounds on Saturday are scheduled 1 hour apart so it will move super fast. I am curious to see how they lay out the mats. I think they could do it all the way around so each mat is close to the seating. It won't be like Indiana's but I think they could do a good job with it and hope they stick with the 2 day format going forward. I wonder if Indiana would consider this type of format and use the RCA Dome if it allowed for wrestle backs.

Now that makes sense in a lot of ways really. I believe it would also discourage weight cutting. I wish there were more concern about discouraging weight cutting on this national survey. Michigan goes all season with day before weigh-ins for example. Kids don't make a weight on the day they wrestle until conference or districts. To me, this is just begging kids to cut more weight and eat all they want the night before.

This is directed at the questions, not the explanation of the questions. I can't believe this is what they came up with.

Is it just me, or do some of those questions make absolutely no sense. Why in the world would any want different weights for sub-varsity wrestling or want different weights for duals than individual tournaments?

I was wondering how this actually turned out for Y2CJ41. I honestly don't know so not trying to be a smart aleck. Just wondered if it actually happened like you were worried it would or if it was not an issue.

Young kids (elementary) should definitely be playing 2,3, even 4 sports if they want to. Play for the season and then move on to another if they want to try another, or extend one if they are only interested in 2 sports maybe just to keep them active. There are some sports that are better than others to pair up with wrestling. Football is usually not going to have much going on when it is not in season. It is a great mental break and physically different so you don't get injured from repetition when you turn off wrestling and turn on football for a few months. Travel baseball is a nightmare in my opinion. They start practicing in December or January and play through August. There are high costs so the parents feel they must do it all. Plus the kid's whole summer is spent competing instead of playing and being a kid. I think you can still strike a balance if the kid ends up in football and wrestling. Wrestle and compete during the season. Take some time off after the season. Find a club or an RTC to go to maybe 2 or 3 days a week in the summer. Maybe wrestle one or two summer touranments. Play little league or Cal Ripken even for fun if you want, just not full blown travel ball. When football starts, be 100% football and take a mental break. I think a kid who does that has a chance to compete for a state championship if they have some talent, work hard, have a good coach and partners. Anyone who wants a state championship are going to need those things. Put yourself in a position to have a good chance and then show up, do your best, and see what happens. From what I have seen, kids who start wrestling at 6 or 7 years old do have an advantage heading into middle school. But 3 years in middle school with a good coach and maybe some summer wrestling for a kid with physical talents makes it very possible to make up that gap on the more experienced kids. I really don't care anymore if a kid has any experience before middle school, I just see it as a challenge to prepare them for high school and I enjoy seeing the huge improvements. Plus they don't have bad habits to break or believe they can headlock or bulldog to win every match - its hard to convince kids those things aren't going to work when they win with it for years. I think kids expect too much as a freshman and make bad choices for a career based on what they do when they are at a physical disadvantage against more mature kids. I am trying to stress that their success will most like come as a junior or senior and you have to pay your dues to get there - take the lumps and it will pay off.

How about considering what gets the most kids to participate in the sport? I would think eliminating weight classes would ultimately result in less participation - like a 95 lb freshman not seeing a good path to getting to compete if the first class is 113. If we want the sport to become more than it is today, we need more people to at least try the sport. This gets more family and friends actually seeing a high school or middle school match and increases your chance of recruiting / getting more kids to try it. It may not even be this generation that pays off. I am taking a long term approach. I figure if I get some kid to even wrestle a year or two in middle school, their kids will be much more likely to try it. Every father or uncle who wrestled in middle school was a state champion according to their kids.

I think the data should include how many state champions, regional champions, and sectional champions wore shorts vs singlets. If there are more that wore singlets, clearly they are the tougher kids and the others should be ran off - you are wasting your time with kids who aren't champions. Winning is all that matters. We have way too many of these kids in our sport who are more comfortable wearing shorts and shirts than a bathing suit from the 1890s. We try to end the season with only the necessary kids so we have 1 in each weight class.

Look at this idiot. Wore shorts over a singlet and tights? I wish his coach had called him a whimp for not just wearing a singlet and ran him out of the sport.

Compound's fight shorts are a little shorter and fit better (stretch material incorporated) than the other fight shorts I have seen. I still think singlets will eventually be a thing of the past and I think it will be for the better. Nobody would wear a singlet for any reason other than wrestling. Eventually I think kids will ask "why would I do that when I can wear shorts and shirt"? Most of our bigger kids wear the shorts and shirts because it hides everything better.