Greg Ratliff
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Greg Ratliff reacted to Coach Mikesell in All-Stars Classic Duals
It was a great day at Mooresville for Indiana Wrestling. One high light for me was the amount of team members both boys and girls who came up to me and thanked me for having them on the team and how much they appreciated the opportunity to compete one more time. We really are producing some great wrestlers in our state and more importantly these kids have a lot of class and respect.
Indiana Gold boys battled hard but came up short 37-22. Winners for the gold team were;
Mason Jones
Luke Rioux
Tony Wood
Chis Bohn
Duke Myers
Indiana Blue sealed a victory for our home state 35-27. Winners were:
Gavyn Whitehead
Griffin Sanders
Carson Fettig
Michael Cain
Keegan Martin
Tyler Schott
Brady Byrd
Josiah Dedeaux
The girls beat Iowa 63-12, but came up short against Illinois 21-44
Double Winners for the girls were:
Tola Aluka
Sophia Buechner
Rose Kaplan
Leila Thomas
Winner vs Iowa were;
Tola Aluka
Sophia Buechner
Rose Kaplan
Leila Thomas
Kyra Tomlison
Alexes Spaulding
Kaylea Beauchamp
Jaiah O'Neal
Michela Clifford
Portia Weaver
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Greg Ratliff reacted to MattM in How much money do you spend on wrestling?
Been saying for a while the top of this sport, and most sports, is becoming a little less accessible to blue-collar wrestlers/families than it used to be. Affordable access to wrestling opportunities and just simply the ability to travel (since many have parents who work a lot) is becoming hard for some families to overcome. Especially when certain events and academies are not within a short drive from the location you live in.
It's awesome that some kids have the opportunity to make a major jump in their skill level. But a decent percentage of wrestlers are limited in what their family can do and really have to search for what rare options may present themselves if they want to make decent gains in their ability. Sometimes coaches have to be creative as well in order to help those kids get some type of opportunity. When the demographic of a large percentage of your team is within that socio-economic situation, obviously finding enough avenues to help them becomes a little more daunting. For several coaches, there isn't much of an off season anymore to start with, and then add on to that the legwork you'll also be putting into finding ways to help those types of wrestlers out so they can "shrink the talent gap."
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Greg Ratliff reacted to SIACfan in How much money do you spend on wrestling?
This is a interesting topic to me.
I am talking sports in general here not just wrestling, but when I was a kid my parents spent very little for me to participate in local leagues & next to nothing for me to be a part of school teams. But back then kids travel sports didn't much exist. Plus kids specializing in one sport year round wasn't really a thing either. Neither was the sport specialized training centers/clubs for kids. It was a very different landscape back then.
But by the time my kids were growing up (who are adults now), the specialization was first appearing, at least to my knowledge. Everything my kids got into, it got extremely competitive & expensive at an early age with travel teams & training.
And one of the things I noticed was all the people trying to exploit kids sports for profit. Now I'm not saying everyone running kids tournaments &/or training facilities is guilty of this, but there are those out there that are guilty of it. In one particular instance, I witnessed a husband & wife who got involved as volunteers running tournaments when their child was playing. They quickly discovered that they could make money doing it. After their child was grown & no longer playing they continued to run tournaments for extra money. After about a decade, both had quit their jobs & were running tournaments as a business. Once my kids were grown & done playing sports, I became an official & worked a lot for them. They would hold meetings in the off-season for the officials trying to ensure they had a large set of officials for the tournaments they were running every weekend 8 months out of the year. They always preached about how it was all about the kids, but their actions got more & more driven by the dollar with every passing year. I eventually stopped working for them.
I'm not certain what my point is exactly, except that as parents just remember what is most important.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from HCman in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from ontherise219 in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to MattM in Bracket Changes
In a similar line of thinking I’ve said for awhile when an alternate is needed the rest of the wrestlers from that group should get to choose if they want to move up or remain in their original spot. One reason being what you pointed out above. The other being that with the SS and state draws having an obvious affect on who you face sometimes moving up to fill the void would puts you in a worse position (sadly) than were you were oroginally placed.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from KLH in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from Mattyb in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from GMSCoach in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff got a reaction from Coach Brobst in Bracket Changes
Also not fair for a wrestler to prepare all week for one opponent and then find out Saturday morning they have someone different.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to buttler73 in Semi-State Death Pods / Ticket Round Matches
Gibbs May is easily the nasty pull of all.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to maligned in The Undefeateds
None from this list come from the Big 3 nationally recognized teams and only two from this list come from a statewide duals Top 10 ranked team. The schedules teams are facing now are so brutal.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to Christopher Bohn in Mooresville Regional Predictions
I predict everyone who gets a hotdog will be very happy with their purchase.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to CainBones in Terre Haute South Phenomenon
Just want to acknowledge I was a bit premature on this posting!
I have since learned how to read Trackwrestling!
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Greg Ratliff reacted to coachtpc in Terre Haute South Phenomenon
Don’t know where you got your information,
the tourney is not over and they’ve got two champions so far
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Greg Ratliff reacted to Chris Cooper in Seeding Shenanigans
Requiring all teams to use trackwrestling as a scorebook would solve many issues. Every result would be public for everyone to see. I don't understand why teams don't use it already. All your matches are online, you can look back in previous years anytime you want.
This would solve the issue of questionable records, asking about commons, etc.
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Greg Ratliff reacted to Caleb Spires in Most wide open weight 144?
Welp. I almost refuted this by saying “are you sure, I remember New Prairie there my freshman year?”
Then I remembered my freshman year was 13 years ago. 😭😭😭
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Greg Ratliff reacted to Nathan Williams in Upsets and Pot Stirrings
Rochester is far and away the best team in 1A this year and would make some serious noise in 2A. As far as seeding went, West Central went into this tournament in a no-win situation. I was honestly just hoping for a top four seed after edging out a banged up Rochester team at the Joe Burvan Duals. If we would’ve been seeded below Rochester, I guarantee there wouldn’t be one West Central supporter complaining about that.
WC belonged in the small gym all day long with the product we put on the mat today. I do not post on Indianamat, I just look like thousands of others do.
However, being from one of the smallest schools in the state, competing with the great programs we did today (and in 2014, 2015 and 2023), it’s always been humbling and great for us. Congratulations to all teams that competed today.
Nathan Williams
West Central Assistant Coach
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