jbburn12

After the IOC decision and this farce from the IHSAA broadcast not a great week for wrestling fans.

I can't agree more with Joe Caprino. I have expressed that before but not as succinctly and eloquently. Get rid of the sports that the Olympics aren't the ultimate championship and there would be plenty of room for all of the other sports. Now that doesn't mean FILA doesn't need to clean up its act with these crappy scoring rules,ball pulls etc. They have done all they can to ruin a great sport as it is. Ok flame away I can take it.

I think the biggest "blowback" from this could be more college A.D's throwing wrestling under the bus. Since they are under a tremendous amount of funding and Title IX pressure they may see this as their "out" in dropping wrestling.Probably not Big !0 schools but maybe those that are more on the fringe of competitiveness. Then you add in the fact that schools that may want to start or restart programs will have a more difficult if not impossible time. This news really sucks during of the best week of wrestling in Indiana. Talk about trying to spoil Christmas.

The Civic Center would be a great place. A lot of great wrestling took place there that I have seen. Dick the Bruiser, The Crusher , Mitsu Araka , Baron von Raascke. OOOOOOOOOOhhhh not that kind of wrestling.

Heavyweights never win the p.f.p. battle but for a freshman to be ranked as high as he has been Streck from Merrillville is pretty darn strong.

Whatever you say about Sliga he did pick the right college to attend! All of this speculation is fun, just tough to imagine a monstrously strong kid with a 25 pound higher weight not being at an advantage. I don't think Sliga could go upper body with but if he can get to the legs well maybe.............. Another way to look at is imagine they were heavyweights at 240 and 265. If they are both talented wrestlers I don't think you would dismiss the 240 guy out of hand or make a real big point of the weight difference. Baumgartner wasn't a real big guy but he did all right for himself.I have seen Robinson numerous times and Sliga only once when he sat on Berry's head. Still and all if I were a betting man I would bet Robinson.

@Bash 513 .....Your reply brought a big smile to my face. That was a good one.

Go Cats !!!!!

Thats good because Shrewsbury really "took one for the team" wrestling heavyweight as a freshman for NU.

@ Maligned .. I meant our best (all time best) are as good as Illinois' or any states buttttttttttt along that vein almost every state could make a list of their "Mt Rushmore" of wrestlers and anyone could go WOW. I don't think our depth matches Illinois . The main thing is this is fun to talk about. This isn't the forum but I imagine except for basketball Indiana's depth in most sports won't match lets say the surrounding "Big Ten" states. If it hasn't been done before I wonder whose busts would be carved in Indiana limestone on our "wrestling Mt Rushmore"?

Well I think in Indiana the 800 pound gorilla in the room is....... Basketball. My sense is at the youth level most kids or parents choose basketball in the winter. As you all know its Indiana's religion. I am sure not saying that the next Alex Tsirtsis,Andrew Howe, Angel Escobedo is sitting the bench on the freshman B team at Floyd Central but there are probably plenty of athletic tough kids that will never be fast enough or tall enough to make an impact i basketball at the varsity level. My sense is though the boy plays youth basketball but by the time he realizes there is no future he feels its too late to try wrestling or I guess swimming also. This is not saying there aren't tons of kids wrestling ISWA and middle school but because of that its pretty tough to start wrestling in 9th or 10th grade with no previous experience. Basketball is of course very popular in Illinois and Ohio but you add in population differences ,the desire to play youth basketball anddddddddd the emphasis on basketball in the schools I dont think the state by state results should be surprising. Our best are as good as anyone's best but maybe we just don't have the same depth. I talked to a coach from a different state that was up for a big job in Indiana but said they just couldn't make it work to get him there. I joked that if he had been a basketball coach they would have made it work.

It was a lot of fun following the Olympic trials and watching the Olympics live online. Saying that I am so ready for FOLKSTYLE high school and collegiate wrestling to begin. There might be some neat techiques in Greco and Freestyle but to me the whole system of scoring and winning or losing is a very poor determinant of the best wrestler. Varner loses the ball pull to the Georgian an 80% chance he loses and there goes the chance for the gold. I still don't know what happened in that last period with Herbert when he lost 6-0 but thats above my paygrade. The whole business of scoring by period,ball pulls, scoring once then hiding the rest of the match just isn't appealing to me as a fan.I do like the push out and the throws. I suppose if you added some freestyle elements to folkstyle and maybe got rid of riding time you would have an ideal competive style that would show the best wrestler when the match was done. Greco well I didn't see much of it but what I saw seemed always to end up in par terre (spelling ?). Hey these guys are great ,tremendous athletes. Just my 2 cents

This is not directed at Howe I only wish him the best. Let me get this straight though.A wrestler can take a regular redshirt which is available to all NCAA athletes in their sport.Then the best of the best wrestlers can also take an Olympic redshirt in which they can spend an entire year concentrating completely on training for the Olympic trials. Though it freestyle it is the best training against the best training partners with no "burden" of academics. Then these "best of the best" get to transfer to pretty much the school of their choice since they have already sat out a year. Even if they don't transfer these top level wrestlers with a quantum leap of training and an extra year go back and compete as collegians against other wrestlers without that advantage.

All this talk on freestyle and not one mention of the most ridiculous facet of freestyle : the ball draw and "clinch". There has got to be a better way.Also the last point scored in a period being more important and giving a period win than the first poin scored. Why should my early takedown count for less than your late period takedown? I just don't get it.

I am a BIG fan of redshirting but my thinking on Tsirtsis is this: Welch will be a senior,Miele who could finally be an All-America will be a senior. McMullan was 3rd last year. Friedly has All American potential at 149. Munster may well be ready for a breakout year. Maybe Coach Pariano thinks this is a year to go for broke ,let redhsirt soph Shober fight it out with Tsirtsis for 141 or red shirt Friedly at 149 and slot Tsirtsis there. They aren't going to be national champs next year but Tsirtsis could give them the most depth they have had in a while and may for for a time. Speaking of Indiana wrestlers Shrewsbury did a MAJOR "take one for the team" his freshman year going heavyweight as a 184 . He hasn't had much of a career since. I think it would be nice for him to take a red shirt and give it one last shot his senior year.

So work with me on this. I understand wrestling Greco and Freestyle can help with Folkstyle. My thinking is this.There are very few opportunities for Free and Greco outside of Olympics ,World Team maybe some Junior national events. To be considered for these areas for the most part you have to be outstanding at Folkstyle to get into a position to wrestle in these other areas. I know there are special armed services programs and Northern Michigan for Greco but still virtually everyone is or was outstanding at Folkstyle. When you look at the lists of qualifiers for the National Team Trails almost all were D-1 national champs,All Americans or major contenders. Then look at the thread for Indiana wrestlers signed for college. Not a whole lot are going D-1. Subsequently there aren't a lot of Indiana wrestlers that will be ranked high enough in the future to be considered for the team trials. Then my question would be is the effort put into Greco and Free worth the time taken away from developing greater Folkstyle skills?Maybe using that off season time for the incorporation some of the Greco and Freestyle skills that translate into Folkstyle. However it is only with outstanding Folkstyle skills that even let someone get to that next level. I know there are exceptions but not many. It seems like more in the heavyweights with Sigman,Delagnev and Gardner coming from D2 but if my memory serves they were national champs at that level. So my point is what? I guess that even if the world wrestles the other styles you have to be an absolute monster Folkstyler to be even considered for an opportunity to represent this country internationally . Maybe this lack of opportunity translates in the lack of participation in the off season Free and Greco events.

The Nebraska student run production was by far the worst of all the "broadcast" teams this year.I felt the Nortwestern broadcasters were the best but the one young man had an extremely high pitched voice that made Mike Tyson sound like a baritone.Still I think its great that students got their chance to broadcast but the Nebraska team was bad. I seem to remember the Purdue students were pretty good also. I like when Johnson and Gibbons do the big meets.They are good on the microphone and very informative.I guess my only complaint is they are Iowa State guys and I would think there are some Big Ten people that could be used.What happened to Lee Kemp? He was enjoyable to listen to.

After reading some of the other threads I would like to make this comment (s).WIth the controversy of the calls in the Robinson/Kral match ;with the controversy over stalling call in the Kral/Gallegos match ; with the fact that Kourtney Berry wrestled all year on a torn ACL, never in any of the post match comments have I read these young men complain publically ,make excuses,point fingers,nor act in any way in a non exemplary manner on the podium. For this I commend their parents ,coaches and of course the wrestlers themselves.

Shapiro's

I vote for..........Richard Aflis........................... sorry I couldn't resist

I don't know anything about this stuff but I would think with this indicates tremendous traffic on this site with a ton of room for even more.It would be nice for more potential advertisers to see this to help to support the site financially.Even with a fair share of goofy postings this is a great resource for the promotion of wrestling not only in Indiana but the entire wrestling community as a whole.

Mullican from LaPorte won 285

This would be from last year but the topic did remind me of something I kept thinking about ..In the Crown Point room it had to be great for Tsirtsis to have Roach and of course vice versa.What I always wondered though when they "went at it " who would usually prevail? Can anyone comment?

Is this his first incident? Has he caused trouble before? Could he actually have been sick? Is this a freshman wrestling varsity? I don't think it is cut and dried. Sure he might have been scared and maybe he just doesn't want to wrestle.However maybe you can do this kid a great favor in his life by keeping him on the team and letting him earn his way back into his team mates graces.I just think so many kids nowadays are living on an edge emotionally Sports or in reality any high school extra curricular activity can give the student the chance he/she might need to succed during his high school years or beyond. My suggestion just from knowing what I read is to give the young man another chance with stipulations of course.It may go a long way to helping him in the future. Just my opinion.

On the Purdue All-American list I am virtually positive Al Vega is from Chicago not Indiana.