Türkiye? Cuba?

[Michael]

What happened to these traditional freestyle wrestling powers? As recently as 2023, Turkey/Türkiye was definitively a top-10 nation in men's freestyle, and now in 2025 they have one wrestler in 10th place (Soner Demirtaş) and nobody else earning team points. Cuba's program seems to have started falling off a few years earlier (I think after a few perennial top guys like Yowlys Bonne and Reineris Salas retired), and similar to Turkey they've now got only one wrestler earning team points (Arturo Silot, 10th place).

For Turkey, at least, I don't think it's as simple as losing Akgül. The last World Championship where Turkey didn't have at least two medalists was 2011. The last World Championship where they weren't top 10 was 2010.

What's the deal? Did these countries lose their top coaches? Did they decide to just go all-in on Greco-Roman?

[Tripnsweep]

Wrestlers in Cuba are finding other ways they can make a living. They can defect and go into MMA or do other things. The government there is very restrictive and even guys like Bonne got paid very little compared to people here. Compared to other Cubans it was a good living, but the government basically had you under their thumb. 

[boconnell]

1 hour ago, Tripnsweep said:

Wrestlers in Cuba are finding other ways they can make a living. They can defect and go into MMA or do other things. The government there is very restrictive and even guys like Bonne got paid very little compared to people here. Compared to other Cubans it was a good living, but the government basically had you under their thumb. 

But the restrictive government isn't new.  It was always restrictive and always had wrestlers under their thumb and they still were very good.  Something else changed. I also don't think it's just MMA.  Aside from Romero going MMA after his wrestling career, I'm not seeing a bunch of Cubans pop up in MMA.  Their slide as a FS power is deeper than MMA.  

[Interviewed_at_Weehawken]

Is it me, or did Cuba's slide coincide with Covid?  I'm sure they were already on the downturn, but things seem to have gotten worse since.  Maybe the world economy pst-Covid has hit them even harder than everyone else.

[GrandOlm]

Cuba, I think it's economics. Their wrestling programs have no funding now. 

For Turkey. I think it's a combination of nepotism/complacency and if I were to guess depopulation which particularly hits in historically wrestling producing rural areas. 

Taha Akgul is working a dream job where his day to day is probably answering a couple emails from home, walking into an office twice a week (or less), and having a press conference once every month or so. 

In America Taylor and Burroughs are running academies, coaching and being training partners for top American prospects. I don't think Americans would be as good if they had do nothing bureaucrat jobs in the department of health right after they stopped competing. Taha should get that role when he's in his 50s, after putting in time as a coach. Instead of giving it to someone with a particular vision and plan of action, they treated the position like a prize for a good competitive career.