boconnell

If it was mostly about other countries having better smaller athletes, then we would do worse at 57 and 61. I think it's a relatively small sample size at a super high elite level and it allows for an outlier like this.

I think a few young guys being crazy successful early makes people think that's what's supposed to happen. But if the golden generation just concluding is headlined by JB/Snyder/Dake/Taylor then it's 50/50 on precocious phenoms and guys who hit their stride in their mid to late 20s. So while it's very unlikely for any wrestler of any age to match those guys, someone being 25 doesn't remove them from the conversation.

Locking your hands around the chest doesn't automatically stop a TD.

The caution and 1 to set up the last seconds seemed terrible. Dake stayed engaged and circled back in and barely stepped out. I'm also curious about the clock. That was a super long 6 seconds. But it seemed like an obvious TD if it happened in time. Grabbing a chest lock while sitting on your butt with both legs captured and the head not trapped doesn't magically stop a TD.

Don't make Dake angry.

I don't think you find much of the prostitution world that doesn't overlap with woman who have no choices. Just like when you outlaw drugs, you don't end up with a bunch of places to buy drugs that aren't directly attached to violence. It might be caused by the criminalization, but when you choose to wade into that world, you've decided what's more important than not supporting a super dirty corner of the world.

You just made a great argument for decriminalizing prostitution. If somebody went to a prostitute in the system you are describing, then I'd agree with your earlier post that they did nothing morally wrong. That is definitely not Kyle Snyder. He knows what he is doing directly supports trafficking, and he doesn't care. So while I don't care who he has sex with or whether he pays for it, I do think it's wrong he's illegally hiring women from a disgustingly corrupt practice that traffics women.

If prostitution wasn't joined at the hip with human trafficking and women being used against their will, then you'd have some really great points here about the moral differences in paying for it directly or not paying for it directly.

Doucet isn't getting majored. He wrestled the entire 2024 season and didn't get majored by Bastida, Elam, Schultz (2X), or Keuter. If you go back to 2023 he lost to Elam, Cassiopi, and Mason Parris without them coming close to bonus. But Wyatt Hendrickson did major him 12-3 that year. That's the only time in his career going all the way back to 2021 that he's been majored. Wyatt is actually the only opponent to score 8 points in a match against him (let alone beat him by 8). He's a classic staller who will not be majored.

You said it all here.

Yep. The extra year of HS definitely turned into a bad thing.

I think what you are saying makes sense. But these guys aren't considered great because they are doing more than other age level guys. They are doing more than guys 5 years ahead of them. Great college guys like Hamiti and Keckeisen didn't win after 5 years of college. Even if Jax somehow had zero improvement ahead of him he's already doing stuff that NCAA champs 5 years older than him aren't. So take away his HS age advantage, his training advantage, and compare him to 23+ year old men and he still crushed the field. The same is mostly true of Blaze. They have gone to the highest level of American wrestling and held their own or won. They are basically world level already. The same can't be said for any other 18/19/20 year olds in the USA, even after giving a year of college to normalize age and training.

Are the 18 year olds in college accomplishing these things? If not than I don't think them being 18 as HS juniors is a sign that they aren't special. I also don't understand why you've just decided that Duke is just going to keep getting better but the other guys have already hit their ceilings. This whole post reads like a 50/50 mix of fact and fiction to create a narrative.

It's fine if you want to use a 2 year window, but I'm not sure how the 1 year window is only Jax edging out Blaze. Jax just TF'd the guy who pinned Blaze in the same tournament. In a 1 year window it's Jax ahead of Blaze and it's not him edging him out.

I've only been in Washington 3 years but I wonder about Chandler Rogers. I know he left midway through HS, but his style is so attractive to kids. Nobody was more fun to watch. What he did with a russian lends itself to a teachable system (and to opponents landing on their heads often). Mead where he and his brother Jordan went is still a bit of a power so that matters for connections and influence.