fishbane

It's odd they chose to remove past accomplishments from the criteria since they seemed set on including Yianni with the finalists. Seems like the biggest case for Yianni's inclusion. Hoping they release the voting numbers this year and there is no tomfoolery afoot

In 2014 every match Logan Stieber wrestled was against a past/future/current AA; Devin Carter (VT), Zane Retherford (PSU), Todd Preston (Harvard), Anthony Collica (OSU), Lavion Mayes (Mizzu).

Looked old brackets I think Dake beat 12, Sanderson beat 13, and Stieber and Smith both beat 14. The absolute min possible would be 10 as every semi and final win would be over an AA.

I think those are the 15 matches he is referring to.

Last year there were 59 available votes. Assuming nothing changed but there was 1 vote added (last years winner Gable Steveson) that makes for 60 votes available. Five of those are from the fan vote, thirty are former winners, and the rest are retired coaches, national wrestling organizations (USAW?, NWCA?), and wrestling media. What's interesting is that PSU coaches and alumni control 9 votes or 15% - Sanderson (3), Retherford (2), Taylor (2), Nickal (1), and McCoy (1). A Michigan wrestler has never won the award, but Hodge winner Alex Dieringer is on their staff. North Carolina alum and Hodge Winner TJ. Jaworski has a vote, but that's the only know I know of with a possible UNC bias. Norther Colorado has no former winners in their alumni or coaching ranks. One would think that in a close race the voting should lean in PSUs favor. They have one of the biggest fan bases and control more votes than any other school especially the main contenders this season.

Jesus Wilson represented Cuba at the 1993 World Championships. Defected to the US and attended Upper Iowa (D3). Nearly made a world team losing in the trials finals to Eric Guerrero 2 matches to 1. https://uiupeacocks.com/honors/upper-iowa-university-athletics-hall-of-fame/jesus-wilson/189 Lázaro Reinoso, John Smith's nemesis, also defected and wrestled D2 at Carson Newman. https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1994-05-14-9405130602-story.html

Cleveland wasn't difficult for me. Pittsburgh was the only year recently I tried to get tickets and could not. I think Is part of the issue. Flights to Tulsa were more scarce than other host cities. By the time conference came around they were pretty dang expensive or impossible to get if you were looking for a Wednesday-Sunday travel schedule. Tulsa airport is probably the smallest for a host city since 2013.

Completely disagree. The consolations are not that significant. The reason tournaments bundle the tickets like that is to sell out the less premium sessions. Session 5 at NCAAs isn't selling out at the price they charge now. Sure I'd like to see these matches, but there are so many good matches happening at one I couldn't possibly watch them all anyway. I don't think the NCAA should try and force unpaid athletes that are injured or banged up to wrestling matches that they would rather not and matter little to the team race. Just pay increasing prize money for placement and it fixes nearly all issues. Not sure a few thousand dollars would get Lee to wrestle Saturday. Only a close team race would do that. Yeah that happens and it's annoying but I don't think there is anything to be done especially for matches on the backside. For in season tournaments like opens, Midlands, CKLV, Soldier Salute, and the Scuffle barely anyone is attending the finals much less the wrestlebacks. It isn't hurting TV deals or ticket sales. Dual meets are the better product. The real problem are people dodging matches in dual meets or forfeiting out of the front side of tournaments. In the past few years we've seen guys forfiet out of Big Ten finals or get to the semi finals. That shit hurts the product. It's almost like the wrestlers and team don't care about the conference/team title. Your side note doesn't really matter. Substitute MLS Playoffs with NCAA soccer or Stanley Cup with Frozen Four and it's the same thing. Name another individual college sport that has an individual tournament format where after an individual is eliminated from national title contention they still compete to determine lower places? I think wrestlers by and large do like the ability to come back and place. Wrestlers that lose before the Semis don't really forfeit out because their feelings are hurt. They want that AA spot. By the last day some don't care about 1 placement spot or so, aren't on a team in the team race, and are nursing injuries. What is the point in trying to make them wrestle?

Respectfully disagree. Backside matches are not what is driving viewership on ESPN. That's the championship matches. ESPN does not care about Saturday morning consolation matches. This is probably the most skipped session of the tournament by in person spectators except for maybe Thursday morning. When not personally attending I don't know I have ever watched it live. It is also a problem that doesn't exist in other sports because they simply don't have them. Other sports with losers brackets aren't really consolation brackets at all. Its a double elimination tournament like in college baseball. NFL doesn't have a consolation bracket. MLB doesn't have a consolation bracket. ATP events do not have a consolation bracket. Stanley Cup Playoffs don't have a consolation bracket. NBA Playoffs don't have a consolation bracket. MLS Playoffs don't have a consolation bracket. US Open Cup does not have a consolation bracket. College football playoff does not have a consolation bracket. WNBA playoffs do not have a consolation bracket. March Madness does not have a consolation bracket. UEFA Champions League doesn't really have a consolation bracket. What exactly makes this a huge problem to you?

I know. He added something after that about being "on TV or something." Probably doesn't change the truthfulness/accuracy of the statement much.

That is the current system. Iowa was punished via opportunity cost. Spencer Lee had the opportunity to earn Iowa 0.5 advancement points, 4 additional placement points and up to 4 additional bonus points by wrestling Saturday morning. That's 8.5 team points Lee had a crack at. Do you really think adding some penalty that would have subtracted 1-2 points from Iowa's total would have changed things? If it was a tight team race for the title with PSU he could have been out there, or he would have been seriously injured, or he is just an awful teammate. I don't really get Chael's point that ESPN was somehow upset/wrong by this. Session 5 matches are not on regular ESPN or even ESPN2. It was ESPN+ and ESPNU. They don't even have any dead time as the were 4 mats going simultaneously so they always had a mat to show. If they were upset it was probably more about the promotion for a match Saturday night that wasn't going to happen, but them the breaks. Reebok paid for the Dan vs Dave campaign before the 1992 Olympics and Dan didn't qualify. The Red Sox signed to $142 million 7 year contract and he played less than 162 games for them. The UFC realized this decades ago and stopped the tournament format PPVs. You are going to get injury scratches in that format. The thing here is that these are unpaid college students competing not professional athletes. It would be difficult to incentivize/disincentivize them enough to stamp out the practice and we need to ask if the NCAA should be twisting the arms of injured/semi injured/disinterested athletes so as to not ruin their broadcast deals? If they paid prize money for placement that would seemingly solve everything. If the difference between placement positions was a few thousand dollars there would be incentive for even individuals on non-contenders to get out there. With the team race over for Iowa and this being they year before the Olympics the upcoming freestyle season will be important. Why should Spencer Lee risk these two matches if he doesn't want to? NCAA Football players skip bowl games. You don't really see it with the playoff games, but the non-playoff bowls which are more analogous to these anyway.

Yeah I don't think it did. If I had to guess at what happened it would be this. Takedown and first two swipes happen as normal speed. The third swipe is noticable slower on the playback. Perhaps he felt like he didn't didn't have a good look and was wondering if criteria was still met. This was probably subconscious like when someone talks slowly or draws out a "yes" when they are actually still thinking about it. He then decides to adjust between swipe 3 and swipe 4 which slows what would have been the 4th swipe down even move. I think you can see him wind up for a 4th swipe after he takes his hand off the mat but changes his mind. I don't think he realized he had used the wrong hand for anything until after calling action out of bounds. So this likely would not have been responsible for any confusion that slowed down his count. That was probably either indecision about whether criteria was still met or an inability to decouple the verbal count from the hand count when moving. A third explanation was that he decided criteria was broken immediately after the third count and before adjusting, but it looks to me like after the adjustment he was winding up for another swipe. That could have been a swipe for a new count or something that just looked like a swipe windup, but based on what was happening with the wrestling in my estimation it was likely a 4th albeit slow swipe.

Right "whenever possible." I didn't think there was a requirement to use a particular color hand for counting just when awarding the points. The issue wasn't that he used the wrong hand to count. He used the wrong hand to award Real Woods's NF points initially (which wasn't a feet to back TD or reversal to NF situation). Then he used the wrong hand to award Alirez's takedown. Then he held the two finger up on the wrong hand from the TD award through counting the Alirez's NF and started to award them with the wrong hand before finally changing to the correct hand (green). That change happened after a break in action and he had a moment to perhaps consider things and realize his mistake.

According to the rule they are supposed to at the NCAA level "whenever possible." Rule 4.5.2 Counting the Near Fall. A verbal count and, whenever possible, a visual hand count shall be used in determining a near fall. Likewise, a referee shall verbally inform the wrestlers when near fall points have been earned. A near fall is ended when the defensive wrestler is no longer in one of the three criteria positions.

I didn't get the part about shifting the other way either. Maybe he thought shifting towards Woods's head he would have a side view of the angle his back was creating with the mat? Looking from that angle you could imagine putting a protractor up to measure the angle. I think the point he was making about putting the hand down was that the action delayed the 4th swipe and Gibbons judged the action to take as much time as a swipe. He probably also judged that NF criteria to have been maintained through the adjustment or at least that the angle had not changed and that had the referee just continued the count w/o adjustment he would have counted to 4. I don't know when the TD should have been awarded, but the referee did seem to start the count immediately after throwing up the two albeit with the wrong hand.

He didn't say first 4x champ. He said "first ever undefeated Pennsylvania 4x state champion." This is a significant difference. Like the difference between Pat Smith and Cael at the NCAA level, but he also wasn't there were 4x champs that did so without losing before. I do not like his final suggestion to give more points (30% more) than a pin for forfeiting in a tournament. This would make the scoring system worse. Most of the time there are only two or three teams with a shot at the team title. Often times the wrestler forfeiting out is not on one of them. If you're on a team competing for a team title there is plenty of incentive to wrestle. Will a gentleman on a team that isn't in the race for a team title be motivated by gifting 0.6 extra team points to whoever his consolation match is against? I am skeptical. Spencer Lee isn't going to be worried about giving 0.6 team points to ASU and Nebraska. The opportunity cost of points he could have earned Iowa is far greater than 1.2 team points. His suggestion would be totally ineffectual and it could make it less fair. Imagine a razor close team race between Iowa and PSU. Obviously none of their guys are defaulting if they can wrestle because they want the team title. Some wrestler on different team that might be able to wrestle forfeits out and in so doing forfeits to a PSU wrestler and these 0.6 extra team points prove decisive in the team race. Is that fair? Is that anyway to pick a team champ?

I dunno, I can't get behind him referring to Cassioppi as Big Tony instead of Big Tone.

1) Who is Alvarez? 2) Gibbons didn't say the ref should not have repositioned. 3) Nothing was easy to see and the referee made several errors in the sequence. It is very difficult to figure out what he was doing. First the referee was seemingly confused the wrestlers colors. He awards the first set of NF as 2 to green. These were supposed to be for Woods who was red. Then they get to their feet and he says still green. He is seemingly still confused as I assume he means to say that Woods is still in control since he has that body lock, but again Woods is red. Next comes the throw and he holds up two for red for the takedown and starts a visual count. Only problem is that it should be two for Green - Alirez is green. He never puts the two fingers down on the red hand he used to award the takedown so it is unclear later whether he is holding two NF or just still has them out from the takedown. He counts two visually with swipes then the third visual swipe comes albeit slower than the first two. Then he puts that hand down on the mat to balance as he repositions himself. Then after he takes he weight off that hand he looks to be winding up for a 4th swipe but stops as the position has changed. It's unclear whether the official intended to stop the count before the reposition because he thought NF criteria has been broken or he intended to just get a better look and was using poor technique. I believe this to be Gibbons's point. In real time the broadcast team is confused and initially Rock Harrison says 4 NF for Alirez. Watching it back several times, it seems that at some point after the reposition the two fingers on the red hand the ref has had up since awarded the takedown become two NF points he's holding and he saying something like "you've got two." However he doesn't immediately award them and holds them after NF criteria is broken and probably the lock too. He finally awards them after he calls action out of bounds and only now does he get the colors straight changing the points to his green hand. I completely agree with Gibbons here. The rule requires a verbal count and visual "whenever possible." The verbal count is required and the visual count is not. It is fine for the referee to reposition himself to get a better look but if the wrestlers position has not changed the verbal count should continue throughout the repositioning even if a visual count is not possible. It appeared to me that the referee intended to continue the count after repositioning and not start a new count and this would have resulted in a longer 4th swipe. That said decoupling the verbal count from the swipes on the fly in a high stress situation is not easy. So while it is easy to see the visual count had stopped that does not say why it was stopped (poor technique causing the count to be delayed - Gibbons's point or change in NF criteria) or if a verbal count continued.

Can be a 4xer? Possibly The next 4xer? Probably not. Both Brooks and Starocci could do it next year and it would take Keegan O'Toole at least two more years. So to get him to be the next 4xer you gotta look at not only the probability that he wins two more but also the probability that neither Brooks or Starocci win one more before he can do that.

Ramos, O'Toole, Keckeisen, Starocci and Kerkvliet still have two years left. Though not finalists this year Daton Fix, Shane Griffith, and Mehki Lewis all have one year left. Ridge Lovett and Cohlton Schultz both have two years left.

4xer Micky Phillippi RS-RS-R12-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-R12. Lost to Sam Latonia (6) in the R12. 1st ever. 3xers Max Murin RS-R12-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-Top 6. Wrestles Kyle Parco in the cons Semis today. 2xers Anthony Artalona R12-Inj./COVID-COVID/Ivy-R12-NQ. He went 0-2 and finished a 2xR12 Josh Humphreys R12-NQ/COVID-Inj-R12-Top6. He wrestles Ed Scott in the consi semis today. Jared Franek RS-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-Top 6. He is in the consi semis today and will face Peyton Robb. Zach Elam R12-RS-R16-R12-Stop 6. He is in the consi-semis today against Cohlton Schultz.

Going into Friday night both Murin and Phillippi still have a shot at 4xer status. Who wins? Who looses? History could be made. Micky Phillippi RS-RS-R12-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-NQ/going for 4. Phillippi wrestes Sam Latonia (6) in the R12. Max Murin RS-R12-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-NQ/going for 4. Murin is in the R12 and wrestles Chance Lamer (22) in session 4. 2xers Anthony Artalona R12-Inj./COVID-COVID/Ivy-R12-NQ. He went 0-2 and finished a 2xR12 Josh Humphreys R12-NQ/COVID-Inj-R12-NQ./going for 3 He is in the semifinals and has a guaranteed top 6 finish. Career 2xR12. Jared Franek RS-NQ/COVID-R12-R12-NQ/going for 3. He is in the R12 and wrestles Vinny Zerban (32) tonight. Zach Elam R12-RS-R16-R12-NQ/going for 3. He is in the R12 and wrestles Colton McKiernan (12).

Here is the match -

The older brother Nathan had a less than standout high school career for a national champion: 31-13 overall, 2-6 as a senior, never wrestled in the PIAA postseason. Now a 2x D3 champion that has not only lost 0 D3 matches the past two seasons, but also has given up 0 TDs, 0 NFs, and 0 reversals to D3 wrestlers over the past two seasons. He was also 6th at the 2022 Midlands where he lost his only matches in that time period. http://www.pa-wrestling.com/hs/teams/bethcatholic/athlete_stats.htm?id=84404

Yeah that's essentially what I found looking at old brackets. JMU having dropped their program doesn't have much in the way of records available on the internet. He was R12 his last two years. His sophomore year he lost in an early round and there was not full wrestle backs. The fact that there were not full consolations for a large period of time and that freshman couldn't compete for a different somewhat earlier large period of time probably means that if there ever was a R12 4xer that individual probably wrestled in the past 30 years.