wrestle87

I agree this is dilutive for the fan experience, but as a very mediocre former college wrestler who had the pleasure of a few rather involved surgeries thanks to competing at the college level, I think it is fantastic these athletes can actually get compensated for their effort now. Cutting 20 lbs three times a week all season f*cking sucks, and is worth more than a pat on the back. For as long as they are allowed, they should build whatever future for themselves they can.

The only difference is Welsh has a demonstrated track record of success at the college level.

Not to be obtuse, but if you are the highest returning placer at a weight, shy of getting beaten out, why would you drop down?

This already happened in the early 2010’s. Have you ever heard of icarus and bigger stringer faster? Also worth looking up dudes named broderick chavez and louie simmons. Drugs are part and parcel of competitive sport. Sport develops top down, from the highest level and trickles down over time. Pushing the limits requires supernatural recovery. We are the only country who get up our own butts about it because commercial interests fan the competitive flames of patriotic and regional devotion for economic gain. Literally nowhere else in the world cares about exogenous supplementation, it’s expected and typically state sponsored. They don’t dance around whether or not something is effective. Us complaining about drug use is like people arbitrarily deciding it is cheating to use a barbell to get stronger. “They used the bad tool to get better, shaaame, shaaaame!” ”A prominent US athlete has been removed from olympic team trials after video of them conducting dangerous barbell back squats was released to the media, they apologized and promised to stick to calisthenics and dumbell lunges in the future.”

You buckeyes fans have been massively spoiled if you are calling for the resignation of one of the top three head coaches in the past decade. I will not completely dismiss this, bc the indicators of program health are more instantaneous movers than they were pre-NIL, and it is always possible for a coach to just go on tilt and lose their touch, but placing 5th in this years tournament and this year’s field is a solid accomplishment. Where did things go wrong? Only one place. Welsh. Having Kharchla and Rogotzke in and Welsh on the bench was disastrous. Bouzakis doesn’t have the top end needed to AA. He may get over the hump with a lucky draw, but he just isn’t as solid as people are in love with him over. Feldman is already way too injured. He doesn’t have a frame that stands up to heavyweight. The only thing Ryan can be accused of being is sentimental, giving Sasso and Kharchla more focus than they warranted this season. Also, no offense, but who do you guys think Ohio State is? 5th is a pretty market-standard performance based on who is in the room guiding practices. There is one world medal on the entire staff, and it was from the immediately post-olympics watered down worlds tournament. Ryan is a great helmsman for the program, you guys need better in the room assistant coach talent. The Buckeye RTC is not strong, and in the current era, college success is a trickledown result of a strong RTC. RTC athletes are extra assistant coaches just on a different payroll. And all great college wrestlers get that way bc of their international aspirations. When tervel left he took 99% of the international experience with him. If anything, the buckeye program needs to refocus on bigger goals. The last person to legitimately chase a medal was snyder, and he put himself in that position.

Dude give it a rest. It’s a part of sport as much as sunlight is a part of life.

I do believe Jamill Kelly belongs on this list.

You have zero understanding of the landscape of higher education finance. The last time someone was this incorrect they said sun rotated around the earth. This is boy kisses girl and she pukes out a baby levels of incorrect.

I think you’re hyperfocusing in the word loud and ignoring the “good on the mic” part. DT engages with the media 100x more than Cael does. The modern coach is required to interface with the media in a thoughtful way as part of branding and free marketing for their team. I think of Ayres, Rob Koll, yes definitely Schwab, T&T, all do a fantastic job of boosting their programs profile by injecting enthusiasm and story behind what they are working on as a team and as individuals. I will say this, T&T are not towards the top as coaches alone necessarily, but they are amazing storytellers. They can make a kid who pushes and snaps for 7 minutes sound like the most exciting thing in the world.

No, but that’s part of what makes the whole penn state situation more mystifying. The vast majority of successful coaches are good on the mic and invest in media interaction as part of bolstering draw for their program and the sport. Cael basically threw them the bird and said “nah I’m not doing that”, but he and bill belichick are just about the only coaches in history who could get away with that and have the powers that be above them be ok with that.

It is awfully naive, but endearing, to think that the past few years with public acknowledgement of NIL is the first time money has been a part of college wrestling. It’s been there, people just don’t talk about it. The only difference now is that teams with wallets but mediocre programs can be more competitive.

This is true, but I also have to imagine if T Ryan is no longer coaching, it’s not by choice. Snyder is way too quiet of a personality to be successful as a head coach. I think he would be the sort of fit for Ohio State that Zalesky was for Iowa.

John Smith did the opposite, strung along a loyal former athlete and kicked him out by the side of the road. Nothing against coleman but that was ultimately a good move for the program. There’s no question though, coleman got done dirty.

None, it’s coach dlagnev!

It’s rumored that AFA took .01% of their dining money and chucked it Gable’s way so the academy celebrate this moment along with OKST and, be extension, could curry favor with our golf course magnate in chief, thus opening the door for future sitdowns to lock in prime tee times for all the top brass at all the best base-adjacent golfing facilities in North America and Europe.

Taylor swift wasn’t in the crowd, I’m not buying it.

It’s hard to explain to rock salt and a lobster merchant.

Name checks out

The list will be way too long for the people above KOT. You can absolutely make the argument for Steveson being one of the top few two time champs in history. People are forgetting a huge one, John Smith was a 2x champ.

It's just always been there, and it is an unpoliced part of the sport, and always will be because ultimately the highest competition is what drives the financing of the sport. You can say "yeah no", but that doesn't change the reality of competitive sports, even at an amateur let alone professional level. Purported morality on a subject is only useful so long as there is a mechanism in place to support the preferred behavior. There isn't, and there never will be, because the incentives of competition have not and will never prioritize "ethics" over success. If 80% of all professional athletes in the world are on something, and nobody is doing anything to correct it because the incentive structure is crafted to encourage it, are we really talking about something that is wrong, or are we just talking about the true cost of playing the game that people just choose to stick their heads in the sand about? I saw this having had my butt handed to me in a few different settings by opponents clearly on some extra assistance, nobody did anything, said anything, or enforced anything, and it is that way at every high level of every sport. So...? At some point we just have to evolve the conversation about sports and the risk-reward for seeking the highest level of athletics. Fair competition is a myth btw. Nobody has ever cared about that, they only say it to preserve audience dollars.

It’s definitely a thing, but you can never pass judgement until you see what family members look like. Genetics is the ultimate performance enhancer, and it is undefeated in potency and reliability long term. ”Holy crap that dude has a barn door back…and so does his brother, and his dad…and his grandpa too?!”

I’m having a hard time lining up a shove to the back of the head being egregious but Shapiro vs Johnny Lovett…nah nevermind.

You asked this seriously so it merits a serious answer. The best thing I can offer is first go watch a film called bigger faster stronger. It is extremely honest and very well done. Then, go do some reading about the history of exogenous testosterone supplementation in athletics. Modern athletics and training evolved on the back of the development of the exogenous androgen/anabolic supplementation. They are intimately linked simply because they work, not just for performance gains but also maintenance of joint integrity and tissue recovery under enormous training loads. There are some old interviews back in the day with the 1950’s-60’s wrestling coaches where they went drinking with the german coaches after the olympics one year, and the dude got too hammered and told them they’d been supplementing with a test derivative, I don’t recall which, it was relatively new at the time. Anyway the US coaches went back the next day and put the whole team on it. Guess who did really well that next cycle. It was unknown and nobody cared. Which is the way it should be. Steroids got vilified when people started having things to sell (professional sports and WWE mainly), and IP’s to protect(Pharma). It’s much easier to control people’s actions by manufacturing morality rather than explaining a complex topic, this was entirely where Reagan came in and just…did Reagan things. Steroids and protein powder, creatine etc are all the same vein of concept, even sports in general, it’s something with a risk reward profile that people participate in for a desired outcome. Our society just vilifies certain things out of convenience or in support of ulterior motives.

They're not telling the truth.

Shhhh….we’re not supposed to speak to athletic realities when it’s about americans, only about big bad non-ally country athletes.