wrestle87

This is wishful thinking. There will be turnover, but DT is the one able to demand quality, OSU is going to be right at the top for recruiting. PSU has shown it’s better to not put up with behavior. The “this is a privilege” approach engenders the gratitude that keeps PSU at the top. If you could go back, Cael would probably take a different tack with the Alton’s. They didn’t exactly work out as recruits. Having a reputation for hitting the fizzy wheat juice and potato water has a way of limiting progress.

Um, having spent a lifetime with wrestlers, these are gently inaccurate percentages. Also, this is great for OSU, just part of continuing to signal and reinforce the culture shift. There is a lot of pent up bad blood from the end of J Smith’s coaching tenure, you hear it in every interview coming out of that time period. There's also no question that the room culture DT wrestled in and brings with him is polar opposite to what happened under J Smith. Some guys want, even need, an outlet for their wild energy, they are by no means rare in wrestling. But, that’s not welcome at all programs. This is great for the sport. Slowly chipping away at the meat head d-bag public image that so many people assume when they hear you wrestled. I am NOT calling jordan williams that, or any other names, at all. At that age partying is exceedingly common, especially during the summer. He will find a home no problem.

“We have unresearched question by blue, basic googling not executed, we then have pushout and exposure by other posters…we have one red, then two red, and one more red for unseccusseful challenge, so score 4 red, 0 blue AND…shallenge loast!” I saw that our kind board host changed one of his social media tags to this on some random post of his. Almost made me spit my drink out when I read it. If you missed the olympics, there was an obnoxious donk who narrated every challenge throughout the entire tournament, and who exerted some rather blatant abuses of power in a few cases to try to sway matches in one direction or the other. At best he was really bad at his job, he also had an exceedingly thick accent, and was very exuberant in his proclamations of “challenge won!” or “challenge lost!”

This is hilarious, nicely done @Husker_Du

We absolutely should. The adjusted medal count from Russia shows the insane surplus of talent coming out of their training camps.

I have never seen one short post so completely encapsulate the college wrestling experience more than this.

A motivated Taylor would have. The guy who showed up and wrestled Brooks would not have. He didn't have the sparkle in his eye anymore (zero judgement, just part of progressing in life, wrestling is not life).

I will take that bet trading places style for one imaginary dollar. Messenbrink basically does what JB did early in his career, technically flawed gas pedal in your face in a way guys haven’t seen before, creating action to stay even in the first and pull away in the second period with his lungs. I think he will make a team and get some sneaky medals, primarily bc his mindset is so much better. He doesn’t care, he just goes. Big match, small match, not respecting your opponents beyond just them being another wrestler is a BIG mindset thing that 99.99% of guys struggle with. Messenbrink doesn’t which is huge. This is also the era of the lanky wrestler, tazhudinov started it off, the gangle is coming back to form.

Petriashvili gets my vote. Dude hit peak lifetime form and outgunned an absolutely stacked weight class in terms of medals and accomplishments. Close second for me is Jamalov, cross body far side cradle for the pin in the olympics is the coolest thing since adam saitiev decked yomero with an inside trip in the finals. Third would be that young buck in greco at 86kg who won gold while actually scoring points and creating exchanges in greco.

This year was extremely sumo-y. Obviously coaches, teams and styles will adapt to aim for low hanging fruit, it has really judo-fied wrestling a lot in terms of the start stop nature. Not a good thing. Wrestlers who can push well can get into medal matches, which is dumb. Rules now mandate points be put on the board, and they get there, but the product is getting diluted. They really need to bring back ties and overtime. Criteria blows.

There is no question our leg attacks were nowhere to be found when they really mattered, which is baffling. Leg attacks are almost always the difference maker for US wrestlers, we typically navigate and manage opponents’ entire bodies less well, and just make up for it by picking a limb and blasting through it or ripping it off. Not this year.

The personality makeup it takes to be a good amateur wrestler is polar opposite to what it takes to be a good pro wrestler. The value systems and behavior requirements are almost entirely mutually exclusive. The internal cultures if both activities are almost 180 degrees from one another. Besides sharing the name “wrestling”, they have a limited amount of common ground. Showboating, brash, arrogant—>great pro wrestler Humble, selfless, deferential —>amateur wrestler. Football players would do a much better job as pro wrestlers. Also, just to make the point completely, bobby steveson is still wrestling, gable isn’t. Wrestling pedigree doesn’t matter. It is performance art, you have to love being in front of people, that is opposite to the personality of most wrestlers. Best point of reference for the difference is the Ric Flair 30 for 30.

I think it's also smart if we start actually referencing regions. When we talk about "Russians", 99% of the time, we are talking about wrestlers from the Caucasus region.

If brooks and dake had won their weights it would have been an enormous indictment of weightlifting.

Game recognize game clearly

Makes a ton of sense, snyder’s style used to be much more tervel-y. NLWC has tried to tell him ankle picks are the only way to the promised land, and frankly they have not served him well. He’s not built like bo or david, and that style is very body type dependent.

You are spot on about snyder, he did his best wrestling under Tom Ryan no doubt.

I don’t like bashing folkstyle, because it is a lot of fun, but there is no denying that having our best wrestling minds largely devoted to a completely different skillset definitely limits our ability as a country to innovate within the international skillset. I really loved Jamalov pulling out a cradle from a cross body ride, that was super unexpected.

Wasn’t there a similar situation a few cycles back with a sprinter from South Africa who had something going on at a chromosomal level?

This 100%. It seemed like somebody fell in love with Iran’s tactics and decided that was the way for the entire team to wrestle. The amount of time guys spent trying to push from a short offense underhook was rather remarkable.

Got any answers as to why we had a bad tournament in a weakened field? Or just want to “lol c’mon” and leave it at that? RBY-down artificially low, weight cut killed him. And you’re proving my point, Amine and Parris come from the same room, but they don’t go through the same process. Odds on that this is a USAW issue of some sort. Don’t know what it is, but to have athletes coming from 3 rooms all look off, where are the commonalities for their process leading up? Our guys usually wrestle the way seabass and amine did, they didn’t this time. These tournaments happen once every 4 years. Each weight class within the US has 20+ dudes putting their lives on hold for years just to aim at these few days of wrestling. Their effort and investment demand the respect of a few questions and raised eyebrows when the entire team looks off, considering it has been decades since we last failed to bring home at least one men’s gold. Not to mention, if we want to actually keep good wrestlers in the US system, we need to be showing out. We will keep losing more talent to dual citizenship otherwise.

This question is getting at our performance on the mat ultimately. Rather than asking if we lift too much, the missing imbalances we really are talking about are gymnastic ability and access to flexibility. This is something that HAS worked its way into grassroots programming, but we could definitely benefit from the body control gymnastic training that is the core of moving up the national ladder in most state-run athletic programs (ie China and Russia). It is undeniably the best foundation for success in a sport like wrestling.

I'm getting the impression that the people having this discussion have never spent time in a college room. The notion that wrestling doesn't make you stronger is insane.

Obviously that's not 100% the case. If it were so...then nobody in any weight class sport would bother cutting weight.

I don't disagree about the optimal combination part. The wild thing for us is that no, we didn't catabolize anything away. Most of the dudes who ran westside settled at a different physical set point (and D3, I never ran gear, I don't know about the other tbh though). For my whole wrestling career high 180's was my natural set point. That year, it was high 190's. Made the cut to 174 an absolute blast. I wasn't the only one. This sort of thing would have been way better.