Strength of wrestling in TN

[grumpyoldman]

20 hours ago, TotallynotLEO said:

I don't get all the hate for the different levels. 

College has D1, D2, D3, NAIA and JC levels for individual sports. 

A kid getting AA status at an NAIA school diminishes the kids on the stand at D1... that's exactly what you are claiming. 

If it were team sports,  an apples to apples comparison is Nick Saban complaining about Carson Newman winning a title. 

I just don't see it. 

 

Ocean, you are correct about parents ruining the sports experience.  As coaches and parents we need to elevate the entire program, not just our kid(s). I've seen parents that dominate the rooms/fields, only looking for their kid to get attention and improvement.  To quote a fairly successful dude, "it's amazing what you accomplish when you don't care who gets credit". That's how parents and coaches should approach making a program better.  

 

At Blackman this weekend there was a lot of talent in the room. I was impressed by some pretty high level kids there.  

I wouldn't say there is a lot of hate.  There are only a couple guys on this board against it.  But they comment on every thread, every year, about the same thing.  So, it just appears there is more.....you know....because they are very very persistent. 

Edited April 17, 2023 by grumpyoldman

[cbg]

5 hours ago, Biffmar4 said:

More divisions, also means more kids experiencing disappointment.

I am not sure that this statement is correct.  If you only had one division but you had the same number of wrestlers, you would actually have more kids disappointed as you would only have one state champion and not three state champions.  While I am a big proponent of one division for all individual sports you would find that more kids would experience defeat before in the district and region before they ever had the opportunity to compete in the state tournament.  Like the "old timer" told me, we currently have kids winning a state championship that would not even qualify for the state tournament if we had one division.

[Biffmar4]

42 minutes ago, cbg said:

I am not sure that this statement is correct.  If you only had one division but you had the same number of wrestlers, you would actually have more kids disappointed as you would only have one state champion and not three state champions.  While I am a big proponent of one division for all individual sports you would find that more kids would experience defeat before in the district and region before they ever had the opportunity to compete in the state tournament.  Like the "old timer" told me, we currently have kids winning a state championship that would not even qualify for the state tournament if we had one division.

And....? What does that do to hurt our sport?  

3 state champs equals less kids competing in college at all levels than if we had 1 state champ?

 

[cbg]

3 hours ago, Biffmar4 said:

And....? What does that do to hurt our sport?  

3 state champs equals less kids competing in college at all levels than if we had 1 state champ?

 

You have absolutely zero proof that 3 state champions equal more kids wrestling in college than one overall combined state champion.  I personally watched both Gray Simons (Tennessee) and Ethan Reeve (UTC) recruit the number 2 or 3 kid over the state champion because those kids while not state champions were actually better athletes than the state champion.  The higher the level of competition the better the athlete must be to win a championship.  Long gone are the days of someone just being a strong and tough brawler like the Brands brothers and them winning a national championship.  Todays national champions are typically very good athletes.

[Biffmar4]

49 minutes ago, cbg said:

You have absolutely zero proof that 3 state champions equal more kids wrestling in college than one overall combined state champion.  I personally watched both Gray Simons (Tennessee) and Ethan Reeve (UTC) recruit the number 2 or 3 kid over the state champion because those kids while not state champions were actually better athletes than the state champion.  The higher the level of competition the better the athlete must be to win a championship.  Long gone are the days of someone just being a strong and tough brawler like the Brands brothers and them winning a national championship.  Todays national champions are typically very good athletes.

You’re right. Do you have any proof that 3 state champs or more accurately stated, three divisions, decreases the number of kids competing at the next level?  I’m just curious how three divisions hurts wrestling in TN. I think there are lots of reasons it helps. Just curious on your take there. 

[cbg]

11 minutes ago, Biffmar4 said:

You’re right. Do you have any proof that 3 state champs or more accurately stated, three divisions, decreases the number of kids competing at the next level?  I’m just curious how three divisions hurts wrestling in TN. I think there are lots of reasons it helps. Just curious on your take there. 

Anything that I say is strictly my opinion.  After being around the sport for fifty plus years I will say that the only thing that has helped wrestling grow in Tennessee is the population explosion in the state and much better coaching throughout the state.  My contention is that if you only had one champion the wrestlers would be required to work much harder than they do today and they would have no place to run.  With three divisions the talent is spread out and kids can separate weight classifications and the good kids are able to avoid each other at the state tournament.  If we had one division and a 32 man bracket per weight division the matches would be much closer at the state tournament.  Today we have kids pinning or winning by technical fall through out the tournament.  When it was one division most all of the matches after the round of 16 were within two or three points or overtime.  Learning how to win close matches is what seasons kids for national tournaments.  

[Biffmar4]

8 hours ago, cbg said:

Anything that I say is strictly my opinion.  After being around the sport for fifty plus years I will say that the only thing that has helped wrestling grow in Tennessee is the population explosion in the state and much better coaching throughout the state.  My contention is that if you only had one champion the wrestlers would be required to work much harder than they do today and they would have no place to run.  With three divisions the talent is spread out and kids can separate weight classifications and the good kids are able to avoid each other at the state tournament.  If we had one division and a 32 man bracket per weight division the matches would be much closer at the state tournament.  Today we have kids pinning or winning by technical fall through out the tournament.  When it was one division most all of the matches after the round of 16 were within two or three points or overtime.  Learning how to win close matches is what seasons kids for national tournaments.  

Totally respect that opinion. I don’t agree with it 100% though. There are some kids that will try to find the best weight class to win a state championship in any of the three divisions. I think you’d still have that to some degree if there were just one.
 

Most of the kids I know that won a state championship this year in any division have been wrestling 10+ years and are putting in several types of year round work. I think the days are gone in TN where you can just be a good athlete and win a state championship. You might find 1 or 2 out of the 42 champions last year. Also, some of these kids putting in work year round while also participating in other extra curricular activities and attaining and carrying high gpas, I’m just not sure how much harder they can work. I definitely don’t see a lack of hard work and discipline among the top tier wrestlers in the state. One division or three divisions won’t change the effort these guys put in. 
 

I’m curious, back in the day when they had one division, did you have kids driving 120 miles round trip in the off season 3-5 days a week to get in a room to practice with the best competition in the area (regardless of division)?  That’s definitely happening today and I’m speaking from firsthand experience. 
 

For these kids, there are goals beyond a state championship that they are working year round for. It doesn’t always manifest itself in a state championship but it does appear to be manifesting itself in next level wrestling opportunities. 
 

I’d also say that the wrestling that takes place between March and August is what makes the best high school wrestlers who they are, not the wrestling that takes place from October to February. 

[cowcatcherII]

From a fan's perspective, I will say that I have loved having three divisions.

We have seen 7 different teams win state titles in the small school in the past 10 years with Hixson, Gibbs, Pigeon Forge, Fairview, Greeneville, Signal Mountain, and Halls. 

DII, Ryan and Baylor have won every single dual and traditional title with the exception of CBHS grabbing 1 in the past 10 years.

Big school, Cleveland has won every dual and traditional title in the past 10 years with the exception of Bradley winning titles in 2016 and 2017, I believe.

The parity in the small school division has given me a reason to be interested in team races and follow many different programs. If we went back to having one combined division, I suspect Baylor and Cleveland would win the state 97% of the time with Ryan having an outside shot once every 10 years or so. 

I think you also have to look at the the idea of having one division by using your common sense. How is it fair for a kid from an avg. public school to have to compete against a kid imported from out of state to a school like Baylor or McCallie to win a state title? The private schools have countless built in advantages due to money that the public schools outside of Cleveland will never have such as facilities, coaching, etc. The opportunities simply aren't the same. And for this very reason, we can discuss the topic all we want, but in today's world there is one thing I do know for certain: The TSSAA is more likely to add another division than they are to combine divisions. There will NEVER again be a single division for duals or traditional. That is a fact.

Again, this is all from a fan's perspective. I can see why many others want one division. You could see state final matchups between guys like Dupill and Norman. Just my opinion, but I like it the way it is with the different divisions currently.

[RMC]

Here's an aged article on the topic of multiple classes:

https://intermatwrestle.com/articles/13237

 

I have never liked the fact the Georgia now has 7 classifications.

[TotallynotLEO]

8 minutes ago, cowcatcherII said:

From a fan's perspective, I will say that I have loved having three divisions.

We have seen 7 different teams win state titles in the small school in the past 10 years with Hixson, Gibbs, Pigeon Forge, Fairview, Greeneville, Signal Mountain, and Halls. 

DII, Ryan and Baylor have won every single dual and traditional title with the exception of CBHS grabbing 1 in the past 10 years.

Big school, Cleveland has won every dual and traditional title in the past 10 years with the exception of Bradley winning titles in 2016 and 2017, I believe.

The parity in the small school division has given me a reason to be interested in team races.

All great points.  I'm confident you'll see an 8th different team this year in the Small Division. 

[Biffmar4]

6 minutes ago, TotallynotLEO said:

All great points.  I'm confident you'll see an 8th different team this year in the Small Division. 

They are 100% putting in the extra work as a team.  Fun to watch them work.

[cbg]

3 hours ago, Biffmar4 said:

I’m curious, back in the day when they had one division, did you have kids driving 120 miles round trip in the off season 3-5 days a week to get in a room to practice with the best competition in the area (regardless of division)?

Back in the day when you only had one division most of the kids were two and three sport athletes, so the only "OFF SEASON" was in the summer.  A large number of the Iowa's high school athletes still remain two and three sport athletes. The only true off season training that I am aware of was at Cleveland High School with Al Miller, a little was happening at UTC, some of the kids from the Knoxville area would roll around with the University of Tennessee wrestlers that were attending summer school and in the Nashville area Brian Dunning and David Scott ran a training camp out of Father Ryan and at Goodlettsville High School Doug Newman had Tony Rowland running workouts for the kids.  Believe me when I say that the upper East Tennessee was almost completely void of offseason wrestling.  Al Miller and Doug Newman would conduct a training camp at Castle Heights with Doug Mays where the temperatures inside the training gymnasium would reach 110+ and the kids went through three workout per day.  Like Al Miller once said, the kids were able to eat three meals per day and still make weight with very little effort due to the heat and hard drilling.  They would then load up the kids for a two-week national tournament adventure to the AAU Nationals and then on to Iowa City for the USWF Nationals.  That was three consecutive weeks of training/wrestling camp for the kids like Howard Langford, Adrian Norfleet and Mike Newman that were tough enough to endure the torture.  Very few of the kids and parents today would want to be away from home for three consecutive weeks focusing on nothing but wrestling.  Most of the better high school wrestlers would go to various camps around the country.  This allowed the college coaches the opportunity to see them, and they learned what has become the lost art of drilling.  Look back at the podcast where Ethan Reeve discusses how kids today wrestle live but really don't understand how important hard drilling is for a wrestler.  

Edited April 18, 2023 by cbg