Doug747 you and I agree on your last post. Quitters do kill the sport. If my kid signs up for something, he's gonna finish it. In a team concept, your team expects you to fulfill your spot or weight class. When you get mad and quit, you let the team down almost as much as you do yourself.

I would have to take umbrage with the idea that 14 4th, 5th and 6th placers are average Joes. I think that would show that you coach the whole room and not just the guys that are pretty darn good before the coaching occurs. Having 3 D1 wrestlers is an anomaly in most cases; otherwise, having 3 D1 wrestlers only occurs when you are able to bring wrestlers in to your program from other programs in the state. Most high school teams don't have that luxury.

I do agree about winning your spot on the team, though. If you win your spot, you win your spot--even if a freshman beats a senior--the best guy, as long as he follows the rules, wins the spot.

There is nothing laughable about a team that wins a championship without a champion. Especially if they are bringing a ton of wrestlers and placing them all, then they are most likely the best team. Our idea of a team is definitely different, but our schools have very different circumstances as well.

Tate Thompson

Well said thompson!

The point of a team is having everyone count from top to bottom everyone has a chance to contribute not just Your so called studs. Having 3 state champions with no help doesn't make you a great team. Having everyone work together and help each other and also move weight to make your team better will make a true team champion.

When you are in the minority and you feel that you are logical, you are really illogical. The day I see 28 guys on the mat going at it I will buy into this team stuff. I would hate to be the coach that told this dad that his wrestler had to wrestle a weight he didn't want to wrestle, if he had established he could make that weight conforming to the rules and beaten all of the competitors at that weight. This is the beauty of the sport. Leave the politics out of this sport. PLEASE! Any coach who puts his own personal goals ahead of any of his wrestlers is NOT a good coach.
_________________________
Will Cokeley


Ouch! Now I know why you told me it was time to get out of coaching. I've moved kids around to fill lineups, win duals, have great matchups for all of my 36 years of coaching. I have always emphasised TEAM to my kids in the dual setting and it carries over to the tournaments. My wrestlers knew that they may be moved up to fill a void, or for a specific matchup that might save team points in order to win the dual. Have I had kids upset or even dad's upset, you bet and I'd do it again because of what it teaches kids.

One of the things I admire most about this sport is that it teaches life lessons better than any other sport. In life you learn that sacrifice is necessary to achieve something worthwhile. We lose weight to achieve a goal of maybe making the team, getting to a weight where we can be successful or because that is where the team needs you and you are the best candidate to handle it. In a dual, I taught kids that they may have to sacrifice their weight and move up if the team could benefit from the move and win the dual. Sometimes that meant giving up an individual win and wrestling a match where you try not to give the opponent bonus points in a loss. Every team member understood the sacrifice their team member made for THEM. Some of the most exciting matches I've coached over the years was when an individual was willing to sacrifice in those very circumstances and battle his heart out in a losing cause only to preserve a victory for his Team (NOT THE COACH). What you learn and what you gain from these situations is all relative to what the individual has been taught. I still think its a Team Sport based on Individual performances.

What did it teach the kids that loss because you made them "fill a void" when they might have been able to win at their original weight? The thing about wrestling is even in team duals the only kids that are happy with the team win are the ones that got their hand raised. The one's that lost are still beating them selves up for losing. You can look at from what ever way you want but when it comes down to it wrestling is all about the individual. That's how it has been and that's how it will always be.

"True team champion" from scoring points in an individual tournament where some teams don't have their entire lineup where others do. A tournament where there were four different qualifying tournaments with four different sets of full teams but the results from that individual tournament leave most teams with just a fraction of their line up.

In 2008 SJA finished 25th in the team standings. Ahead of 35 other 4A teams with just one guy scoring points. I am pretty sure that SJA would not have been able to beat even half of those teams in a dual.

Coach Alley, I agree with your approach to duals but would you ever tell a kid he couldn't qualify and compete at state in the weight class he would do best in for the sake of putting an inferior wrestler in for the HOPE of scoring more points at the state tournament? That is real issue I am addressing. I already stated that a dual team state would be a real team event and then the coach's strategy is important.

I just wonder how many of teams that have won a title at INDIVIDUAL state but wouldn't have won dual state?

I didn't say that 3 state champs would be a better team. I said I would rather watch a team with three state champs than 14 5th and 6th placers. There is a huge talent gap between 1st and 5th/6th.

One last question, what is a "so called stud"?

I have never heard a HS wrestler say, when asked about his wrestling performance, say I lost my match but it is okay because I saved some points and my team won the dual because of it. MOTIVATION is direction and intensity. You are going to have a hard time with human nature convincing young men to lose when they could have won just so a team could win a dual. You are better off having all of your wrestlers focused on winning their matches at the weight they earned the right to wrestle.

What are you teaching a kid? "I am the coach. I am the authority and you have no right to challenge my decision. I decide what is most important and your opinion does not matter! I am the almighty coach, bow to me!" I am certainly happy that I have never dealt with a coach like that. It wouldn't have been pretty.

I am going to have to say it is more logically an individual sport where individual performances determine a team score.

There are times that moving a wrestler or two around in a dual can be a great thing. We had a wrestler bump up a weight for a dual last year to try to steal some team points because their weight class was vacated by the other team and we had another wrestler who could step in for the 6 points. Our wrestler looked quite a bit smaller than his opponent but pulled off a 4-0 win.

The wrestler he beat is preseason ranked in Class 6A this year and may be a wrestler he sees early in the season. The match gave this wrestler additional confidence which took him a long way last year, so I believe that it was a good thing for both him and for his team.

By the way, someone has infiltrated the Kansas Wrestling website and put a bunch of bizarre posts on here. We need the monitors/facilitators to hunt this rogue poster down and eliminate them from the site. Thank you.

[quote=Cokeley.

I have never heard a HS wrestler say, when asked about his wrestling performance, say I lost my match but it is okay because I saved some points and my team won the dual because of it. MOTIVATION is direction and intensity. You are going to have a hard time with human nature convincing young men to lose when they could have won just so a team could win a dual. You are better off having all of your wrestlers focused on winning their matches at the weight they earned the right to wrestle.

What are you teaching a kid? "I am the coach. I am the authority and you have no right to challenge my decision. I decide what is most important and your opinion does not matter! I am the almighty coach, bow to me!" I am certainly happy that I have never dealt with a coach like that. It wouldn't have been pretty.

I am going to have to say it is more logically an individual sport where individual performances determine a team score. [/quote]

I think you hit the key word "Teach". From the beginning of the season, we taught the importance of the team. We taught them that there will be times in life that things don't always seem fair but you do them for a reason. You ever had a boss tell you to do something you didn't want to do? Have you ever had the opportunity to help someone else knowing that is might actually set you back temporairly? Those are decisions we or at least I have dealt with most of my adult life and I tried to explain that to my athletes. Would I ever sacrifice their position in a tournament, no way, but you would be amazed how much of that team attitude comes out even in a tournament. The carry over is having a kid strive for the bonus win to get the extra team points, when he had the match won and could of just sat back and say "what do I care, I'm winning my match."

When you get kids thinking about "Team" you will have a team. Hopefully, my former wrestlers would agree that they did understand authority, respect and discipline, but their respect came from what they were being taught not because of a position I held. They realized if they were being moved in a weight class it was because I had confidence in them to do a job that no one else on the team could fulfill as well as them. They didn't always like their assignment at the time but if they accepted the challenge, I feel they became stronger because of it. I think Shawn related many of the same points when he talked about his Army "brainwashing" as you called it.

Quagmire,

I have to disagree with you on this comment.....

"The thing about wrestling is even in team duals the only kids that are happy with the team win are the ones that got their hand raised. The one's that lost are still beating them selves up for losing."

I have observed and been a part of duals where kids that didn't give up the pin, staved off being tech falled, or only lost by 7 pts vice 8 pts have been the hero's of the match. Why: Because they saved critical team points.

Likewise I have had my had raised and won the match and felt like crap because I should have pinned my opponent or scored more team points and we lost as a team.

Will: I understand your perspective given the following post....

" "True team champion" from scoring points in an individual tournament where some teams don't have their entire lineup where others do. A tournament where there were four different qualifying tournaments with four different sets of full teams but the results from that individual tournament leave most teams with just a fraction of their line up.

In 2008 SJA finished 25th in the team standings. Ahead of 35 other 4A teams with just one guy scoring points. I am pretty sure that SJA would not have been able to beat even half of those teams in a dual.

Coach Alley, I agree with your approach to duals but would you ever tell a kid he couldn't qualify and compete at state in the weight class he would do best in for the sake of putting an inferior wrestler in for the HOPE of scoring more points at the state tournament? That is real issue I am addressing. I already stated that a dual team state would be a real team event and then the coach's strategy is important.

I just wonder how many of teams that have won a title at INDIVIDUAL state but wouldn't have won dual state?

I didn't say that 3 state champs would be a better team. I said I would rather watch a team with three state champs than 14 5th and 6th placers. There is a huge talent gap between 1st and 5th/6th.

One last question, what is a "so called stud"?"

The problem with this argument is that the real issue in your example assumes that the methodolgy we use to determine team champions is correct. I would argue that the way we do it in high school and college is not the best way to actually determine a team championship. We would be better off using a dual format to determine a team championship.

As for one of your earlier posts where you mentioned winning an argument with someone that is ignorant or words to that affect....not sure if that was a personal shot or not. I will assume it isn't because we are friends but just remember that one's perception of ignorance and logic depends on one's perspective.

Shawn Budke

Coach Alley,
That is why your teams were so successful. I would imagine the majority if not all of your kids respected and looked up to you. They not only became better wrestlers but also became better people. I love winning as much as the next guy, but here is a heads up for some of you. Not every wrestler has D1 aspirations! Some want to be part of a team and just go compete. They still work their tails off, but they are a wrestler from November through February. With that said, I will have this same situation this year. I will have several kids in the same weight. When we go to tournaments, I will put those kids in brackets that will allow us to score the most points. When we go to a dual tournament I will put them in the weight that gives us the best opportunity to win the dual. However, when we go to the regional tournament whoever wins the wrestle off for that weight will wrestle that weight and the other kid will bump up.

Bingo!

Is there a rule that says you have to wrestle a certain percent of your matches in order to wrestle that weight for state?

NO

“Any wrestler competing in the regional tournament must have a minimum of 1/2 of their total regularly scheduled school team competition weigh-ins at their certified weight class in order to be eligible for participation in that certification weight class in the state tournament series."

http://www.kshsaa.org/Publications/Wrestling.pdf

Or they can move up a weight class. It is set up so that you cannot just drop for regionals and state. Moving up is not an issue.

Clarification question: What if a wrestler is injured and misses competition until january. Is there a minimum number of matches he must wrestle to be elgible for regionals? Half of the teams total matches for the year meaning basically all the rest at the certified weight?

Thanks
t

No minimum number of matches. Just at least half of that wrestler's weigh-ins. So if he has just two weigh-ins before regionals, one of them have to be at his certified weight in order for him to be eligible to wrestle at that certified weight. Moving up weight is fine.

late to the convo but love it.

couple things:

Just because you win your wrestle off does not guarantee you a spot. I have seen wrestlers who have lost their spot and won a wrestle off. I have seen and heard of the best coaches in our nation doing this. Wrestle off is one thing, wrestlers still need to compete. I would hope my coaches focus was on competition and not practice. "PRACTICE"

Moving and sliding a line-up to win a dual does build character for wrestlers. Just because your bumping and sliding does not mean the "FOCUS" was changed from winning to losing. Your teaching kids to win as a team. I would also hope your individual wrestler isn't walking on the mat thinking he is going to lose. I would also hope one of my better wrestlers would be willing to move, even if it meant having a tougher match. Pushing yourself is a good thing!

This same team concept can be said for an individual on the back side of the state bracket, wrestling his A$$ off for the team, because they need his points to win a state title. You can't tell me being on the TEAM is not motivating the indivual wrestler. I have been on backsides of brackets before and won matches with my motivation being "not going to let the team down".

Bumping and sliding for line-up at State. I hope whomever is coaching has good enough communication with the wrestlers and the wrestlers parents so everyone can come to a decision that is agreed upon. 99.9% of the time an individual wrestler at their ideal weight will help the team at state. As state is not a dual but a tournament.

Last:

If you are a wrestler not bying into the TEAM. Your missing out.

T-Together
E-Everyone
A-Achieves
M-More

Bump and slide, that is a pretty good analogy. When it comes to State, it is a tournament and you go with your best line up at the weight they should be wrestling. In duals, I have really enjoyed the "bump and slide". Wrestlers get to see competition that they won't see in the post season matches, and get to evaluate their skill against a quality, yet heavier opponent.