The NCAA has done a wonderful job changing rules to make wrestling more fan friendly. Adding the 4 point nearfall, leaving the mat warranting a stalling call, opponent being given the option if a wrestler takes an injury timeout, just to name a few. What needs to happen for the High School Association to follow suit? Not that I have any faith that Kansas will do the right thing even if these changes are made. Hell, we can't even follow the rest of the country and get our weigh in's right.

Bump

Those rule changes would need to be approved by the NFHS. Kansas follows the NFHS rules on everything except the weight loss procedure and allowing home site weigh-ins.

I guess my point on falling behind would be, if Kansas cant even comply with simple weigh-in procedures how can we hope to adapt new rules. I would hope that the NFHS would be looking in to adopting some of the changes that the NCAA has added. These are positive changes for our sport.

Question : When was the last time a change in the COMPETITION/MATCH rules as adopted by the NFHS NOT adopted by Kansas?

Answer: In my lifetime, I remember none.

Home site weigh-ins were instituted years ago. . .in the early 90's out of concern for the wrestler's health and academics. Maybe it IS time to again look at them. My experience has been going to site weigh-ins just shifts the problems with weigh-ins by 12 hours. When it was last seriously discussed there was strong support statewide to retain them. Perhaps that has changed.

Weight loss: What Kansas developed is much easier than the NFHS descent plan to work with, for both the wrestlers who live with it and the coaches who must oversee it.

And, I will throw in another area I wish Kansas would deviate from the NFHS: allow a sixth match to be wrestled in a day's competition by wrestlers of KSHSAA Member Schools where the match is necessary to determine place points in a bracketed tournament.

The hour weigh in before and random drawing a weight would be good. I wish even with the method now that duals would all be random drawn so it isn't always coming down to Heavyweight. Hour before weigh-ins would also promote diet instead of trying to cut a lot of weight the morning of and then just packing it all back on. I would like to see what a kid weighs on a Tuesday-Saturday when they have a dual on a Thursday and tournament on Saturday to see the fluctuation.


I personally would love to see Kansas allow a team to go to 1 competition outside the 500 miles radius per year so Kansas guys can go see competition beyond just the nearby states.

The NCAA is doing a great job at looking at the sport of wrestling and trying to make positive changes for the sport. Whether it is the state association or the national association, Chad is right, the high school associations are happy with status quo. The powers to be need to take a good look at wrestling at the high school level and try to make positive changes for the good of the sport and the athletes. The NFHS needs to take a look at the out of bounds rules, injury time, stalling, scoring, and many other things that would make our sport more exciting and fan friendly. The KSHSAA needs to take a look at the weigh in process. Is Kansas really helping our kids by allowing them to weigh in before school so they can focus on school or are we shifting that to the day before? We live on the border and see the effects of the national weigh in. I see other states' wrestlers healthier and stronger and they are still losing weight but are forced to do it differently because of national rules. Are we really doing this because it is easier? I don't want extra work but if it is good for our sport and athletes then so be it. Other areas I would like them to review are allowing at least 1 pre-season or open tournament and not have to sit out of practice. Also, allowing high school coaches to coach their athletes freestyle/greco in the spring. It is much easier for athletes to find a freestyle/greco club in urban areas than rural areas. We have high school wrestlers that want to try freestyle/greco but do not have coaches with the experience or time to do it so they either travel or don't do it.
Again, CHAD IS RIGHT! Lets get the powers to be to take a good hard look at the sport of wrestling at the high school level and make some positive changes for our sport and our athletes.

Even our neighboring state Missouri is making some changes... Their rule formerly excluded any outside competition for any HS wrestlers once the MSHSAA first practice date hit. This meant they couldn't even skip out of practice to club wrestle in order to compete in some preseason events. The NEW rule... Any HS wrestler, with written approval from their AD, may compete in two outside of MSHSAA or high school sanctioned events during the season. An awesome step in the right direction!!


THINGS THAT KANSAS COULD CHANGE:
1. KSHSAA needs to permit HS coach contact to continue after state until the first day of school the following school year. Coach Buckbee is spot on as he indicated this in his post.
2. Deregulate Middle School wrestling!!! Who cares if a wrestler double dips and competes in club and school events?? It is middle school and in many places it is a glorified intramural setup!
3. I believe the KS weigh in system PROMOTES weight cutting. It gives far too much freedom to fudge and far too much time to recover! Why do we think we have it right Greg??
4. Make the travel distance restriction disappear!! It doesn't make common sense and it completely eliminates the opportunity for KS wrestlers to see the top shelf competition during the HS season.
5. Too many individual state tournaments!!! If we want dual state then have ONE individual state tournament and 4 or 5 (just for you Doug V) dual state events.

We could go on and on but really the #1 change that MUST be made to put Kansas athletes in a progressive position is to impeach, remove, fire, demote, terminate, or my favorite "CAN!" Gary Mussolini er I mean Musselman!

I'd just like to sum up to make sure I understand.

Kansas follows ALL of the Rules...except the ones we don't like.

I wonder how a school would work if the students just followed the rules the WANTED to?

I'm having trouble figuring out how that one rule deviation from NFHS effects us negatively nationally. Yes, we don't get to vote on issues effecting the NFHS. I don't see that as holding us back.

I think it's just the one we don't like. Not the ones. Or are there other rules we don't follow??

If you have no vote then you have to follow what everyone else chooses. Followers are behind while leaders are in the front. Those schools that do not travel to States that follow the rule wouldn't understand. The NFHS has this rule in effect for a reason. Lazy Coaching should not be a reason to fall behind.

I want to make sure I understand. . .Leaders always follow all the rules? I will certainly remember that.

I think Chad is confused by the fact there are in effect two sets of rules. NFHS doesn't govern ALL the rules that KSHSAA has in place. States are given a lot of freedom with regard to travel, in season competition restrictions, etc. NFHS governs the rules on the mat and many surrounding the actual competitions but not regarding eligibility etc. For example... I believe Kansas may be the ONLY state that cooked up two rules for eligibility regarding age. First would be the cap that doesn't allow a student to turn 19 before August 1 and be eligible. But if you repeat the 7th or 8th grade for ANY REASON then you will forgo a year of HS eligibility. STUPID. You can file for a hardship on the 19 year restriction but none for the 7th or 8th grade repeat! Even more dumb, they didn't grandfather in the impacted group. Even more dumb, the appeal process is two boards occupied by lemmings! Nearly EVERY appeal heard under Gary M. has been unanimously upheld. No one thinks for themselves??? I digress... The point is KSHSAA is holding us back but not bc they follow the NFHSA rules.

Lets talk about the KSHSAA business model...Schools are going broke while they stuff their treasure chest.

I'm starting to wonder if you understand anything.

Love the points cokeley am Beeson are making. Kshsaa rules are hurting this sport in ks. An I feel you will continue to see tough born an bred ks kids leave are state seeking a bigger stage in surrounding states. It needs to start with addressing rules Beeson an cokeley pointed out above an ultimately getting a D1 program here in kansas.. we should keep them kids here for college.

We are big on following USAW type of rules and regulations, but for NFHS we go opposite way. USA must be Republican in Kansas and NFHS Democratic with the way we don't want to vote with that party.

Obvious that you don't.

It will certainly be a glorious day when "the" rules are finally developed that EVERYONE agrees with, thinks are fair, "make sense" to all, etc.