Sorry for this long post, I promise it will be my last one (long one on this topic). I will let the readers know that the first section is a promise I made regarding asking some questions at Tulsa Nationals.
Regarding my questions of individuals regarding their support or lack thereof of middle school Vs. Clubs & National Tournaments.
I had the opportunity this last weekend to talk to several people regarding their opinions as to what is best for kids in middle school regarding their participation in School or Club. Below is a very brief summary of their responses. It was interesting that when possible all thought that when possible that kids should wrestle both for club and school, but when not possible the options varied a little regarding the benefit of national tournaments.
Joe Seay – Former Olympic Coach & Assistant at University of Virginia Now, known of as possibly the greatest tactical coach alive, also Kansas State NCAA National Champion Wrestler. - When not possible as is in Kansas, do what is best for the kid, to be a good wrestler though club participation is better than school on a middle school level because more advanced techniques and tougher competition become a part of the norm. Mental toughness and tough competition produce tougher wrestlers.
Kenny Monday – Former Olympic Gold Medal Winner. He expressed strong opinion that club wrestling on a Jr. High Level was the best option for high level wrestlers. “You only get better by wrestling the best.” Kenny would state. He did not take away from Jr. High Wrestling though; he felt that it was better for more advanced wrestlers to wrestle the best. I must say here that Kenny coaches a team out of Texas as assists at a High School. It would certainly become obvious why he would support youth wrestling but he was rather emphatic about wrestling the best and the only way to do that is at national tournaments. He also indicated that if we want to produce Olympic Champions that they will have to wrestle as many National Tournaments as possible.
Cael Sanderson - I was somewhat surprised in that Cael was not as clear on his opinion. We spent some time talking at his motel prior to his departure and he felt that the National tournaments do tend to put too much pressure on the kids and that if done they should be done on a limited basis, especially at first. While he would not come right out and state that he felt it was better to just go Jr. High, maybe because he has done so many appearances this year for Cliff Keen, I did get the impression that he didn’t like the National Tournaments. I could be totally wrong here and this is in no way meant to demean Cael, but that is the feel I got from his response to our conversation.
Danny Hodge - If you don’t know who he is you are probably new to the sport, he is known of simply as The Legend of Wrestling – I was a unique conversation with Danny. We spoke some about a mutual friend’s son who actually made the decision to wrestle for his school instead of at TN this year, by the way he normally wrestles for both. For this kid it meant giving up the Trinity Award and quite possibly the United States Cliff Keen Wrestler of the Year. While we both respected the decision our friend and his son had made, we both felt saddened because it is likely one of the only times that this boy would ever be able to receive this type of recognition and the competition would have definitely been much tougher. While we both respected the boy and the decision he made, we both felt he should have wrestled Tulsa Nationals.
