No, not with 9.9 scholarships. We can and will continue to get top 20 guys but most classes may only have 1-2 of them. We already have 1 for next year in Naak. As long as we can be top 5, based on quality not quantity, half the time we will be a title contender years to come.
2022 Recruits and their list of schools
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It appears there is a big gap between #3 and #4. Also, Rojas is way under ranked IMO. Wrestles one of the toughest schedule you will see include college/senior level.
I tend to agree with this. IIRC he had a tough opponent in the pre-season wrestle offs held in the Rec Center and I came away impressed thinking that he would be a contender. I think the match was super close for a couple of periods and then he lost control of it in the 3rd. Maybe against Fanthorp or Gallick.
What I have been told is that TJ is responding to the marketplace in his approach. That is, the parents are seeking that type of training and mentality and he is providing it. I recall an interview with him where he admitted he was pushed too hard in his development.
Very well could be. Obviously there is a huge market of stupid wrestling parents and almost all of them are clueless about what it takes to be a successful athlete.
He of all people should know how wrong that approach is, and that overbearing parents only harm the vast majority of these kids.
What the marketplace wants isn’t always right. In my neck of the woods Askren Wrestling Academy is the gold standard. Ben is convicted in his ways of doing things and will tell the parents who want that “tough wrestling” overload to hit the road and find a new club. The results are starting to speak for themselves and he doesn’t get questioned/challenged nearly as much.
If you want to make youth/high school kids good you can work them hard and burn them out but achieve that level of success. Long lasting success beyond that is harder to come by though as kids end up just being over the grind of wrestling all together too early.
Agreed. Which is why the link to seabolt kids going to wrestle for tweedle dee and tweedle dum makes a lot of sense.
That marketplace is the parents that have a hard on for the old school iowa style they see the dancing monkeys doing over east.
It’s understandable not to like the guy because of who he is but to say these kids aren’t having success isn’t accurate. High school wrestling in Iowa is at an all time high and almost of that success is because of TJ raising the bar. They are having massive success at the AAU level, Tulsa, Fargo, HS, Super 32, etc. Not every kid is going to be an “athlete” - some don’t have the genes to play football or baseball. I don’t think TJ or Askren are doing it wrong, just different. Different flavors for different people. I hate when people make it sound like college is all that matters. Why wrestle high school if all that matters is college? That’s like the stupid argument that all that matters is nationals. TJ had zero college success but is a household name because he’s one of the greatest Iowa HS wrestlers of all time. Where he doesn’t compare to his dad is that he was forced into being home schooled and didn’t develop social skills until much later than normal. Still lacks some. I don’t agree with a lot of their philosophies over there but I also recognize that tons of kids specialize in a certain sport, not just wrestling, and it’s not right or wrong.
Who said they aren’t having success? I’m worried about much more than wrestling with these kids.
I’m not against specialization, especially in high school, but grinding 5th graders like they’re in D1 I’m firmly against regardless of how many matches or tournaments they win.
I can agree with you there but Ayala is about is good of a kid as you’ll ever meet. Parenting has more to do with it than TJ’s coaching. Deadbeat parents are going to ruin their kids regardless
I agree with you about the parents 100%. The problem is when the wrestling coach gives the stupid parents reinforcement. Then they get an “expert” backing them up that if they just grind Johnny a little harder, make him push through that injury, or cut a little more weight that is in his best interest.
There are always stupid parents. Look at the Askren example above. He had plenty of parents wanting him to grind his kids harder. He told them no. Eventually, most of them came around, and so far his club has proven tremendously more successful than Sebolt.
Sebolt is a tremendous wrestler and has a wealth of technical and tactical knowledge. He could 100% run a successful club without beating kids into the ground.
This goes back to what the ultimate goal is for the kids. You say Iowa HS wrestling is at its most successful. Very well could be at the HS level. Last year there was one collegiate AA from an Iowa HS and I believe there was only one this year. Iowa HS wrestlers are not translating into blue chip recruits are we have in the past. Many variables to that so I’m not pinning it on the clubs…
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Agreed, wrestling evolved with some excellent clubs out east over the years. Those kids have had exposure to all the big tournaments (beast, Super32, Poweraid, Ironman, cadet WTT, etc.) Iowa kids never wrestled the best tournaments and because of that, the Vanilla wrestling go-hard style fell way behind the rest of the country. Iowa kids are getting more and more exposure to the best kids in the nation and being forced to evolve and learn and grow. Iowa kids are starting to get a little better on the mat, still behind kids out east, but getting better. Sebolt has a great group of kids in high school now. Also a great group of young kids. Check back in 5 years to see how it all worked out.
I agree with not grinding kids with brutal training at a young age, which is why we chose a different club.
I have found that *most* parents who have wrestled themselves agree with me. Anybody that had been through it usually knows success is in the long game.
Not meant as a slight on Sebolt, but a good deal of his athletes were elite before they showed up there.
I have found that *most* parents who have wrestled themselves agree with me. Anybody that had been through it usually knows success is in the long game.
Not meant as a slight on Sebolt, but a good deal of his athletes were elite before they showed up there.
Sebolt has raised the bar for high school wrestling in the state of Iowa I’m not sold on if that will be a successful transition into college. Too early to tell what I have seen is Shriver and now Alaya both having injuries their first year of college. There are other examples of HS seniors who have missed the majority of their high school season because of injury. Is he concentrating too much on early success and grinding his guys to hard at a young age? Time will tell so far the trend is not positive for the transition to college.
Honest question for everyone...are we seeing injuries on these kids from being overworked or is it because they are doing so much funk wrestling that things are bending/getting pressure put on compared to before?
while true when you have won 2 Hodge trophies you’re starting from a stronger position with parents. TJ seems to be a heck of a coach but he doesn’t have instant credibility like an Askren.
I can’t answer for certain but there is definitely over working in youth wrestling. I’ve seen kids with pretty traumatic injuries simply because they competed about 40 weekends a year and pushed through minor injuries that soon became major injuries.
