The John Smith low single is part of his sport's lexicon, and yet he is legend for many more reasons than his namesake takedown and sublime leg attacks.
When he speaks Wednesday at lunch at Maggiano's in Buckhead and at dinner at the Buckhead Club about how coaching has evolved in a quarter century, the Oklahoma State head coach will bring an unmatched pedigree before members of the Atlanta chapter of Wrestlers in Business.
No American wrestler has been more successful at the international level, where his 100-5 record, two Olympic gold medals and four World freestyle championships -- won consecutively from 1987-'92 -- stand alone in our land.Only one other American wrestler, Bruce Baumgartner, has won as many as five world-level titles, and Smith is still the only wrestler to win a world freestyle title while still in college. That one came between his junior and senior years at Oklahoma State, where he won NCAA individual titles in '87 and '88.
Just six men have won more world-level titles, and Aleksandr Medved (10), Buvaisar Saitiev (nine), Sergei Beloglazov, Arsen Fadzayev, Valentin Yordanov (eight each) and Makharbek Khadartsev (seven) all wrestled longer.
That's worked out well, as the Cowboys have won five NCAA championships and 13 Big 12 titles while producing 26 national champions and five Olympians on his watch.
In 1990, he became the first -- and still only -- wrestler to win the AAU Sullivan award, given annually to the nation's top amateur athlete.
A great deal has changed since Smith moved into coaching 23 years ago, and he said that, "about 70 percent" of his job now is administrative exclusive of recruiting and coaching student-athletes.
Academic requirements have stiffened, rules are always shifting, the sport has been threatened at the Olympic level, money beyond scholarships is now in play for student-athletes and must be managed, and the nature of student-athletes themselves has evolved.
One thing hasn't changed: wrestling has long been a family affair for the Smiths and will be for a while.
This fall, John -- who has nine siblings -- will for the first time coach one of his children. Joe, a four-time Oklahoma high school champion, will be a freshman.
Smith, 49, has experience coaching blood. His younger brother, Pat Smith, was the first four-time NCAA champion, winning titles from '90-'94, while wrestling for the Cowboys. He also coached his nephew, Chris. Smith's older brother, Lee Roy, was like John and Pat an NCAA champion.
He took time to preview his speeches and opine on a few issues.
Is coaching substantially different than when you started at Oklahoma State?
Smith: There's definitely been some changes in America. That doesn't necessarily mean that they're negative or positive. You stay pretty close to what you believe is successful, but dealing with individuals is different.
I don't know whether as you get older you believe it's more maintenance [required], but in the end, this generation of athletes works just as hard as any.
We've gone through pretty serious times with things like 9-11, where you want to protect. With that comes things that don't correlate with athletics at times.
I think parent involvement is pretty good yet I think we need to teach parents how to be involved. How do we teach them to give [their children] the best opportunity to excel, meaning reach their potential? That's not necessarily about being an NCAA champion, but [ensuring that] they feel fulfilled, and have some sense of accomplishment.
In some ways with parents, that's working opposite. Today's student-athletes, when they're done, they're sometimes feeling unfulfilled because of parental interference.
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