It's not a new concern. I've certainly heard from disgruntled readers when I've written news stories about college wrestlers being charged with drunk driving or assault or other potentially serious crimes. "You're ruining that kid's life" is one often-expressed idea; "You don't write about the alleged crimes of students who aren't wrestlers" is another.
I understand that some wrestling fans may think that it's not a good idea for me to write stories which may be embarrassing for the individuals involved or for their schools or for the entire sport. The duality of my professional writing background "gets" that idea. As someone with a journalism degree who sat through many hours of classes in news reporting, editing, ethics and journalism law, my general thought is, "If it involves a wrestler, coach or has some impact on wrestling -- and it's newsworthy and verifiable -- I should consider writing about it." However, as someone who spent thirty years making a living as an advertising writer -- someone hired to present a product in the best possible light, to get you to buy it -- I understand the concept of avoiding saying anything that is negative.
What's more, as an amateur wrestling fan for about 45 years, I join those of you who think wrestling just doesn't get enough positive coverage from the mainstream media. I'm right there with you when a major wrestling event is ignored by Sports Illustrated or USA Today or ESPN or national jock-talk shows.
All that said, does that mean we wrestling fans think our sport is so fragile that it can't withstand a news story at a leading wrestling website about a Russian mat official being denied the ability to attend the Worlds ... or a wrestler who is accused of breaking the law? Will parents tell their kid "I don't want you to wrestle because of what so-and-so did ..."? I've got to think the sport, its participants, and its fans, are tougher than that.
Unlike most sportswriters, the only sport I write about is wrestling. That said, I would be surprised if basketball or football fans contact their local papers or talk radio shows or sport-specific websites to say, "I don't want to hear about so-and-so's arrest". If anything, I sense there's a great hunger among many sports fans to know that sort of behind-the-scenes stuff ... and they become angry if they believe sportswriters and sportscasters are withholding information from them.
The wrestling community has been known to act this way, too. Last summer, I wrote a feature article for InterMat titled "Matmen Behaving Badly?" that sprang from my coverage of a number of incidents the previous season -- alleged DUIs, offensive tweets, rough hazing rituals that threatened the very existence of one college program. As I wrote in that article, bad behavior on the part of student-athletes -- whether it's blowing off a class, or being arrested for a potentially serious crime -- is not a new phenomenon ... nor is it limited to amateur wrestling. Another statement that has proved to be truer than I realized a year ago: wrestling fans tend to be of two minds when it comes to what could be considered bad news. They'd rather not hear it if it concerns the program they follow; however, if it's about a rival, then it's "Dig deeper! We want you to expose the truth!"
I understand that many of you feel these stories may not reflect well on the accused -- or the sport. But it's not as if I am the only person in the world reporting this stuff. In most cases, for me to write about it for the wrestling world, the story has to be available online at another website. (There are the rare occasions when I've been alerted to an incident/story by an individual.) In the case of denying the Russian official a visa to visit the U.S., websites for The Moscow Times and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty were reporting it as news; about the same time as my stories were appearing on InterMat, the Associated Press was also reporting the incident in a story that appeared in newspapers across the country. (A day or two before, I came across stories that some wrestlers from India had problems obtaining visas for the World Championships, and was set to write about this ... but the issue was settled within hours and the wrestlers were able to travel to Las Vegas.) In the case of college wrestlers who have been arrested, usually it's the local community newspaper and/or the college paper that breaks the story ... though, in some places (most notably, the state of Iowa), local police departments and county sheriffs post daily arrest records online for the world to see.
In other words, InterMat isn't the only website providing this news. With a bit of digging and plenty of time, intrepid wrestling fans can uncover many of these stories on their own.
All that said, I'm not all about the negative. Like most of you, I love those uplifting, feel-good stories related to wrestling -- the wrestler who overcame serious injury, or the program that conducted a fundraiser for a worthy cause, or had wrestlers who volunteered their services to make life better for their neighbors in their community, or the college that's just added a wrestling program. I like nothing better than to share those stories with you. However, like many of you, I want to know the story-behind-the-story when a wrestler is suspended ... or a program is threatened with elimination because of the alleged actions of a few members. Even if it may not feel so good to share that kind of information.
I feel blessed to be able to write about the sport I've loved for decades. The ad writer in me wants to do all I can to help promote all that's great about wrestling and the vast majority of its athletes, coaches and fans. The journalist in me also realizes that I would not be doing my job if I chose not to write about the occasional alleged crime or potentially embarrassing incident. The sport is built to withstand the occasional "negative" news story. That toughness, that resiliency is one thing that brings so many of us to wrestling.
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