There isn't much about the actual event or wrestlers involved that is interesting to most readers. These are mostly the overworked assistant coaches of college programs, guys coming off season-long injuries and athletes who've been training in the background for three years, looking, hoping and wishing for that last chance at Olympic glory.
The action this week won't be as technical as it will next week, and it won't be as dramatic as it will be in August, but it will be heartfelt and passionate competition. There is no recent precedent in men's freestyle where a last-chance qualifier has gone on to win the starting spot, but that doesn't mean it can't happen. Who doesn't love a good Cinderella story?
As a broadcasting note, all the action of the Olympic Team Trials will be on NBCSports.com with the Saturday finals live on NBCSN and a short tape delay version for Sunday's broadcast.
On a personal note, I'm getting married next Saturday and while I'm sure it will be a low stress affair, anyone who has gone through the process can probably agree that it's best I be present this weekend and focus on my family and friends.
Alas, no mailbag next week. However, I will be watching the opening rounds of the tournament as I climb into my monkey suit and rehearse my vows. In two weeks I'll be ready to discuss the results. Until then it's matrimony, trying to prevent my wrestling friends from burning down the reception hall and a brief mini-moon filled with sun and gambling.
To your questions …
Q: Who do you think has the best chance to medal for the U.S. at each freestyle weight class, and who do you think will win the Trials at each weight class?
-- @J_Agnitsch125
Foley: I'm not as good as I'd like to be in knowing how freestyle wrestlers from the United States match up with each other, but I've seen most of the top guys overseas. That might not play a major factor in Iowa City next weekend, but it has always given me some insight on how they will do internationally, which is only to say I'm more likely to flub a qualifier than miss on Olympic placement. Still, this is a tall task!
In order of likely qualification with chance of earning an Olympic medal in parenthesis.
57 kilos: Tony Ramos (20%), Nahshon Garrett (10%), Coleman Scott (20%)
65 kilos: Logan Stieber (20%), Brent Metcalf (35%), Jordan Oliver (10%)
74 kilos: Jordan Burroughs (99.999%)
86 kilos: Kyle Dake (10%), David Taylor (25%), Richard Perry (10%)
97 kilos: Kyle Snyder (80%), Jake Varner (30%)
125 kilos: Tervel Dlagnev (40%), Nick Gwiazdowski (20%)
Q: Seems like Jim Zalesky was fired as head coach of Iowa for getting results similar to what the Hawkeyes are currently experiencing. Will Tom Brands be on the hot seat if he does not bring a team title back to Iowa soon?
-- Matt
Ryan Morningstar and Tom Brands at the Big Ten Wrestling Championships (Photo/Mark Lundy, Lutte-Lens.com)The problem facing Iowa isn't that they have Tom Brands, it's that Penn State has Cael Sanderson.
I think the firing of Zalesky was built into that post-Gable ideology that Iowa should exist for epochs as the best wrestling team in the country. They believed his NCAA team titles were the result of inertia and then he progressively did worse each season.
The Brands bros. don't suffer that same fate since they took the program back to the top, winning NCAA titles from 2008-2010 in his second to fourth seasons. While he hasn't won in the last six years, he also hasn't finished outside of the top four. The standard of fans caught in the 1980s might be to win an NCAA title each season, the ground has shifted and that's just not likely for any program.
Maybe the only way for Iowa to win an NCAA title is to be in position to strike in the off-chance that Sanderson's Penn State squad is in a rebuilding year.
Q: Zander and Evan Wick became the first twins to win California state wrestling titles. How many other sets of twins have won state high school wrestling, NCAA, or Olympic medals? Who are they and when was the last time this has happened?
-- Gregg Y.
Foley: The most famous set of twins to win Olympic gold at the same tournament are Ed and Lou Banach, who both won gold at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
For others we are going to need the comments section to help us!
Q: So what's the deal with Iowa? Why does it seem that they cannot shoot a leg attack? I was in New York for the tournament and I feel I can count on one hand how many leg attacks they fired off (aside from Thomas Gilman and Cory Clark). They were often in OT in 1-1 matches and I recall one Iowa wrestler being down by a point in the third and getting hit for stalling. Back in the day, they were non-stop attacking. The Brands' were non-stop attack guys. Why does it seem that they simply cannot fire off an attack?
-- Sean M.
Foley: I'd need to revisit all their matches to confirm how little they shot, but I do remember that Coach Gable said during the broadcast he was noticing a lack of penetration. Some of that was opportunity-based, since guys like Clark couldn't make it past the hands of their opponents, but others were simply not attempting attacks at all.
There might have been a lack of game-planning for certain athletes, but I also think that the rule changes, which kept wrestlers in the circle more effectively meant that Iowa guys weren't getting more opponents who could hand fight. That's a reach, but for certain we were not seeing the types of attacks that hammers like Brent Metcalf made famous for the Hawkeyes.
Something to watch for next year will be how they are firing off attacks at the start of the season in contrast to the end of the season. Might be a significant difference and an area to investigate.
MULTIMEDIA HALFTIME
A discussion by author Josh Waitzkin on making opponents feel uncomfortable and the idea of transitioning positions in combat sports. For those who hate-read you can also see me getting almost-choked by an angry 200-pound black belt!
Traditional wrestling does have comical moments
Posted by Funny on Friday, February 26, 2016
Q: What do you think of this new headgear?
-- Brian L.
Foley: No.
We should always welcome innovation, but adding a pad to the front of your head does not in any way prevent a concussion. The science has shown that football players suffer more blows to the head simply because they do have a helmet on their head. The padding only incentivizes the contact which causes a concussion!
While I don't want to discourage anyone from trying to create sensible solutions, this product should be seen as a weapon on the mat. It will decrease inhibitions and increase head-butting and ramming, both of which are far too common already.
The key to reducing concussions in American wrestling is to make illegal the extracurricular bats to the head and senseless aggression that often becomes the centerpiece of matches. With less focus on aggression and more on technique there would be a reduction in concussions and an increase in American wrestling success overseas.
We don't need or want helmets of any sort.
Q: J'den Cox announced he is going to 86 kilos for Olympic Team Trials. First, what are his chances to make the team? Second, with the NCAA two-hour weigh-ins vs. the international day-before weigh-in, why don't we see more guys who wrestle 197 pounds cut to 189 pounds with a day to recover as opposed to wrestling up at 215 pounds like most seem to do?
-- Dan B.
Missouri's J'den Cox rides Minnesota's Brett Pfarr in the NCAA semifinals (Photo/John Sachs, Tech-Fall.com)Another eight pounds is roughly an additional five percent of their body weight. I'd assume that most guys don't have it on them, but I also can't think of an example of a wrestler like Cox who right out of college went up instead of down.
The additional time is certainly helpful, but in no way should we assume that the wrestlers don't feel the burden of the cut. Emaciated, gaunt and otherwise dreadful looking, often the cost of the cut isn't just physical, but emotional. These are dangerous, labor-intensive cuts that have an effect on athletes. I suppose that if some don't cut it's because they simply hate that part of the sport.
Looking back, I certainly do.
Q: This question may show my lack of knowledge of international wrestling as I am a relatively new spectator, but I am curious as to why most competitors for the U.S. men's World and Olympic teams tend to stay with their collegiate coaches when competing in freestyle? At least from what I can tell there are not too many coaching changes made by athletes with the transition from college folkstyle to international freestyle. I would think some athletes would benefit from a change in coaching and hearing a new voice. Is the system similar for the top U.S. female competitors?
-- Scott S.
Foley: Most of the top college coaches seem to also be top freestyle coaches. That's at least true with Cael Sanderson, John Smith, Zeke Jones, Mark Manning and other coaches with regional training centers.
One exception is Tom Ryan and Ohio State who does have an RTC but is not the main coach. That role seems to be filled by Lou Rosselli.
A major factor may also be age and exposure. The top guys coming out of college have really only known one elite system and most lack a social network that provides them the opportunity to move about. That dynamic shifts a little once they make their way to the OTC in Colorado Springs and meet more coaches and athletes. As we saw with Ed Ruth, that can end up influencing coaching changes.
Michigan is also an example of a place that aggregates talent, having attracted a smattering of athletes from Illinois, Northwestern, Cal Poly and others to their training facility.
For women most of the coaching is concentrated in Colorado Springs with the USA National Team coaches. Most will move there as soon as it's possible, which seems smart since they have such a variety of training partners. There was also a training facility at Northern Michigan led by Shannon Gillespie, which helped produce many of the women on the current roster, including three-time World champion Adeline Gray.
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