boconnell

Yep. I was talking about Sadulaev being in his prime. But Smith definitely quit competing young, and Snyder is sneakily older than he seems.

What are you basing the juiced stuff on? You can't declare a guy the best wrestler ever 7 months after he got crushed in his prime by a 20 year old.

What about the 20 year old who crushed Snyder and Sadulaev? Isn't it hard for Sad to be the greatest ever when that happened at the most recent worlds? That kind of dents the idea that Snyder is an all-timer stuck behind an all-timer.

I have no problem with him putting his personal twist. If he said the exact same thing during the match I don't care at all. If he said 'Welsh should be attacking that leg, I know I would' Who cares. That's what he's there for. But you seriously think a minute after the final while a guy is celebrating his 4th title is the moment for that? That he should be making it about himself in that moment? It's just an ego run amok moment. That moment wasn't about Jordan Burroughs in any way.

I agree that when a CB goes down in a football game they say they would go after the replacement. You're nuts if you think after the winning play of the super bowl, Tony Romo immediately says 'I could have thrown a TD against that injured CB or his replacement'. This isn't about contact sports or toughness or whether basketball is soft or wrestling is tough. This is about how you obviously don't make it about you when someone else wins a title that had nothing to do with you.

What a pointless answer. The idea that color commentators are infallible because they are there to provide inside info. I rooted for Daton Fix all weekend. He was there to score takedowns and win matches. But amazingly that didn't matter to Vito. He still lost when he did a bad job of scoring takedowns and winning matches. JB being hired to provide commentary doesn't make everything he says correct. When he provided inside info during the match about attacking the leg as a strategy, that was him doing his job. When he immediately made things about him after the match, that wasn't him doing his job. When you make things about yourself when they aren't about yourself, some people won't like it. That's fine. He's a big boy and he doesn't appear to be bothered by people being upset. I'm not sure why you need to play white knight for him and explain that he didn't do anything wrong.

Thanks for reminding me of that. Does that mean announcers are required to make things about themselves? Does that mean that in the moment after a great accomplishment, the guy paid to talk about the accomplishment should instead talk about himself and what he would do?

Absolutely. Without those losses he doesn't qualify for nationals and doesn't win number 4. So you can't pretend those losses away.

He shouldn't have. He should have kept the focus on the guy who just won his 4th title instead of helping DC drag the focus away into an imagined beef. I don't blame PSU alum/fans/wrestlers for being bothered by it. And I rooted against PSU in every match that entire weekend. But I can't imagine the announcer immediately after the NBA finals conclusion saying that he was going to go after an injury in that summer's olympics. And if that happened, it would be a huge story and the guy who said it wouldn't be able to blame it on the question that was asked. JB's ego made it about him, and now people don't like that. Oh well.

Yep. All three were transfers. But if you want to make a point about how they don't develop and only poach, then guys like Spratley and Jamison don't make sense. Both were undeveloped non-starters who had never been to NCAAs at the time of their transfer. Then they combined for 2 points. OSU will get nothing out of either without lots of development. You could say OSU poached them, but you can't say they didn't develop whatever they are and become. Olejnik was definitely a classic one year poach. Hamiti will be. Having one guy like that in lineup still puts them well behind the teams near the top (just like they are behind those teams in most areas right now).

It's pretty high if you want to make a point about how almost every top school has lots of transfers or a point about the fact that almost 25% of the total points at NCAAs were scored by transfers. But if you're trying to make a point about OSU specifically being a school that poaches guys, then no it is not pretty high.

1 Penn State 58.5 172.5 34% 2 Michigan 52.5 71 74% 3 Iowa 40.5 67 60% 4 Oregon State 19.5 20 98% 5 Iowa State 18 68.5 26% 6 Oklahoma 17 20 85% 7 Lock Haven 13.5 14 96% 8 Oklahoma State 12 56 21% 9 Arizona State 11 64.5 17% 10 Rutgers 10 22.5 44% They were 8th in points from transfers. And they got a lower percentage from transfers than PSU, Michigan, or Iowa.

Where are you coming up with this stuff? You can obviously knock them for not developing guys in recent years, but then you go make stuff up about how they just try to bring guys in from elsewhere. They had fewer transfer points in their lineup than almost any big school at the NCAA tournament.

You make some great points here about personality in wrestling. Keckeisen really is the ideal personality. He's incredibly physical and mean on the mat, but he's the same guy who after the semis last year said he didn't attack injured Munoz because he was winning and didn't need to. He's like a boyscout with a mean streak. Swiderski is just a jerk, and a wrestling team absolutely needs those. I wish the HS team I coach had a few Swiderskis.

Little Rock is supported by one large donor. Success does matter to him. It matters to all donors at all schools. Most wrestling programs are not supported by revenue, but rather by fund raising. When all of the best wrestlers leave a program, it will absolutely effect fund raising. And while an AD won't care about fewer individual all americans, they will absolutely care about less fund raising.

JB didn't explain strategy. Immediately after Starocci's win JB said he was going to go after Starocci's leg at the Olympic trials. And no, announcers don't do that.

I heard we also landed on the moon.

You're making up some stories here. You claim nobody wants to wrestle for him and he has a bad reputation, but their recruiting the last few (and next few) years has been strong. Their real problem has been culture. They let Ferarri get away with a lot and it wrecked their program. Coleman Scott had a very positive impact this year and they started 4 freshmen and only lose Fix. They were improved this year even without a great NCAAs. Next year they should be improved again. They are just fine.

It's worse to get calls wrong. Review helps get more calls right. The problem is that we don't penalize failed reviews. In FS a failed challenge is a point. In the NCAA finals you have a bunch of coaches challenging stuff because they have a review left and there is no drawback to not using it. Make a failed review worth 2 points and guys will stop challenging stuff frivolously.

He won his only challenge last night.

100% He's a FS guy without any reliable attack in a folkstyle match. He wrestles sumo in FS. He pushes guys and then scores when they push back. Slide bys and snaps and par terre turns. He is so good at that stuff that it's assumed he has folkstyle offense he's choosing not to use. He doesn't. Last night is who he is. 7 years of college somehow didn't change his inability to shoot and score.

I liked him. I find it hilarious that people can be so definitive about what good commentating is. Like it's not something that's largely subjective and personal taste doesn't play into it. I like it, but it's easy for me to accept other people hate it. Just like food. Different people love different things. But with DC we get a bunch of people telling the whole board that he was the worst and nobody could enjoy him.

Absolutely. He was super aware of when to let go. He wasn't pushy. He asked softball questions and let guys talk about whatever they wanted to talk about. I can and do reasonably hate sideline post-match interviews. But Quint was understated and not part of the problem at all. And he clearly cares about it.

That happened. Then after the match Starocci got interviewed by Quint and said he'd be at the trials in a few weeks. When they kicked back to the announcers DC asked if they knew anyone else who would be at the trials and Burroughs answered that he would be there and if he wrestled Starocci he'd be going after that leg for sure. It was more than the original mention of going after a general leg as a general tactic. It was JB saying he'd be going after Starocci's injured leg in April. It's not a big deal, but I can't ever remember anything similar from an announcer in any sport. Of course most sports don't use active competitors as announcers. I can definitely get why a PSU fan (or former wrestler) wouldn't like it. I felt like JB inserted himself into a moment that should have been about the guy who just won his 4th title.