Running Amateur Wrestling Thread

[franticscribe]

Huge news as the IOC released its list of Russian and Belarusian wrestlers who are eligible to compete as independent athletes.

2x Olympic gold medalist and 5x world champion Abdulrashid Sadulaev was not included. His absence takes out one of the big three in the 97kg bracket of death, where Saludev, 2016 gold & 2020 silver medalist Kyle Snyder and current world champion Akhmed Tazhudinov of Bahrain were all slated to be in the bottom half of the bracket.

Also left off the list was 2020 74kg Greco gold medalist Zaurbek Sidakov. It looks like his absence may open the door for American Kamal Bey to wrestle in Paris as he's the next eligible athlete in line after the US failed to qualify that weight.

And Kamal Bey does get in with Sidakov not being eligible. I'm glad to see that as he's one of my favorite Greco-Roman wrestlers.

https://www.themat.com/news/2024/ju...n-greco-roman-and-will-compete-at-paris-games

 

[franticscribe]

The Russian Wrestling Federation is now boycotting the Olympics entirely, meaning the 10 athletes that were to compete under the AIN banner will not attend. It's not a huge deal because their best wrestlers were already disqualified by the IOC anyway, but still pretty crazy that a country that qualified 18 weight classes across the three divisions won't have any athletes there.

 

[franticscribe]

The first post in this thread was about former Ok. State NCAA champion AJ Ferrari's antics at an open tournament before the spring semester started. He was expected to join the Iowa lineup once classes started, but managed to get himself univited from the Hawkeyes wrestling room with his behavior at the Solider Salute.

So he spent the spring and summer looking for a new home and a bunch of schools kicked the tires but clearly decided he wasn't worth the headache, even with his immense talent. He ended up landing at CSU Bakersfield where he is enrolled and plans to wrestle.

So now that he has a new home, he didn't take long to start making an ass of himself again. This time, on Instagram, he inexplicably called out 4x NCAA champion Carter Starocci who thanks to the covid bonus year has a chance to become the first NCAA D1 5x champion. (Carleton Haselrig has 6 NCAA titles from the era when DII and DIII champions got an invite to the DI tournament).

Starocci responded yesterday with a hilarious, though somewhat homophobic, IG post of his own, and now I think NCAA wrestling fans are drooling at the possibility these two will meet at some point this season. (They may not as Starocci is bumping up to 184, though there's some speculation he may go to 197, and Ferrari is at 197.)

NSFW warning for the last slide.

 

[dixiehack]

So he spent the spring and summer looking for a new home and a bunch of schools kicked the tires but clearly decided he wasn't worth the headache, even with his immense talent. He ended up landing at CSU Bakersfield where he is enrolled and plans to wrestle.

Hey you don't know me but you don't like me.

 

[franticscribe]

There's a pretty incredible story developing at the U.S. World Team Trials today.

Marcus Blaze is a 17-year-old high school senior with an impressive junior level resume. This year he's had his first senior level matches, finishing third at the Olympic Trials, which allowed him to train with Team USA as an alternate. Now he's vying for a shot to represent the U.S. at the world championships for non-Olympic weights next month at 61kg.

Yesterday he won the challenge tournament, which allows him to wrestle a best of three series today against reigning world champion Vito Arujau for the spot. To win the challenge tournament yesterday, he had to beat Seth Gross (2018 NCAA Champion & former world team member), Nahshon Garrett (2016 NCAA Champion & former world team member), and Daton Fix (2021 World silver medalist and 4x NCAA runner-up) in consecutive matches.

In addition to Aruju v. Blaze, we're getting Jordan Burroughs v. Chance Marsteller at 79 kg and David Taylor v. Zahid Valencia at 92 kg, which should also be fun.

First round of the finals is at 11 a.m. Eastern on Flo.

 

[jr/shotglass]

There's a pretty incredible story developing at the U.S. World Team Trials today.

Marcus Blaze is a 17-year-old high school senior with an impressive junior level resume. This year he's had his first senior level matches, finishing third at the Olympic Trials, which allowed him to train with Team USA as an alternate. Now he's vying for a shot to represent the U.S. at the world championships for non-Olympic weights next month at 61kg.

Yesterday he won the challenge tournament, which allows him to wrestle a best of three series today against reigning world champion Vito Arujau for the spot. To win the challenge tournament yesterday, he had to beat Seth Gross (2018 NCAA Champion & former world team member), Nahshon Garrett (2016 NCAA Champion & former world team member), and Daton Fix (2021 World silver medalist and 4x NCAA runner-up) in consecutive matches.

In addition to Aruju v. Blaze, we're getting Jordan Burroughs v. Chance Marsteller at 79 kg and David Taylor v. Zahid Valencia at 92 kg, which should also be fun.

First round of the finals is at 11 a.m. Eastern on Flo.

I was at a table with Marsteller at a banquet during his senior year of HS. He was an interesting kid, had some depth. He made some horrendous decisions, but I'm glad he seems to have made it out the other end.

 

[franticscribe]

RIP Alan Vera, U.S. National Team member who died following complications from a heart attack suffered while playing soccer.

Vera defected from Cuba in his early 20s and became a national champion here.

 

[franticscribe]

It looks like Campbell's move from the Big South to the Coastal Athletic Association has not panned out with increased revenue, but has brought higher travel costs and so now a really strong mid-major wrestling program is out in the chopping block.

The AD announced yesterday that they're reducing the number of scholarships from 9 to 3, which if it is survivable will make it nearly impossible to have the caliber team they've been putting out there.

https://intermatwrestle.com/articles.html/college/socon/the-campbell-funding-situation-r99624/

I guess at least they didn't cut it outright, but given the program's relative youth, I'm not optimistic there is enough donor money out there to endow the scholarships being taken away.

 

[franticscribe]

The UWW World Championships for the non-Olympic weights just wrapped up in Albania.

Another somewhat disappointing showing for Team USA with no Greco medals (expected) and only scoring bronze in freestyle. But we picked up four bronze medals - two in women's and two in men's. It was almost certainly the last go-round for new Oklahoma State coach and Team USA stalwart David Taylor. He got an insanely bad draw. Taylor had to face 7x world champion (including 2x at the Olympics) Abdulrashid Sadulaev. Taylor is one of the best the US has ever produced but Sadulaev is arguably the best active wrestler in the world. He was barred from the Olympics this year, but the UWW relaxed its policies on Russian athletes enough that he could go to worlds. Taylor is no slouch having won 4 world titles (including one Olympics). They were both unseeded at worlds, which is how they ended up wrestling in the first round, because their prior senior level matches this year have been at the lower 86kg weight class and they were both wrestling up at 92kg at worlds. Taylor wrestled back to win a bronze medal against 2x world champion Kamran Ghasempour.

This may also have been the last tournament for Jordan Burroughs, though that's less clear.

The biggest story out of the worlds is the arrival of Masanosuke Ono on the world stage. The young Japanese wrestler showed a level of dominance that's extremely rare in international competition. Four of his five matches were tech falls, including only taking a little over a minute to get one in the finals. The biggest story in international wrestling this year just might be the emergence of Japan as a powerhouse in both men's greco and freestyle (they were already dominant in women's). Japan won 8 of 18 gold medals in Paris (two greco, two men's fs and four women's fs). At Worlds where another 12 medals were available, they picked up four more gold medals (three women's, one men's fs).

 

[franticscribe]

Big news today in college wrestling as Minnesota announces Gable Steveson's return to the mat after taking two seasons off to pursue WWE dreams, and when that didn't work out, to try playing in the NFL.

If you're unfamiliar, he's a 2x NCAA champion and Tokyo Olympics gold medalist at heavyweight. He's the most talented heavyweight I've ever seen. I will forever be convinced that he could've supplanted Bruce Baumgartner as the greatest American heavyweight in history and maybe even chased Aleksandr Karelin and Mijain Lopez for greatest in international history if he hadn't skipped this year's Olympics due to the WWE.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around how he has any eligibility remaining, though since he first enrolled at Minnesota in 2018.

18-19: Took 3rd at NCAA tournament as a true freshman
19-20: Tourney cancelled due to Covid
20-21: NCAA Champion
21-22: NCAA Champion
22-23: Pretend wrestling
23:-24: Pretend wrestling

I guess they're counting 22-23 as a redshirt and 23-24 as an Olympic redshirt. He did enter and win a qualifying tournament to get to the Olympic Trials, but never entered the Olympic Trials, so maybe that's enough to be an Olympic redshirt?

 

[I Should Coco]

His first name is Gable? That can't be a coincidence.

 

[franticscribe]

It is not a coincidence. At big youth tournaments these days you'll see a handful of kids named Gable and more named variations of Cael.