The Last Chapter

Eric Grajales, at the ripe old age of 19, is having a mid-life crisis.In just a few months the nation’s best wrestler will no longer wrestle for Brandon High School.

At 7 pm on February 21, 2009, Grajales will don the white Brandon Wrestling singlet for the last time.He won’t cry, but for a moment he will be at his introspective best.His entire life, all he has ever wanted to do was wrestle for Russ Cozart and the Brandon Eagles.

“What am I going to do when I don’t wrestle for Brandon anymore,” he thinks.“While some of my classmates wanted to be veterinarians, or whatever, all I ever wanted to do was wrestle for Brandon.”

The nations’ best high school wrestler is also a member of the nation’s most historic team.A documentary was filmed a year ago about the team’s season.It has a Hall of Fame Coach, in Russ Cozart.The Brandon High School Wrestling Eagles own the world’s longest winning streak in any sport at any level, after winning 459 straight dual matches.This team, it’s all he’s ever known, all he’s ever wanted.

Imagine having everything you ever dreamed and wished for, and having to leave it behind.Now you know how Eric Grajales feels.

Eric Grajales’ story as a Brandon Wrestler doesn’t start in a sweaty, musk gym.It doesn’t begin by watching the WWE on television and a chance meeting with a neon-colored flyer.   His initiation began exactly 28 years ago when Cesar Grajales, a wrestler at Pinellas Park fell head over heels in love with Leslie Baker.Ironically, their first meeting was at a football game.

“It was very uneventful,” Leslie recalls.“We just knew from the start that we belonged together.”

The longest the two have been away from each other was during the summer months following Leslie’s sophomore year of high school.Young Cesar had to travel north to work in his uncle’s auto shop to save money so that, during the wrestling season, he didn’t have to.After that, the two traveled north together whenever Cesar had to go.

“We’ve been living together, basically, since I was 17,” Leslie says.“All we had was each other.We knew we wanted to give our kids everything and give them the opportunities we didn’t have.”

The two love birds moved north permanently after Leslie’s graduation.However, Leslie became home-sick, as living in New Jersey, she knew no one except Cesar.She returned home to Florida in late November.Predictably, the relationship hit a rough patch, as the two had to decide whether to continue the relationship or possibly, break up.The decision was made for them on a chilly night on Christmas Eve.

Leslie’s mother, tragically, passed away after being involved in a car accident.There was never another discussion about breaking up.Cesar stayed in Florida to console Leslie, and never left her side.

The two eventually had children, three in all, in Anthony, the oldest, Melissa and finally Eric.

Cesar and Leslie eventually started their own business, Rubber City, Inc., an auto shop in St. Petersburg.A highlight of their dedication is the hour drive to work that the Grajales’ brave every day.The burgeoning business afforded them the ability to dote on their three highly successful children.

Anthony, known in wrestling circles as Cesar, was a top-ranked recruit himself and is enrolled at Penn.Melissa is a future law student, attending the University of Florida.

Eric is the youngest and you can see that his personality is an amalgamation of his siblings and parents.Eric has the compassion of his mother, the work ethic and leadership of his brother, the mental toughness of his highly independent sister, and the sense of humor and vision of his father.Eric is the kid that lights up the room, is always ready with an intelligent quip and the one who leads by example.

Big Cesar, is the architect behind the success of both of his boys.After transferring to Brandon his senior year, he always knew he wanted his boy or boys to wrestle for Cozart.He knew Cozart would push his kids the same way he pushed every one of his other wrestlers.Through wrestling, his boys would have the opportunities he never did – namely, go to college.

After Anthony turned 5, the Grajales traveled twice a week, an hour away to practices in Brandon for the elementary-aged kids.

“Our lives changed forever,” Leslie says.

What followed was Cesar doing everything possible one father could do to ensure the success of his children.His boys and other future Brandon wrestlers traveled the country, looking for the best matches and the best competition - all in an effort to become the best wrestlers possible.

“The goal was never to be good in Florida,” Cesar says.“It was to be good on a national level.”

Tulsa Nationals was one of the largest national tournaments the boys went to.Anthony and Eric both came within a match or two of placing their first time competing.After that, Big Cesar decided that the boys would focus only on wrestling.No more peewee football or baseball.

“They [Eric and Anthony] were not happy about it,” Cesar says.

Showcasing his strength and determination, Eric made a deal with his dad.He told him he would wrestle at Tulsa Nationals and win, and that the next year he was playing football.

“I said deal,” Cesar says.“The next year, just like he said, he won it.”

Early on Cesar decided that he would lead by example.When they would work out, Big Cesar would lift alongside his boys.Father and sons would go on 5k runs.He would take them to wrestling camps and take notes.He made sure they saw that he was willing to do the same things he expected them to.

“The desire to win is important,” Cesar says.“But the desire to want to train hard is much more important.”

And so, Eric’s life has always been co-driven.As father and coach, Big Cesar played the role with delicate aplomb.

“Every now and then it gets kind of annoying,” Eric says.“Especially when you’re cutting weight.But we try to be honest with each other 100% of the time.We each understand the other one’s position.”

Eric started wrestling sometime after he turned 3.From the beginning, working out with the Brandon Wrestling Club and Coach Cozart, he has been a phenom.

“I thought he was a little ball of fire,” Cozart remembers.“He was all muscle, really aggressive and a really good wrestler, even then.”

His talent apparent, Eric admits that Cozart was the right coach for him.

Because Eric Grajales is no saint.

“I wasn’t a bad kid,” Eric says.“But I like to push people to their limits.He [Cozart] always put me in my place.”

On a day that Eric states was probably a bad one for Coach Cozart, he added fuel to the fire.While warming up, jogging around the mats, Eric and workout partner Austin Figari decided that pushing the other wrestlers would be a better warm up.Coach Cozart didn’t agree.He sent the two deviants to do push-ups in the corner.

“At first, we were making jokes, laughing,” Eric remembers.“After about 20, 30 minutes it got old, and after 45 minutes we’d do about 3 or 4 pushups every 5 minutes or so.”

The two did pushups the entire practice… all ninety minutes of it, and Eric got the point.Not that he didn’t continue to push the boundaries, but he knew when to back off.He realized Coach Cozart would help him become the wrestler he so desperately wanted to be, but he realized it would be by Cozart’s rules.

Russ Cozart fostered and developed Eric’s ability the only way he knew how. It was the only way he coached and it was the same way he coached his own two sons – hard work.The Brandon Wrestling Club opens the door for wrestling every day. Russ Cozart is wrestling, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.Much in the same way he busts his own tail on a daily basis, he expects nothing less from his wrestlers.

Eric picked up on that.His earliest memories are of a bearded Cozart, wrestling in open tournaments right along side his own sons, Rocky and Joey. Saturday’s were a family day, with the Grajales’ and whomever else from the Brandon Wrestling Club decided to travel.Through trips to cities such as Las Vegas, Atlanta, Chicago and Oklahoma City, Eric has seen much of the country’s sports arenas.He loved every minute of it, and it didn’t hurt to have teammates of similar mind.

Every wrestler who joins the Brandon Wrestling Club dreams of one day having their name placed on The Wall.It is the place where all of Brandon’s 70 State Champions have their name marked under their weight class and year.While it is common for athletes to dream big, it is unholy common to have athletes, plural, work big.Every week of Eric’s life at least 2 times a week, he trained with the Brandon Wrestling Club.And every week, at least 4 times a week, the club was filled to the brim with other kids with the same dream and the same work ethic.

Coach Cozart’s greatest accomplishment isn’t the 459 dual-match winning streak, it isn’t the 19 Team State Titles he’s won, and isn’t the 139 All-Americans he’s coached.It’s the culture he has created, where coming to practice year-round and doing so with your fullest effort isn’t enough.

At Brandon, you’re expected to come to every practice.You’re expected to work hard in practice, every day.You’re expected to wrestle tournaments every Saturday.You’re expected to win a State Title.You’re expected to be an All-American.And while at most programs you have 2 or 3 guys who are willing to pay the price, the Brandon Eagles average 20 – 30 wrestlers at every practice.If Coach Cozart says there is 5 am run on Christmas morning, you can bet that everyone will show up.

This atmosphere, this camaraderie is what Eric craves.He eats it up, he lives it, and he basks in it.It’s a lot easier to go through practice with 20 other guys suffering with you.

Monday through Friday it was intense training with constant repetitions.On Saturdays it was time to compete, and win.Coach Cozart is a realist. While he understands and coaches his kids to enjoy the work and practice necessary, deep down, it’s about winning.It’s about winning wrestling matches week in and week out because your opposition is not training as intense, or as often, as you are.

It is no coincidence, then, that Eric Grajales will continue the next chapter of his illustrious career at the Division I school of his choice.

That next chapter will start in Ann Arbor, Michigan.On October 14, he committed to Coach Joe McFarland and the Wolverines.

That the Number 1 ranked recruit in the nation got away from the likes of Iowa, Iowa State, Oklahoma State and Minnesota isn’t that much of a surprise.It happens a lot more in collegiate wrestling, than say, NCAA Division I football, where powerhouses like USC and Florida build a veritable storehouse of talent.Thanks to a scholarship limit of 9.9, there is a lot more competition for the best recruits.Still, for a wrestler not even to consider the supposed “top” schools is an anomaly.

“I wanted a balance between academics and athletics,” he says.“Not to say they aren’t good schools, but Iowa, Iowa State, it doesn’t add up.”

Consider, Eric Grajales is one of those kids.Beyond Michigan, he considered and visited Cornell, Penn and Columbia.That’s Ivy, Ivy, Ivy and then one of the nation’s best public schools.When it comes to academia, Grajales is Einstein with a suplex.

“I have a 4.78 GPA,” he says. “I guess I have good genes, because I never study.”He says this with a shadow of arrogance and a lot of gratitude.

Remember that kid?The one who rarely does homework, rarely studies, rarely stays awake in class and still manages to pull a 97 on every test?That’s Eric Grajales.He remembers everything, the first time.Absolutely nauseating to the rest of common society, he admits, that, if anything, his grades should be better.But he doesn’t try, and he doesn’t have to.Because even when he doesn’t try, he’s still better than average.

Brandon High offers AP Calculus to those few daring and intelligent individuals looking for a challenge in the discourse of math.At 7:25 in the morning, Eric Grajales saunters into the classroom, sits in his desk, and goes to sleep.

A certain recipe for failure for the other 95% of the population, Grajales sleeps his way to two C’s.His mother received a phone call at least twice a week from his Calculus teacher, expressing concern that Eric was sleeping in class, and that he was not reaching his full potential.

“His teacher would literally have him stand next to his desk,” Leslie recalls.

“It didn’t seem to have a point,” Eric says with disgust.

Couple that with the daily three-hour grind sessions that Coach Cozart’s practices are known for and the extra 3 or 4 mile run at 8 o’clock every night and you have one really disinterested Calculus student.That he pulled a C is a testament to his intelligence.Even without caring, without being even marginally interested or involved Eric Grajales passed a class a majority of Americans have never even seen the book cover for.

His achievements in Honors and AP classes in addition to his first-try score of 1240 on the SAT afforded him opportunities most secondary students only dream of.But he always knew he’d go to a good school.He expected it.His parents expected it, and it was never in doubt.Now he simply had to make the first real big decision of his life.He made a check list.

Great Academics

Great Wrestling
Teammates who share same goals
Coach I can Trust to push me

The weather was the only thing that did not play a part in his decision.Living in the Sunshine State, Eric knew wherever he went, it would be cold.

“Whether its -10 degrees or 0, it’s still cold,” he says.

New York (Columbia) and Philadelphia (Penn) were just too big, and Ithaca (Cornell) was too small.

“I couldn’t see myself in a big city like New York or Philadelphia,” he says. “I know it would be too much of a distraction.At the same time, I didn’t want to be in the sticks.”

And there was something that itched him the wrong way when he took his visit to the Ivy Schools.

“A lot of the guys had different intentions.They wanted to get amazing degrees and wrestle along the way,” he says.“I want to win an NCAA title and have great academics.”

Predictably, Grajales had a great time when he took his official visit to Michigan.

“They’re supposed to show you a good time,” he says without a hint of naiveté.“But even when we weren’t out doing something, I could, just, you know, hang.All of the wrestlers, were just, wrestlers.”

The wrestlers talked about bringing home the school’s first NCAA Team Championship.They talked about working hard and pushing each other in practice every day.The more they talked, the more Grajales respected these guys.He felt the same camaraderie that he felt when he talked with his Brandon teammates back home.

Grajales respects wrestlers like you respect a NAVY SEAL.“People don’t understand what wrestlers go through,” he says with a bit of anger seeping out.“If you’ve never done it, you don’t know anything in my book.”

Grajales isn’t talking about wrestling for four years as a high school wrestler.

He’s talking about logging over 10,000 miles in extra running, just to make weight.He’s talking about giving up every single Spring Break to train at the Olympic Training Center, sometimes three times a day.He’s talking about wrestling year round and traveling annually to Vegas and Fargo, ND.He’s talking about training 4 -5 days a week in the so-called off-season.He’s talking about sacrificing meals, plural.He’s talking about not going to the movies with friends.He’s talking about not hanging out with a girlfriend who worships at your feet.He’s talking about not being at home for months on end to train in a sport where you are thrown on your head in practice.

He’s talking about sacrifice.Grajales, like every other elite athlete, is married to his craft.For better or worse, in success and defeat, sacrifice is the unforgiving bitch of a wife who needs your attention like an unborn child needs an umbilical chord.The training that is necessary to compete for wrestling is far more taxing than anything a boxer or an MMA fighter experiences.Imagine training for the biggest fight of your life, every week for 11 months.While boxers and MMA athletes train with similar intensity, they do not train at a similar length.An elite boxer and/or MMA athlete train for, max, 2 or 3 fights a year.

But Eric can’t help himself.As much as he’d like to spend more time with friends or eat that second helping of his Mom’s Cajun Chicken Alfredo, he can’t.He loves to win.He loves to have his hand raised, while his opponent’s head nods in defeat.Much in the same way a symphony was meant to be appreciated by an audience, Eric Grajales loves to put on a show for any and everyone watching him.The bigger the crowd, the better.

“I want to get my hand raised in front of hundreds, thousands of people,” he says.“I love that pressure.”
Due to his incessant quest for training, it has only been on rare occasions that Eric has not had his hand raised.He has never lost a Greco-Roman match at the nation’s most prestigious junior/high school tournament – code name Fargo. The Asics Cadet and Junior National Championships, held annually in Fargo, ND, is, ‘where State Champs go to die.’

It is the world’s largest tournament and it is also the single most important tournament in a sport where scholarships at the Division I level are scarce.Place top eight in this tournament, where it is not uncommon to have more than 70 competitors in a single weight class, and you can pretty much punch your ticket to a Division I school.

Or, you can just beat Eric Grajales.

Like adding seasoning salt and pepper to any dish, wrestling is Eric Grajales spiced up.As if wrestling wasn’t easy enough, he wants to do it, thrives on it.Nothing inspires him like stepping on the mat.He feels at his best, most complete and happiest inside that circle.He wants to destroy every opponent he faces.  

Eric Grajales wants your mother to scream in terror and for your girlfriend to be embarrassed of you.He wants to feel the moment that your mind tells your body that it’s not worth it to fight back - give up. If at all possible, he would not feel in the least bit guilty if some poor soul quit the sport after a thrashing.It would be a compliment.Step on the mat with a bear, and prepare to be mauled.

There is nothing cautious about Eric’s wrestling.There are those wrestlers who approach a match like playing chess with your great aunt and her arthritic wrists.Slow and methodical is not the preferred pace.

Ike Anderson’s official title is Greco-Roman Developmental Coach.He’s the guy responsible for finding and honing the abilities of the next crop of American Greco-Roman wrestlers.A style where attacks below the waist are forbidden, Americans, have been, historically, deficient at the World and Olympic Level.

Greco, does not in any way resemble, Folkstyle, the style employed by American High Schools and College.Folkstyle wrestling much more closely resembles Freestyle, a style associated with names like Dan Gable, John Smith and Cael Sanderson.It’s no wonder then that, as the nation’s #1 high school wrestler, Eric will stake his claim as a force to be reckoned with as a Freestyle competitor during the next Olympic Cycle.

Nope.

“Eric hates freestyle,” Anderson says with delight.“I’ve never met a kid like him.He’ll do Folkstyle, then in March, Greco.He’ll wrestle Freestyle for Team Florida at national tournaments, but that’s it.”

Even at a young age, Eric has always been great at Greco.

His American age-group opponents were mastering the gut wrench.This move starts as your opponent is lying prostrate on the mat and your hands are locked on or above the waist, heads facing in the same direction.Driving your feet like a sprinter off the blocks, and keeping your hands locked, in one continuous motion, you roll and arch your back, ultimately finishing in the same position you started.

Meanwhile, Eric had mastered the crowd-pleasing, mother-hating Reverse Lift.The move that made 3-time Olympic Champion Alexander Karelin the most feared wrestler ever, is, and has always been Eric’s favorite move.Opponent prostrate on the mat, Eric positions himself atop and to the side of his opponent, forming a T.While facing his opponent’s feet he reaches over his opponent’s waist with one hand, the other scooping underneath. Eric locks his hands, stands straight up and arches his back, lifting his, now defenseless, opponent chest high, arms and legs flailing.As Eric’s back arches in a backwards crescent motion, his arms drive his opponent into the mat at a 90-degree angle. The top of the cranium is often the first body part to feel the mat.

It is the most vicious move possible, in the world’s most vicious sport.

Cozart remembers that during Eric’s first year of wrestling, the Brandon Wrestling Club made the reverse lift a part of its daily practice regimen.

“I remember watching some little kids at a tournament doing it,” Cozart says.“I thought, hey, if they can do it, why can’t we?”

Cozart warns that the move is not as simple as it looks, nor as spontaneous as it may seem.It takes hours upon hours of practice and years of experience to be able to hit it consistently on good wrestlers.You love Thanksgiving, Eric loves reverse lifting.He’s added his own personal touches, and over the years has learned to make adjustments, on the fly, depending on how his opponent reacts. Try to “dead-weight” yourself and he’ll load you up on his knee.Try to circle behind his legs, and he’ll pivot his heel and spin accordingly. Try to run him over and he’ll straighten his back, his hips exploding with such force that his back and knees force his body into a perfect ‘I.’

If Eric Grajales gets his hands locked in the reverse lift position – enjoy the ride.

Anderson first saw Eric wrestle at the FILA Cadet Nationals in Chicago.  He watched him repeatedly reverse lift every opponent he wrestled.He was just 14.

“You’re talking about a move that, at that age is not common,” Anderson says.“It is common for the Europeans, who don’t even know what Folkstyle or Freestyle is.At an early age he was hitting moves that guys on the University and Senior level do.He was like a European.”

That Anderson compares Eric to a European may be the highest compliment possible.Our friends across the ocean focus on one style their entire lives, and at a young age, are taught with the same system that creates World and Olympic Champions.In Russia, you must have at least a master’s degree in physical education to become a coach.Imagine having a John Smith or Dan Gable at every high school in the nation, and the effect it would have on the development of our athletes.Eric was wrestling like them.

There were no holes in his Greco, nothing he was not athletic enough to do, no move he didn’t pick up the first time.He’s so good he can see a move once, and five minutes later, try it in a match, and hit it perfectly.He would try to score at every opportunity, with no regard for the score, no regard for position.Anderson watched this phenom and knew that if he didn’t get Eric to understand that defense wins championships he wouldn’t reach his full potential.

“I told Eric, if you score 12 points on a guy and he scores 13, you’ll lose,” Anderson recalls.“He didn’t think it was important and that was the thing I worked on the most with him.”

Ike Anderson is responsible for the Eric Grajales that now inhabits the Greco Circuit.Whenever Eric would venture to the Olympic Training Center the two would work on Eric controlling himself, staying in positions that would keep his opponent from scoring on him.At the top of the to-do list was Eric’s gut-wrench defense, of which, Eric had none.The endless drilling, learning how to fight the gut wrench properly using your hips as a weapon, completed him. Ironically, it also gave him a gut wrench that he can hit on almost anybody.Slowly, Eric decided that defense was important.

“I’m always worried about my attacks,” he says.“Ike didn’t necessarily want to slow me down, but he wanted me to be more meticulous.He wanted me to keep my elbows in and not take all the chances.”

He finally put it all together last March at a tournament in Bulgaria.

“I finally saw that he was getting it,” Anderson says with satisfaction.“He finally grasped the concept.”

In addition to his vast array of offensive weapons, Eric had made himself near-impossible to score on.After placing third, Anderson knew his star pupil was ready to wrestle at the Senior Level.

Eric called Anderson for advice some weeks after that tournament.He was thinking about wrestling at the US Senior Open.He wanted Anderson’s honest opinion on whether or not he should even try it.Anderson assured Eric he was ready.

Anderson was so certain that he fought for Eric to get seeded.Eric wasn’t a trailblazer, as wrestlers in high school had wrestled in and done well prior on the Senior Level.That he was considered to be seeded in the top 8 was, however, noticeable.He had never competed at the Senior Level, although he had practiced with some of the guys who did.The first question at the coaches meeting that would determine the seedings, was, why?Why did Eric deserve it over guys who had, at the least, wrestled in the Senior Division?

Anderson, armed with the knowledge that he personally knew Eric was ready not only to compete, but win, rattled off his list of accomplishments.Former Greco Athlete of the Year, 2-time Junior World Team member (losing only to the champion and third-placers) and 3-time Fargo Greco Winner.A few of the other coaches in the room, including Steve Fraser, The National Greco-Roman Head Coach, had seen Eric wrestle and they all agreed he deserved a seed.

Seeded seventh, Eric, in short, wrestled the tournament of his life.

“It was crazy, he hadn’t even trained that much [Greco] prior to it,” his father says.“It was great timing with the fact that he had peaked for the State Tournament.So he was in great shape and shortly after State there were a ton of guys in the room training with him. He wrestled the best I have ever seen.”

When the tournament was over, Eric was not the National Champion, but he had wrestled above his seed.He finished fifth, again losing only to the eventual champion and third-placer.Along the way, he scored the most points in the tournament, scoring a technical fall in every one of his wins.To score a technical fall Eric had to outpoint his opponents by at least 6 points in two separate periods or score a 5-point throw (think, reverse lift).

His talent, his drive, his work ethic, his ability, his potential, was on display at the best time possible.He had qualified for the Olympic Trials as just a high school junior.Although he wouldn’t make the Olympic Team, or place, Eric had cemented himself as the possible future of Greco Wrestling.

At about 8:25 on February 21, 2009 Eric Grajales will complete his career as Florida’s second 4-time undefeated State Champ.He will etch his name into the conversation as possibly Florida’s greatest wrestler ever.

He will be at his introspective best.

Damn, what do I do now?