Wrestling Blogs - Rick Addante

A response to a great blog by Jim Harshaw: http://www.flowrestling.org/blogs/blogger/jimharshaw/9322-top-10-excuses What is the GOAL? Is it to be like Football, NASCAR and UFC? Does that mean that the Goal is commercialization; that the goal is simply to make money off of it? What is GREAT about this sport, perhaps uniquely so, is that for thousands of year it has Thrived as the everyman's sport that discriminated purely on work ethic, practice, heart, and toughness. It selects against the people who simply want to make money, and instead Selects FOR the people who train/compete for the purity, the honor, discipline, self… more »

I begin this blog with the reference to the inspiration for it, which was a blogged question of Pat Hitchens ( What Are College Wrestlers Supposed to Do After Graduation?), where he asked the following questions: “I am a fan of a lot of sports, and I ask myself, what is the draw to be a really bad-ass wrestler. I mean, what is there to look forward to after college graduation for the country's best. Is it all MMA now? Or is there something else?” Followed by a response by Alan Zorthian that included the following: “I guess one tries… more »

I agree with the statement (in Martin's blog) that "it all comes down to how our system is setup in the USA" ("Twilly's" comment), but I think financial situations of athletes is a more peripheral issue in the bigger picture, though still important. Training Center approach seems to be working quite well- but is asking a lot to have a kid full of promise forgo a free college education in the NCAA (which might be a better service to the guy for the rest of his life than a gold medal around hi neck, but I am open to debate… more »

In Martins Blog, he asked several really good, fundamental questions: "How wrestlers perfrom under the "pressure"....Do wrestlers perform at their ultimate or do they crumble or just tighten up? Why and how? It is at that time where you make a conscious choice to work through it or let up. That pressure we all feel at that moment is intense, real and flooding. Can we continue with the same intensity or will we let up a bit? Is it that the best are just able to keep composure and compete with a clear head and able body through that intense… more »

In repsonse to a question from my high school brother, I thought I would post this. He plays football, and wants to get bigger and faster form lifting weights. He wanted first to take Nitro Tech, which, from working on my PhD in Neuroscience, I professionally caution against as being a very dangerous product to use. There can be major problems associated with it and similar products... most anything from GNC, almost. I can let into the cellular, genetic, and molecular components, but will spare you here. Email or comment for further detail if your interested. He then wanted to… more »

As a wrestler, it severely pains me to see ANY program get cut, especially in todays times of massive program cuts and the dangers that our sport faces nationally. Eastern Illinois University's decision to cut wrestling hit particularly close for me, since my younger brother just graduated there for undergrad and an MBA, and my younger sister is still attending there now. I would love to tell her to transfer, and make a principled stand not to support a college that doesnt support wrestling, and tell my bro not to donate as an Alumni. But I Cant. Good Riddance, unfortunately,… more »

Ben Askren made a great post about Saving College Wrestling. However, I'd would add a few more intangible points though too. We need to be better at helping ourselves. How? We as a sport need to stop whining, complaining, and playing the victim in this title IX thing and losing all of our programs, even if we don't mean to be doing it. Heck, we are WRESTLERS, we should know better. If the ref keeps hitting you for stalling when you clearly aggressive, or if he doesn't award points that you clearly earned, or if he gives the opponent a… more »

So this is my first blog, and I am not used to this. But I was writing a few ideas of creative out-of-the-box ideas to help save our sport from programs like Oregon dropping it. I thought that posting it here might result in getting good feedback on improving the ideas, as well as how feasible it might be. I dunno...I also had some other non-traditional ideas about ways to exert pressure to save the program and gain further funding. If football, basketball, and baseball are Kings there [at Oregon] to whom the AD must cower to, and if there… more »