Rethinking things

[cooch]

saw a post that said hockey is losing kids just like wrestling. Well lets see, In college guess who the wrestlers hung out with...Hockey Players. why?  We go through many of the same things. We deal with injuries, we fight, we battle for every inch, we need to watch our diets.  We are both reckless with our bodies within the sport. Bruises & taped joints are a badge of honor and expected. 

I tell everyone who's kid doesn't want to wrestle.  It take a special kind of person to want to get involved in something where smashing your face against another human being is considered normal. Bleeding is in the rules (Blood Time)  I am pretty sure we are the only WIAA sport with that specifically named in it and the refs have a signal for it. - others address the care of or how to handle it and they say the kid can't play with blood on their uniform.

I've had wrestlers come back from Army and Marine Corps boot camps and say it was easy compared to wrestling.  And the Moto for the Marines is "the Few, the Proud", Army is "Army Strong" -- Not everybody can be in the military, not everybody can be a wrestler. 

As far as the K-2 conversation. I really believe the K and under should only be body control/tumbling if there is a practice at all and no tournaments.
To add to the conversation;
My neighbor just brought there 1st grade twins to practice this year.  Now, The one wants to be a professional wrestler/fighter in the UFC the other says he doesn't really like it but, wants to be tough so he can be a good practice partner for his brother so he can be a professional wrestler/cage fighter.  --- SO that is twins, one is now obsessed according to his mom she has to record the cage fighting and college wrestling and look it up on the internet if nothing is on so the one can watch it, the other one doesn't really like it at all and never watches it.

[DocWrestling]

A moment in time....

Dad and 6th grade daughter in the room.  Dad says he has been busy with daughter's hockey season. I ask daughter how the season is going.  She says "good and bad".  Before I say anything dad says "well the're in first place".   She states "well that is good I guess but we have practice and games almost every night". 

I guess that is the bad.  Just struck me after this thread.  My son's friends seem to be having a tough time transitioning to practicing more as they get to middle school.  Is this the start of the reason why so many kids drop sports in middle school?

As parents should we push them as they are just being lazy or should we back off and just be happy that if we back off and they practice less they will participate in high school but not likely to be as successful.

When a parent asks me what they need to do to be a high school star I always say the first thing is to assure that they are actually playing the sport in high school.

[thequad]

I think if a kid enjoys a sport they should enjoy practice also. Practice is just learning the sport better.

[Quack]

I think if a kid enjoys a sport they should enjoy practice also. Practice is just learning the sport better.

Cant tell you how many kids tell me that they just want to do the meets, and not the practices. The practices are boring. Why, because they are working on technique.

Heard this from youth, middle school, and high schoolers. Maybe that would be the best thing, let the kids choose if they want to do both or just the practices or just the meets.

[firemanscarry]

I have a theory, no research here, that part of this is because we're a little more transient society than we used to be.  People switch jobs more often and families move.  In a town like Wabeno, our population used to feel like it was mainly made up of people whose parents and grandparents had lived in the area and gone to WHS.  Now, there seems to be more people who are entirely new to the area, and their roots don't go as deep.  Enthusiasm for the local teams and traditions isn't as far-spread throughout the local population as it used to be.  Kids aren't brought to sporting events by alumni parents who want to watch the teams from the old alma mater.  The sports don't feel as important to the kids then.

While I feel like there are things wrestling can do to keep from losing some of our kids, there are some things that stem from the society at large that we can't fix.  I didn't wrestle until my sophomore year, and I really only did it because my friends and the coaches convinced me that my school needed me, and I could be a help.  There was a sense of duty involved in my first going out for wrestling.  That carried me through the nightly butt-kickings in practice and that long first four weeks of competition before  a ref ever raised my arm after a match.  Of course, it all ended with me loving the sport for the rest of my life, but were I new to the school and the community... I might never have tried it.

[littleguy301]

A moment in time....

Dad and 6th grade daughter in the room.  Dad says he has been busy with daughter's hockey season. I ask daughter how the season is going.  She says "good and bad".  Before I say anything dad says "well the're in first place".   She states "well that is good I guess but we have practice and games almost every night". 

I guess that is the bad.  Just struck me after this thread.  My son's friends seem to be having a tough time transitioning to practicing more as they get to middle school.  Is this the start of the reason why so many kids drop sports in middle school?

As parents should we push them as they are just being lazy or should we back off and just be happy that if we back off and they practice less they will participate in high school but not likely to be as successful.

When a parent asks me what they need to do to be a high school star I always say the first thing is to assure that they are actually playing the sport in high school.

I love your last line in your post. While years back that wouldnt be thought of as a honest thing to say, now it is.

[ramjet]

Hey all things said this is time to celebrate the success of those who have worked their tails off to make the State Tournament. It's time to clelebrate the journey and the effort. We can all sit here and "woes me"but it is time to give recognition to those who do not to those who don't.

[cooch]

"When I read this discussion as to retention in wrestling, I wonder how the retention numbers in wrestling match those of other sports?  Does any one have any hard numbers?  How many kids play youth soccer and stick with it through high school?  How many kids started with T-ball and stick with it to play baseball in high school?  It would seem that more kids than not try at least one of these sports at one time in their childhood, yet by high school few stick with it.  I would be very curious if anyone had any factual numbers to compare retention in wrestling vs. other sports."

the numbers line up % wise about the same depending on the sport and number of participants. -- I know there was a study done.  I don't have time to find it right now but, they were within a couple of points of each other. Football is the exception as far as being on the team, actually playing is a different matter.

In my opinion basketball and baseball are worse for the number of kids that start the sport in youth and actually get to be varsity players, at least in my town. 

As far as filling a line up, we've talked about this on here many times.  Basketball Needs 5 to play 10 plus is nice. Baseball needs 9, 13+ is nice.  Football needs 11, 25 plus is nice but, 7man football is taking care of that.

NONE of these sports Require a kid to be 106lbs, 113lbs ect.....  I look at Northeast Wisconsin and Most teams have close to or more than 20 kids on their rosters.  But, many are forfeiting at least one spot in their varsity lineups at some point in the season.  I can not think of any team that did not have to forfeit a spot during the season because of sickness or injury.  I do believe even KK, BP and Coleman (all at team state) had to forfeit a weight class in a dual or tournament at least once this season because they did not have a back up in that class. 

Heck I remember a football game where our three running backs all got injured, A line backer went and played running back, he needed a breather so a backup Offensive lineman stepped into the backfield to block on a couple of QB sweeps & passes.  In wrestling you can't take your back up 220 and plug him in at 152 if he's sick.

The issue is out of the 560 kids at state, who doesn't deserve to be there?  Who would you send home and say your entire weight class is terrible and has not earned the right to be here? Its about opportunity for the kids and honestly making money. Or else wrestling and all other sports would be a one class winner takes all state tournament.

[mike]

Hey all things said this is time to celebrate the success of those who have worked their tails off to make the State Tournament. It's time to clelebrate the journey and the effort. We can all sit here and "woes me"but it is time to give recognition to those who do not to those who don't.

+1 Boom!

[imnofish]

I think if a kid enjoys a sport they should enjoy practice also. Practice is just learning the sport better.

Cant tell you how many kids tell me that they just want to do the meets, and not the practices. The practices are boring. Why, because they are working on technique.

Heard this from youth, middle school, and high schoolers. Maybe that would be the best thing, let the kids choose if they want to do both or just the practices or just the meets.

I think that can be addressed, especially at the youth and middle school levels, by designing games designed to incorporate key skills and positions inherent in many techniques.  I used to do this regularly with the middle school kids and they learned, drilled, conditioned, and had fun during those activities.  To a lesser extent, this could be done to break up the monotony in high school practices, too.