Monday, August 29, 2011

Welcome

Hi everyone. Oddly enough probably only a handful of people will read this so by "everyone" I mean those of you who got tired enough of me emailing you wrestling news and yelled at me to start a blog instead.

The name of the blog should sum things up. My primary focus will be Penn State wrestling but I also like to follow what's going on in the rest of the wrestling world. I will try to post links as I go to sources that may be more in depth with their information than I am providing, as well as videos, interviews, etc. I won't cover much of high school wrestling in this blog, at least I don't plan on it for now. As Penn State picks up recruits I will track them.


Above should be an image we are all familiar with. I think it would be appropriate to call the 2011 season one that was full of surprises. The national title was a surprise for most PSU fans (including myself), especially after the spanking Iowa laid down in the dual season. Coming into the season all eyes were on Ed Ruth and David Taylor to be the dynamite wrestlers. Ruth and Taylor proved to be as good as expected. Andrew Alton was a pinning machine just like in high school. The 197 weight class continued to be non-existent. Cameron Wade still wasn't sure if he liked winning or not. Brad Pataky was on the team for about the 12th year and Molinaro still looked like he was from Jersey. Finally, Wright got hurt again which didn't come as a surprise. However the year held seven surprises for me. The first two should be obvious: national title and Big Ten title. But the biggest surprise of all...




Spending a lot of time talking about Wright's amazing run to a national title would be like beating a dead horse with another dead horse. I don't think this awesome story got the attention it deserved since Robles, the man with one leg and the body of a 165lb wrestler, manhandled a bunch of tiny 125lb wrestlers. Kudos for doing it with one leg though. Moving on to the next surprise..


 Everyone expected Ed Ruth to be good, but I had no idea he would be good enough to knock off the then #1 and #2 guys in the same tournament (Lewnes and Henrich). After seeing Ruth tear apart the field it was clear that the 2011 team was going to be a lot better than expected.






 Frank who? You must mean Molinaro right? That may have been the feeling at the beginning of the season when Frank Martellotti stepped into the lineup for the injured Pataky, but that quickly changed as he went 7-0 in dual meets and 18-3 overall. He even started to crack the top 20 at 125lbs. So again, Frank who? Frank Martellotti of course, and don't forget it. Hopefully he can crack the top 20 of his academic class.


Pearsall was one of those guys in the 2010 lineup that made you groan when he took the mat. Nothing against him personally, he just always lost (3-23 record in 2010). Yet he came out every match and gave it everything, and apparently that hard work paid off. The collective sigh turned into head scratching disbelief as he stormed to a 13-6 record in 2011. No doubt this was a proud moment for the coaches (why couldn't Ortega do this?) All moot by Long coming into the team, but still awesome to see the improvement.

 The final surprise was the Alton/Marion incident. Was it a surprise that Alton had 18 pins on the season as a true freshman? Not really for me. Watching him through high school I had no doubt he would eat college wrestlers that were lacking in skill. What was a surprise was Alton's ability to just as easily throw the best wrestlers around if given the chance. By time Alton faced top tier wrestlers, you could see they wanted nothing to do with him in the clinch and instead exploited the weaknesses in his game to win. Along comes Montell Marion after getting released early from his DUI punishment (an entire other discussion) and apparently hasn't caught wind of the news that is Alton. Would Tom Brands really send a wrestler on the mat who hadn't studied? I guarantee the Iowa wrestlers have to watch more film than football players. So there is no doubt that Marion knew what Alton was capable of but figured he was athletic and talented enough that he didn't have to worry about it. This attitude lead to the throw that was heard through the Big Ten. Marion looked like any other two bit wrestler when Alton threw him down (only problem was Alton didn't hold him long enough for the ref to see he was pinned). The bout took a very different look from then on.

It should be another exciting season on the horizon. With Long leaving the team and Ruth being potentially unavailable (as well as three other alcohol offenders), the opportunity is there for new wrestlers to step up to the plate and be the 2012 surprises. Before the season begins in November, I will release my version of a brief Big Ten preview and my predictions for the Big Ten tournament team results. If anything else comes along I will update on here, but I'm not expecting much. As a final word, check out the below link for one of the most awesome Greco Roman takedowns you will ever see (it has been named the flying squirrel takedown).


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oW8Mf3IL4zA

 Thanks for reading, leave feedback if you want.



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