What Have You Done for Me Lately, Does Wrestling Need the NCAA?
I was thinking I would kick this off with some kind of heartfelt rant, but I know that would be largely ineffective. I would venture to guess that most of you do not know the name Joseph Juran. Juran was a pioneer in management consulting. What does he have to do with wrestling and the NCAA? Well, nothing really, but he is the author of a famous quote that I feel will make my point. Juran stated “Goal setting has traditionally been based on past performance. This practice has tended to perpetuate the sins of the past.”
This is how I feel we are currently approaching the crisis that faces college wrestling in this country. Yesterday we got news that yet another program is being dropped. Liberty University announced yesterday it will be dropping their wrestling program. In this case it is being stated it is due to Title IX and their obligation to comply with this wonderful federal law. The following excerpt from the schools press release should not only annoy men, but should spur some women’s group to finally realize how big of a scam Title IX is. Here is what they wrote; As such, the University was left with two options: either to continue to add NCAA Division I women’s athletics programs or adjust their current NCAA Division I men’s participation opportunities. At least someone finally said what is really happening. Instead of creating opportunity for Women, we would rather reduce opportunity to men.
Ok, you are saying you still have no idea where I am going with any of this. Well, over the next two months we are going to be writing a series of articles that explore other options for College Wrestling that may be outside of the scope of the NCAA. Ask your self this question; what benefits does the NCAA provide wrestling? We are going to explore this question and do our research to determine what, if any, value the NCAA brings to the table.
The reality of all this is that if we continue down the same path, why should we expect any different results. For the NCAA it is all about one thing, money. Wrestling and many other Olympic style sports are not “money makers” for the NCAA. Therefore, they have no real vested interest in maintaining programs. Matter of fact I would go as far to say that in an ideal world the NCAA would be very happy if the only two college sports were football and basketball. But that is just my opinion.
I wanted this article to serve as a starting to point for this series and let people know how we plan on approaching this topic.
The first thing we need to ask ourselves is; Do we want to have the best wrestling system in the world or not? The obvious answer is yes, but are we willing to start changing the way we think? Are we willing to make a paradigm shift in how we do things? I am not so sure, but I certainly hope we do. Please note that I am not saying I have the exact answers; I am simply trying to throw out numerous options to create debate and discussion among our readers, wrestling fans, coaches and our leaders.
How are we doing things now? The NWCA spends an enormous amount of time and money fighting for the sport we love. We should all applaud their efforts and show our support in any way possible. They are doing a lot of things to get ahead of this crisis, but they can only do so much. But this question is not about one specific group or any one situation. Currently, we have a model, for the most part, of being reactionaries. When program’s are dropped or cut, we all scramble to generate a solution in a short period of time. What happened at UNO is a good example. From what I know there was no real way of getting ahead of this one as the unethical Trev Alberts decided to do this behind closed doors in the middle of the night. So, how could we have possibly been ahead of this? What if UNO was not a part of the NCAA and had been using their privately raised funds to represent UNO on their own? Would the unethical Alberts have had to come after them? Maybe, maybe not. The point is our current methodology is not working.
Another thing we will look at is; who is our wrestling leadership and how do they fit into the big picture. We have the NWCA, which we already stated does a tremendous amount of work in this area. USA Wrestling is our National Governing Body; NUWAY is the new kid on the block with part of their mission being to help assist in helping college programs remain viable. Then we have other organizations such as the NAIA and the NCWA. How do all these fit together and on what level do they work together, if at all. We need to understand the architecture of wrestling.
One thing I would throw out there is that there really needs to be a summit of some kind where all these leaders/groups in our sport come together and discuss the crisis we face. This can not just be a meeting of the minds; it needs to be a place where new plans, ideas and paths are worked on. Actionable items needs to be a result of such a meeting.
As we move forward we will attempt to look at all the possible options. We can continue down the NCAA path. What will that look like in the future? 20 DI teams, no DII and a bunch of DIII programs? Would that be a good or bad thing? Are we just overreacting to the current news? See there are a ton of questions that we need to figure out if we want to stay an NCAA sport.
We will look at the NAIA and what would be the pros and cons of looking that direction. The majority of our growth seems to be coming from this organization. Why?
Who could take over the college wrestling infrastructure, will be our main question and would any change like that be sustainable? Keep an eye out for the first part of this new series from TOM.
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17 Comments
Interesting article. The divisional thing needs a serious look.
John Lee (long time Havard Coach)stated in te 80′s “if someone wants to be involved in wrestling, clubs are the way to go, eventually NCAA wrestling will be gone based on his experince on evaluation groups looking at the future of sports like wrestling, swimming & gynastics.
Problem is: folkstyle wrestling is not an Olympic sport. If we were getting our athletes ready to win World and Olympic medals, the AD’s would find a different methodology to comply with Title IX. Imagine if UNO had a Tervel Dlagnev (I know he was UNK, but shows it is viable) and the AD was able to introduce him to alumni: “this is our wrestling heavyweight that is #1 on the Olympic ladder” don’t you think that would be a money-raising opportunity and therefore not one an AD would squander? or how about if Henry Cejudo could’ve pursued freestyle in college? do you think the ASU AD would’ve had the chutzpah to drop the team that produced an Olympic gold medal?
Folkstyle will be the death of NCAA wrestling
Very nice commentary V. While wrestling is having these problems I feel I must point out that this problem is a symptom of the culture we live in where the bottom line IS ALL THAT MATTERS. While every business is driven to make a profit when it becomes the sole objective consequences often reflect how abberative that is.
The perception that people like Alberts are not only unethical but complete whores is reinforced by the fact that there was no discussion held NOR was any subsequent plea even heard, (listened to…maybe.)
With that in mind, what you propose would suit many folks who just picked up in the middle of the night & in an Irsay-fashion moved all of wrestling to the NAIA or an independent organizational body.
It is going to take, however, a helluva an opinion leader & salesman to not only create that vision but close the deal.
Keep it up.
Folkstyle is the death of NCAA wrestling? Wrong!
The death of NCAA wrestling is our fault for being so thick-headed to think the NCAA even gives a crap about our sport.
Folkstyle wrestling is exciting and draws the fans, just look at the NCAA tournament. Now look at Univesities and listen to the pin drop in the audience.
When you hear the head of the NCAA for wrestling make statements about being interested in the growth of D1 wrestling, don’t be fooled. If they were truly interested, they’d be working to add programs.
What I’m about to suggest would probably get me run out of town or in the least ridiculed. What if we just did away with gender classification altogether and universities provided 1 team for each sport. Male athletes and female athletes competing for the same sport. Gender inequality issues SOLVED. Let’s face it, the only college sports that make any significant money anyway are men’s sports. I’ll tell you one reason it would never happen. The goal isn’t really gender equality, it is the continued emasculation of the American male population.
LOL,
I am wondering if you see the irony in your post.
Btw, the NCAA’s are exciting because Penn State fans want to beat Iowa and Ok State fans want to beat OU etc. The rivalry and pageantry are the draw.
NCAA track & field gets lower attendance than NCAA wrestling but yet their programs exist. Why? I believe it is because their athletes are contending for medals.
I think the club approach is the way to go. I recently started doin Judo and the Club system drives them Olympic wise. It’s year round oriented and avoids the academic issues. Plus, get rid of folkstyle. If we want to be the best, then freestyle and Greco are the way to go. Our system needs to clear as many obstacles to growth as possible. Learning a new style eliminates one of those barriers. World Champions should be the goal not NCAA Champs. What have they done for us anyway?
“We can continue down the NCAA path. What will that look like in the future? 20 DI teams, no DII and a bunch of DIII”
I hope these guys writing this article realize that NCAA D-II Wrestling has grown over 30% over the past 10 years… stop using one program as an entire example for a division.
Great job V! The only thing that really doesn’t smell right to me is we as a community continue to say that wrestling is not a revenue sport, I scratch my head sure we are not Football or Basketball but didn’t we just sellout 3 days in Philly? I am curious to know where wrestling stands compared to other sports like soccer,golf,tennis ,lacrosse and baseball. I have a horrible taste in my mouth we had a amazing National Championship but the programs being dropped makes me feel enough is enough and it might be time for a drastic change. We need to take the offensive stance and put pressure on Brands style. Lets not fool ourselves wrestling generates a lot of money and greedy paws never want to lose money.
Yes we do realize that. But thanks for you valuable insight. That was called “Sarcasm”. Thanks Joe.
Wrestling isn’t the only male sport feeling the pain of being cut. Iowa State dropped baseball, Nebraska swimming, track programs have been cut. You might want to visit the College Sports Council website for some background.
As for wrestling, club programs are probably where we’re headed. Then it will be athletes that want to wrestle, not chase scholarships. Pretty much the model the rest of the World uses anyway.
It’s quite possible that the KEY to college wrestling’s prosper is to have the sport be as entertaining as possible for the fans.
NCAA, NAIA, or club…
I doubt a college program would be cancelled if it drew a few thousand excited fans to each home dual meet. And these dual meets would have to have ‘meaning’, just like the old days (maybe have that single overhead beacon, illuminating only the mat).
Although not as damaging as Title IX machinations, a case could be made that the focus on international wrestling has not helped out domestic programs at all. As practiced now, I find the ‘international styles’ boring as all heck. Greco-Roman was invented by the French, for heaven’s sake.
Weird mini-periods. Tilts, schmilts. Give me a standing Granby or a decent arm-bar anyday. It’s probably not a coincidence that US’s biggest successes in international wrestling were mainly the old-style types: the hard-nosed fellows (Gable, Petersons, Banach) and the funkateers (Schalles, Mills, Lewis).
But that’s just my opinion, of course.
It is great that this discussion is taking place. I think a key in dealing with these issues is that the wrestling community get very organized in their approach. An example of the opposite is that when programs get cut, chatboards are sometimes lit up with thousands of posts (collectively). But that is mostly just wrestling fans posting comments back and forth, “preaching to the choir.” What percentage of those people send correspondence directly to the decision makers? We need to get organized, get as many people on board as possible, decide on an approach or approaches, and go from there. Which leads me to agree that a Summit on the issues raised in your article, along with other issues hitting the wrestling community, would be an excellent idea. How can we make that happen?
The NCAA does nothing to bolster wrestling. In fact, I’ve felt for a long time that it has hindered the growth of our great sport. Most countries don’t follow our college system format in developing their talent. NCAA limits the number of participants, limits the age of participation, and limits the season of competition. Go to a club format and athletes can train year round, compete on a balanced schedule (not condensed), and our national talent pool won’t be limited to those that wish to attend college (I personaly know 2 wrestlers that didn’t go to college that would have AA’d at the college level). My daughter has a gymnastics teacher that was an olympic team member for the mens team in Romania. He talks about how he got so good because from a young age he trained along side older more developed athletes. He knew at ten years old what it looked like to perform at the olympic level. Something our divided school system doesn’t offer.
Yes, hold the summit and keep the discussion going. Also, link this article to your state wrestling websites. I’ll be posting this link at Illinois’ http://www.ILMatmen.com
Regardless of the future structure, marketing, public relations and media attention must be a part of the discussion. Looking forward to more of this, and counting on TOM to continue the discussion.
Also, who has numbers on revenues at local, regional and NCAA’s?
When in the summit.
Yeah, if ya do the math, it’s pretty clear that NCAA wrestling will be dead in a few decades, probably sooner. It’s a reality, even if few want to come to terms with it. That means that folkstyle will be pretty much dead, since folkstyle doesn’t exist in any substantial way outside of school. We really ought to consider a switch to freestyle. No real point in continually getting shut out on an international level while at the same time getting thrown out on the domestic level.
The most important change that would enhance wrestling would be to make it a 2nd semester sport and stop trying to compete with basketball for exposure and publicity. What’s wrong with ending the season in mid to late April when there are really no college sports to compete with.