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This sure seems like a feasible alternative. You can then separate all the Regional champions and if the two best kids are from the same Regional, they will be separated due to the Regional results.

When you buy a new home so you can build a wrestling room.

Rules are rules but just dont seem right a fifth or sixth grader that was born in 2001 can be eligible but a seventh grader the same age is ineligible cause hes in seventh grade.

The seeding takes care of itself with the addition of one tourney after regionals (I think that is what it is called?). Seed each regional. Top eight from region 1 and 2 go to a district. Top eight from region 3 and 4 go to a district. Seeds in accordance to finish at regionals. 1 and 2 from each regional are separated. Top eight from each district fill state tourney brackets. Again, separation for top two from each district. More separation if desired. Ohio and Indiana have similar structures. As do many other states.

When you go to your kids school during lunch time to recruit some of the bigger kids that aren't doing nothing in the winter months to come out for the wrestling team. Or when your watching Sunday football and instead of saying "did you see that great tackel" or say stuff like " did you see that double leg, or did you see that cut back takedown"

I think it is within reason to seed the top 8-10 wrestlers for each weight in state tournament irrespective of regional performance. Let's be real, we have a group of individuals who build very accurate rankings year in and year out. Now, clearly we would need to assign this responsibility to a committee of non-coaches. This would alleviate endless squabbling over trivial differences in records and so on. But I genuinely believe every year, we could comprise brackets that reflect the patterns of a given season. And so what if this practice translated into other sports? I also played baseball at a Lexington high school, so I'm familiar with the unfair postseason format. Baseball in Lexington has produced 5 of the last 10 state champions and Woodford County won in 2012 (Woodford is in the same region). It is also common to see five or six Lexington teams ranked in the top 10-15 all season, yet only one of these powerful programs each season will advance beyond regionals. in my opinion that renders all of our ranking systems useless. They mean nothing if they aren't used to fairly assign seeds for postseason competition. Let's bring it back to wrestling. There are a few instances where the top two wrestlers for a given weight class are from schools in the same region. Well one of them has to lose the regional final. Does that mean that wrestler is no longer the best or second best wrestler for that class? ABSOLUTELY NOT. Or even worse, The #2 at 145 wins his regional and the #1 at 145 has a bad day and places 2nd in a different regional. Now there is a non zero possibility that the two best from a weight class meet in the 2nd round of state. Is that a good thing? NO!!! Is that #1 at 145 suddenly a lesser athlete because he had a bad showing for one match? ABSOLUTELY NOT. And that should be reflected in the state tournament. Let's give some practical meaning to the rankings. After all, several people spend a lot of time trying to get them right. They do an excellent job by the way. I believe I understand one of the big reasons seeding doesn't happen here. It has to do with fairness. But the KHSAA tends to focus on only one side of the fairness coin. And that's the side that feels seeding individuals can be demoralizing and can damage the psyches of our athletes. The other side (the one the KHSAA conveniently ignores) is two-fold. As an athlete, my goal was to win. Period. If I knew another wrestler was supposed to be better than me, it made me work even harder. Nothing feels better than beating a guy you're not supposed to beat. That is true in every sport. It's universal. The other point I would make in support of seeding these events is that it is equally unfair to intentionally or unintentionally punish two or more elite level competitors by (potentially) having them draw each other in the early rounds of a state tournament. Let's say #1 and #2 meet in the quarterfinals for whatever weight class. One of them will have to fight through consolations to at best finish 3rd when, on paper he is deserving of 1st or 2nd place. That isn't fair to the most talented competitors. If those wrestlers were seeded 1 and 2 and one of them lost before then finals, then so be it. But the top performers should be rewarded for their achievements during the regular season. Seeding is in fact the most fair way to organize a state championship. And that goes for all sports.

We now call them the "underneath the bleacher creatures"

Yes we in KY still do it the same way the only problem is that there is only 1 tourney before the state tourney and you have 8 champions. That means that if all the number 1's win there will be a match up of number 1's in the quarter finals. This is where some people have a problem. If the supposed two best wrestlers are in the same quarter bracket they meet in the quarter finals instead of the semi's or finals. I personally don't care about when the best two meet, as long as they meet.

Region what would you do different? I have seen most of the top 7 this year it looks dead on to me. If is so bad so us how it should be.

In Indiana they have a sectional, regional, semi-state, and state. The only portion of the tournament that is actually seeded is the sectional...the rest of the tournament is based on performance in the previous stage(s) of the state tournament series. The top four are taken from the semi-state and placed in the state brackets based on a predetermined format. This format is "drawn" at some time earlier in the season and it is not released until after the completion of each Semi-State to avoid someone loosing based on what they think will happen elsewhere. After the semi-state they just fill in the names based on their placing at the four semi-states. A semi-state champion will wrestle a fourth place finisher from another semi-state. A second placer will wrestle a third placer from another semi-state, etc. This format allows you to separate all wrestlers from the same semi-state so they do not meet in the second round...they can only meet in the semi-finals or finals. This is how they also used to do it "back in the day" when we still had Districts and Regionals and it worked quite well. They may even use this same format today...although I wish we still had the 16 man bracket. I have not yet sat down to see how it would work out numerically with our current 32 man bracket (and again, they may already do this), but after the first stage of the state tournament series there is no more seeding or possible "politics", it is all left up the the competitors. I am not saying this is right, but it is an option.

Seed this thing already! Good proposals by a few folks listed above.

When you take a loss harder than your son

This one for a wrestling friend of mine, "when your football team is playing in the regional championship game and you look to find your 2 little ones who are supposed to be right beside you on the sidelines, only to find them on the other end of the field wrestling around with each other and all you can do is yell (Half Half Half)"

When you secretively hope his team misses the playoffs (football) so that he can get on the mat early.

Seed the top 4 only. Only region champs are eligible for a seed. Blind draw the rest. This is fair and could be done in 2 hours, max. Allows the semifinals to be some amazing matchups.

when your daughter's swim meets seem short. when you make your kid "clear the arm" when he stands up out of bed.

When the first thing you say to kid your kid every morning is Did you check your weight? When your 2 year old starts stripping down everytime she walks by the scale because she sees her big brother do it.

You've kept your high school wrestling singlet for 23 years through 9 moves with the military (including overseas to Okinawa) in a pathetic and desperate hope your son may one day wear it in an offseason tournament some day!!

When you scheduled your wedding around wrestling tournaments

I wish they would go back to four regions. If they did that and took the top 8 in each bracket you would still have your 32 man bracket and a more balanced bracket and tournement. This would help to separate your best wrestlers.

Put together a board comprised of the super brainiacs from the KHSAA, a couple of out of state refs, along with all the info from Track and seed this thing! Tired of seeing finals matches in the quarters. If you take the region champs and seed them like the middle school has done this year, (minus coach input) and go off the cold hard facts and numbers, seeding could be accomplished.

Has Been... your name suits you well. I'm not sure there's been bigger contributor than fanofwrestling to the 182's specifically.... and Ranger just blew that one all to hell. If he didn't blow the other weight classes, at LEAST he needs to turn over the 182's to someone else because that one is just a mess.

After having time to cool down and look back at what I wrote I would like to apologize to coach Moore for making it personal. That was uncalled for and for that I do apologize. I still don't think it does anybody any good to match 8 year olds against 12 year olds. But I am sorry I let my anger get the best of me and I do apologize.