wrestling and the economy

[bigedcoach 27]

Open question here.

What effect do you think the economy is playing on kids in sports especially wrestling. I know the numbers for travel/ competitive soccer is down and they are saying its because people are struggling to pay for travel cost and camps. I know this dosent really effect the top 1% kid because either the parents find away or there is a club that will help out some.

I have always said that a lot of talent goes untapped because you cant get higher level training and competition to lower level income kids especially inner city. How many of kids miss out that are on free lunch programs. I get sad sometimes when I see a 15 year old kid working in a McDs that looks like a physical beast or a kid the day after the season has to literally work a full time job to help his family pay the lights.

opinions??????

[Mpire 76]

Not sure what you can do if a kid is working but usually in wrestling there is someone or someway to help as far as training or rides everyone needs partners and usually someone wants a big team so they don't mind helping . People should take Dvantage of ideas and oportunitys there is nothing written in stone that says everyone should do the same thing or go about getting involved and raising funds the same way , ky is wide open there are lots of ways to help maybe a few free camps or at least very cheap ones honestly it's not the big names that make a camp it's the work number and amount of kids that show up , how neat would it be to have two or three camps getting top kids and whoever will come to some very cheap camps or even free ones have one in each part of the stAte , surprised no one posted on this topic , the youth and jr high kids would love it So would their parents ,

[bulldog-leader 56]

I for one will admit that in our house the economy has caused a reduction in competition or the thought of traveling to compete in the summer.

I also know from experience about kids who needed to work instead of participating in sports. Where I use to coach this was a huge problem. Even during the season. When we traveled to Lou. or Lex. Most of the wrestlers did not have money for food and drinks, this was why I had to change my schedule so as not to travel to Lou or Lex as much.

[Mpire 76]

I have seen boosters raise quite a bit of money for teams , I really do not see why a group of parents teachers etc cannot raise enough money through events and different types of fund raisers that such things as drinks and snacks cannot be covered , some events could be coordinated state wide to raise money every school could have its own lift a thon then have a state wide lift a thon for state funds and there are other things that can be done as well . It seems if people spent as much time trying to help and raise money as they do making excuses things would be a whole lot better .

[Wildblueeyes 6]

Mpire- It isn't that the parents can't or don't want to raise the money to help the kids. In our school system, the site base and school board limits your fund raising. So anything the coaches or parents want to do has to go before the principal, site base and school board to be approved. It can take up to a month to get approval. If another group is doing a fundraiser you may not get to do one. It depends on what the group is as to who gets to raise funds. I have also seen your idea of taking food for your wrestlers Mpire, it looked like a buffet. That hurts the school that is hosting the tournament. That maybe one of their major fundraisers. I would be wonderful if everyone could raise the money to feed their wrestlers every weekend but it is very hard to do that when you have to pay for buses/drivers and gasoline to get to the tournament.

[Notfromhere 6]

We are in a poor school district, lots of single parent families. A lot of kids don't have much money to spend. I know fewer kids have had money for a USA wrestling card and for summer tournaments the last few years. We have had to use more booster money than in the past to make sure the kids are fed on Saturdays. Also, costs are going up. Referees fees went up this year.

We bring a lot of food to the tournaments too because healthy food is not available at most sites. Kids still spend plenty of money on the junk sold at concession stands.

[bulldog-leader 56]

The team that I had got no support from the school and most of the parents did not even see thier kids wrestle. I recieved nothing from the boosters, I didn't even have a full set of singlets. We used 3 different sets to make one set, and had no warm ups.

I was told if I used my money on warm ups then we would have to limit our season. I thought it more important to wrestle every week. As for fundraisers, I only had about 10 kids on the team with maybe 4 parents involved. (When I mean four I dont' mean four sets of parents)

What is the ruling on boosters supporting summer wrestling?

[Mpire 76]

Summer wrestling should hav wry little to do with the school??? Good if they are involved great even but it's summer

[bigedcoach 27]

boosters cant by law but some people get around it with USA clubs but in Jefferson county , schools and school booster clubs cant buy or pay for summer tourneys or USA cards but its easy to set up a USA Club and go from there, but its a lot of paper work. But you really have to have a ton of parents involved. As for fundraising, The HS soccer team got tired of fundraising and they just went to booster fees and the consession stand and we held a couple events to add sales to that. But unfortunatly soccer parents had more influence and money then the wrestling team. (The wrestling team was well provided for through the school, Coomes was the best at that) Still I wish there was money for some of our kids to participate in the national events and stuff but they had to work and help their families. I know we would have had a couple more AAs at Eastern.

If I ever have a fundraiser its to get Mpire a computer so he can type and not use his phone so we can all understand what he is trying to type on his phone....lol

I tell you what Lou Central and Che Founder has one of the most athletic teams in the state but his kids hardly wrestle year around and probably its because of money and inner city things, Che does well with them but he has a lot of untapped talent there

[Mpire 76]

Wrestlers are athletes they shouldn't eat hot dogs greasy hamburgers chips and candy the food we bring or recommend is much healthier and better to carb up on the fans way the food at concessions wrestlers do not need to eat much of that crap . Wrestlers should be abl to have their own fund raisers like lift a thons those could be for each sport .

[stalling 7]

Parents really are the key to this problem. I agree with Mpire about bringing food to the tourneys for the team. Junk food just causes sugar crashes and all the fat in that concession stand stuff makes for lathergic blah feeling wrestlers. Not good. I understand some feel it hurts the host school not buying from them, but honestly a lot of kids can't afford to eat from them all day. If you can get parents to attend more tourneys, its easier to band together. We have an old conversion van and I haul as many kids/parents as legally allowed to help all with the cost. There is no easy answer to this problem, I wish there was. You would think with the popularity of UFC and the like the wrestling fan base would be on the rise. More popularity means more funding. But too many people (Moms in particular) that I talk to think wrestling is brutish and they would never let their "baby" do that. God bless the wrestling Moms that do support our sport! If I ever win the lottery, I'm going to make some wrestling teams very happy...

[Jacketcoach 19]

Thanks for the compliment Big Ed. It is true what you said. I have always tried to give my kids the opprtunity to summer stuff but it is hard. Here recently more than I have in the past. Most of my older kids are working now and the others just can't do it because of family obligations. I have tried to pay some things but can't pay for them all. If I could ever tap into the gold mine here it could be special. I do have athletes but not even half of them have come out. We are working on that!

The biggest problem I have is not the economy but the stereotype of wrestlers. "I don't want to grab on another sweaty guy". I laugh when I hear it and just ask them to give me a chance. Most wrestlers that start stick with it. If the tides ever change we could be dangerous. 4 out of the 5 past 3A football championships looks good if I could equate that to the wrestling team. Anybody got any ideas how to bridge the gap?

[Nkawtg 137]

How many would be great wrestlers never tried the sport due to the ridiculous singlet!!?? College wrestling tried the doublet a few years ago but it never caught on. There's no reason it can't work.

[grappler-of-old 44]

I really don't think the singlet is that big of an issue. Those that say it are just looking for an excuss. If it wasn't the singlet then it would be the shoes or the hair regulations, or the weigh in issue.

Do swim teams lose swimmers because of the swim suit? Do football players loose players because of having to wear a cup?

I was the first person in my family to wrestle. I didn't know anyone who wrestled. One day my dad said why don't you try wreslting? I didn't know what it was. I went out for the team my 9th grade year and loved it ever since. Not once did the singlet become an issue for me. I don't even remember the 1st time seeing a singlet. It was just the uniform I was told to wear and I wore it.

[Mpire 76]

Sorry big Ed coach my typing is terrible not sure if it's the darn phone or my own idiocy . I did type and write a little better before I had the screws pins and anchor in my arm compacted elbows and arthritis sucks as much as not being able to throw a ball a rock or bend your arm more than 12 degrees or rotate your wrist much more than 50 degrees . Probably more to do with my horrible English though and my terrible typing and computer skills . But if you want to have a fundraiser to get me a giant phone with spellcheck that fine lol

[Mpire 76]

The singlet stuff is a way for kids who are scared to wrestle make an excuse that makes them out to be to tough to wrestle rather than to scared to get thrown around and work .

Just my own opinion I doubt any great wrestling talent has ever been lost because of fear of a singlet .

[grappler-of-old 44]

In my advanced age, I would say that the one biggest problem with getting kids out is the amount of time needed to wrestle. Kids don't want to give 6 days a week to a sport these days.

I in no way agree with this but it is what I have explerienced in my time. Football and basketball (sorry for cussing) don't require 6 full days of dedication to compete.

I don't see any way around practicing 5 days a week and wrestling on Saturday. It's the nature of the beast, and kids today don't want to give that much time up. Girlfriends and non-wrestling friends don't understand the dedication and it pulls some kids away.

I know in ancient times when i wrestled most of my friends didn't see me for 4-5 months except at school. And the few girlfriends I tricked into going out with me I had to give the boot to during wrestling season.

Wow thats twice this week that I have agreed with you Mpire. My hair must be getting to long I'll need to get a haircut.

[Mpire 76]

Ha ha I got a big haircut myself a couple weeks ago .

[tiltfor3 20]

What BigEd is saying is real. A real problem for the kid, his family and our sport. But, don't blame today's economy. This happens even in the best of economic times. Plenty of these kids have had to give-up playing football or basketball for the same reasons. I am sure it happens to the Science Club, Language Clubs and Band too. I honestly have never heard of a kid who had to quit, soccer, golf or swimming to help pay the family bills.

[paulham 4]

I think that economical restraints on individuals can severely hurt their advancement in this specific sport. However in sports like basketball and baseball you can either get a group of friends on the street to play the sport and better yourself. However in wrestling you need to have technical training which is $400 for 5 days and most families especially in today's economy don't have the necessary money to keep their kids constantly Wrestling and improving.

[Mpire 76]

Open mats are free and I'm sure if a group of wrestlers wanted to practice a coach would open the room for em , kids can get together drill anywhere and practice wrestling in the yard the park in the snow sand anywhere ,

Excuses , In wrestling you could do a hundred standups switches granbys sit outs and on and on by yourself actually it's the cheapest sport and the oldest . Wth , your saying the oldest sport on the planet is harder to train for and more expensive than the others I have heard it all now ,

Numbers are down because kids are lazy and the economy is crappy not because you can't train for it inexpensively.

Seriously there are open mats almost every night somewhere , the problem being there is not very much structure and not blasting on KY and Definatly not on it's wrestlers but the open mats I have seen have not been consistently structured and there is very little serious drilling conditioning and an all around feeling of aaaalllllrrrrigggggghhhhhhtttttt it's play time for me an the rest of the romper room wrestlers . I see the youth actually going hard and the best of the HS kida giggling running around and wasting a lot of time I mean it Is off season so maybe go all out for about 75 percent and goof of the rest but it's the opposite I see HS kids actually going hard about 25 percent and that's stretching it . Sorry not trying to bash anyone or any school or state but do not expect to hang with the best and play like the rest it doesn't work that way , I would rather see the kids go intense for 45 minutes drill for 15 wrestle for 30 and then go play basketball for an hour or so than watch kids waste nearly two hours giggling and trying stupid stuff to make people laugh and go hard about ten minutes .

Went to open mats tonight saw a few state champs runner ups and top placers but I don't see anyone training like they were going to Fargo to kick some ass maybe 1 HS kid I saw was focused maybe 2 more that even would have been had they had kids their sise and they used that as an excuse to play .

When the rest of the room sees the "better"kids fool around it sets a bad example .

I did see a couple of cool moves the cruncher and Ikaris was pretty cool I saw a super shot that was mistakenly called a superduck , "it can't be a superduck without the duck part " flight without wings is a beautiful thing to see . I guess it was a lot of fun after all,

[eville dad 17]

Fargo is not cheap and a waste of time if your not preparing seriously. Its along way to go to get beat and watch the best in the country fight it out.

Hopefully a KY Team concept will develop and help manage the cost down and develop training in FS and Greco.

[Notfromhere 6]

Open mats are free and I'm sure if a group of wrestlers wanted to practice a coach would open the room for em , kids can get together drill anywhere and practice wrestling in the yard the park in the snow sand anywhere ,

Excuses , In wrestling you could do a hundred standups switches granbys sit outs and on and on by yourself actually it's the cheapest sport and the oldest . Wth , your saying the oldest sport on the planet is harder to train for and more expensive than the others I have heard it all now ,

Numbers are down because kids are lazy and the economy is crappy not because you can't train for it inexpensively.

Seriously there are open mats almost every night somewhere , the problem being there is not very much structure and not blasting on KY and Definatly not on it's wrestlers but the open mats I have seen have not been consistently structured and there is very little serious drilling conditioning and an all around feeling of aaaalllllrrrrigggggghhhhhhtttttt it's play time for me an the rest of the romper room wrestlers . I see the youth actually going hard and the best of the HS kida giggling running around and wasting a lot of time I mean it Is off season so maybe go all out for about 75 percent and goof of the rest but it's the opposite I see HS kids actually going hard about 25 percent and that's stretching it . Sorry not trying to bash anyone or any school or state but do not expect to hang with the best and play like the rest it doesn't work that way , I would rather see the kids go intense for 45 minutes drill for 15 wrestle for 30 and then go play basketball for an hour or so than watch kids waste nearly two hours giggling and trying stupid stuff to make people laugh and go hard about ten minutes .

Went to open mats tonight saw a few state champs runner ups and top placers but I don't see anyone training like they were going to Fargo to kick some ass maybe 1 HS kid I saw was focused maybe 2 more that even would have been had they had kids their sise and they used that as an excuse to play .

When the rest of the room sees the "better"kids fool around it sets a bad example .

I did see a couple of cool moves the cruncher and Ikaris was pretty cool I saw a super shot that was mistakenly called a superduck , "it can't be a superduck without the duck part " flight without wings is a beautiful thing to see . I guess it was a lot of fun after all,

Mpire you have hit the nail on the head here. At these open mats we go to, there is a lot of laughing and joking. Have fun, sure, but I know that when I am laughing, I can't lift as much weight, etc.