Something Coach Russo mentioned to me this year was talking about doing a page dedicated to the FR/GR team, with pics, a small profile and what not. This got me thinking. I'd like to do a preseason preview of the HS rankings for each class in a similar fashion. A small profile, with a pic of the #1 ranked preseason wrestler per weight, in each class and maybe a profile of the #2 and maybe #3 preseason kids.
Then at the end of the year, do a pre state preview as well doing the same thing. I'd still have the profiles and pics on file and would more than likely only need to update a few here and there.
What this would entail is a little help from the coaches from around the state, helping to gather the info. Wouldn't be too much like GPA, possible college wrestling program choice or fan of, etc, then I would just need a head shot of the wrestler. Its something you could ask the parent to do or the coaches could do and just email it to me. I know you guys are busy like myself, but I think this could really benefit our sport more as we fight for more coverage.
I'm going to also try harder to possible come up with some topics to talk about during the year. One thing that I think separates us from the other sports, especially in OR, is that when you look at the message boards, its pretty much the same people talking about wrestling every year. I know a lot of coaches encourage kids not to talk on O-Live or my message board, but believe it or not, newspapers gauge a lot of interest based on message board chatter. So, my thought is, maybe we should be encouraging kids to talk about their teams or potential matchups on the open forums more often, in a positive way.
For instance, I can go to O-Live and see that the state wide wrestling board is on message 15826 today and go to the UO Ducks FB forum and see that its on 77421(yeah I know you're Beavers so it shouldn't matter) and even go to OSU FB and see that its on message 40441. That's a 25000 and 62000 message difference. Then you look at how much coverage they get and see that they get a ton of coverage. So, as a newspaper you see that and know that more people are interested in reading about FB in our state. If wrestling got those type of numbers, we'd start to see more articles about OR college and HS wrestling. Heck, maybe OR colleges take notice and see that OR wrestling is important. Trust me, I know I used to work for a newspaper.
My point is, as coaches, as much as it pains us, I'm thinking in order to make our voices heard in the state and keep things like UO from happening again, we need to get the wrestling public more interested in the cyber space chatter. We've been too quiet for too long.
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I have a feeling that most of our athletes are playing a fall sport and not participating in any mat room. With that in mind, the farthest thing from a parents point of view is wrestling. There isn't any info out there for who is wrestling at this time. For instance, who are going to preseason events, Super 32, USAW Preseason Nationals, Holloween Open, California World Challange, Gladiator, Best of the West, Pacific Jr., and if they are where are they working out and with whom? Why is it that we have FS/GR practices for potential team members ( actually they will not turn anyone away)in the spring yet nothing for folkstyle in the fall? I understand that you would like to " keep posts positive and refrain from personal attacks" and yet you waste your energy with LIMARTIN, and not start some posts here in Oregon. There have been curious posts and topics on OLive that just dwindle away. Washington and California forums rock and roll everyday and OLive gets hit once in awhile. They have open rooms and Oct. tourneys to have something to talk about. I do realize you open your room in Boardman, but that is way too far out of the way. Kudos to you!
I get what you're saying about preseason events, but a few of those haven't even started yet. I did a little research though and found Justin Eldred is heading to Super 32 and so far, Tyler Sherman and Nolan Womack are slated to attend Preseason Nationals in Iowa, so far.
I'm sure with FB going on, this limits our talk by why should it? Sports like FB and B-Ball don't slow down on the message boards once the season is over. With wrestling not only do you rarely see any talk on the boards, but once the season is over, with the exception of about 4 posters, its dead silent until the following season.
I addressed one of the issues and that's with coaches encouraging their kids not to even read O-live or other message boards. But you go to the FB or BB boards and they are always chatting it up. Like I said, newspapers take notice to this and thus the reason why they and college admins across the state think our sport is non-existant.
And I agree with you about WA and CA. One advantage they have is they have a lot more people involved with the sport there, but that shouldn't be any reason why we hear nothing but crickets on our board.
The point of my blog was to encourage coaches and parents to start opening up more and get soem talk going. Whether they like it or not, this is the way it is now. Encourage them to not only frequent to boards but get some friendly competitive chatter going on them as well.
BTW, don't get me started the douchebag that is LIMartin.
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