For the record baby, I’d rather be nowhere besides here yakking and talking Penn St sports with you guys and steaky. Testosterone gets in the way sometimes but I honestly believe we all get along pretty dang good we’ve been here for a long time.listening to politicians and people on the radio and tv ain’t real because all of ‘em are paid to say what they say. What we do here is real and I believe we are all good friends and we all want the same thing, Penn State winning. As my man lake said, water under the bridge. The only thing I ask is no bad mouthing Matt Limegrover because we were winning 11 games a year while he was the OL coach 😂. I’m going down to gulf shores Al baby for a week let’s get back to some Penn St sports we got a spring game coming up. Let’s go Penn St.
Tsuga, looking forward to gettin you back in here brother you keep gettin better I’m still praying for ya.
@t-hale Had seen that yet. That's too bad, particularly the signing w/ Iowa part.
@been-there-ii Yeah, that was a kick in the teeth for sure. Just for fun I added up all the points scored at nationals that we have coming back next year,including RBY. I did the same for Iowa plus I added Spencer Lee's 2021 points and Woods' points (12.5)
Results:
PSU: 107.5
Iowa: 66.5
So what does this mean?? Absolutely nothing in April....lol.
I will say that RW wrestled Nick Lee pretty darn close in the semis this past year(3-2). He then lost his next two bouts to finish 6th place. He'll make a difference for Iowa and definitely fills a hole they had at 141.
So what does this mean?? Absolutely nothing in April....lol.
Yes, literally LOL'd.
Based on what I read on the BW board, Woods was thought to be a Penn State lock putting Bartlett's place in the line up at 141#s in question. Then came Iowa and a supposed last minute $'s from NIL that couldn't be matched. Who knows? I for one am glad he didn't come here so those questions posed above are moot. Although it appears Cael isn't opposed to discouraging high profile transfers, he builds his teams from the ground up. I think Bartlett will do very well at his more natural weight and be more aggressive, possibly becoming an AA. If Iowa wants to challenge for a NC they will need more than 1 transfer.
Long time before this kid will be a freshman in college. Michigan or Iowa might throw big NIL bucks his way. I’ll get excited when he is in the room.
@sky: I agree with your NIL assessment but IMO this kid is different. He trains with DT and therefore rubs shoulders with some of PSU's current and formal legends. BTW,that includes our very own PaKid. Also, his mother is an employee of PSU and he'll receive a nice discount. But yeah. A lot can happen during his HS years to change his mind.
@lakerie. I thought he was a lock too. Apparently Cenzo (who is a coach at Stanford) has stated that PSU was never in the talks. It's rumored that Real was approached at the Championships about transferring.
It'll be interesting to see how this whole NIL stuff plays out. Filthy lucre??
I'm curious to know your thoughts on wrestling NIL, because it seems like a way to get the better wrestlers a good amount of money in a sport that otherwise doesn't generate a ton for it's athletes. Is it a benefit to the top wrestlers to strike while the iron is hot, or more a detriment that will lead to schools in bidding wars? Seems like a different animal than Football or Basketball in some respects.
I'm curious to know your thoughts on wrestling NIL, because it seems like a way to get the better wrestlers a good amount of money in a sport that otherwise doesn't generate a ton for it's athletes. Is it a benefit to the top wrestlers to strike while the iron is hot, or more a detriment that will lead to schools in bidding wars? Seems like a different animal than Football or Basketball in some respects.
Excellent question Roam. Bottom of line is that few Americans follow wrestling. Big money will come from Boosters
@t-hale While we don't know what was going through Wood's mind when he transferred, we do know he graduated from Stanford with 2 years of eligibility. One would think with Stanford's alumni money and resolve to keep the program in place, they could have acted to keep him. Maybe he wasn't accepted into one of Stanford's graduate programs, who knows. One would also think there would exist an "esprit de corps" among team mates ( much like Penn State) and he wouldn't want to leave his team mates while building something.
I really hate this NIL thing especially in a non revenue sport. It's creating an arms race for the best wrestlers and only the wealthy schools can win. How many schools with limited athletic funds can afford to do that? Schools under pressure to keep their marquise sports floating won't divert NIL doner funds from BB and FB. I could see college wrestling looking more like gymnastics, fencing, bowling with very limited NCAA participation. Maybe in the future wrestling will have just one large confernece consisting of mostly Big10 schools, a few Big 12 schools, plus Cornell, Lehigh, NC State, Virginia Tech. I don't know how the rest can survive.
@lakerie I'm hoping the whole NIL thing evens out in the near future. But I agree, it seems like some of these guys are hired guns; offering their services to the highest bidder. Interesting stuff being written about Larry Lee. Not sure if you've seen anything but apparently he could be the one that reached out to Woods and played the role of bagman. If true, that is an NCAA violation. Kind of ironic that Iowa insinuates that our program isnt on the up and up and we have the unlimited slush fund, pay our athletes, recruit over them....etc yet they're the ones looking like the kid that just got his hand caught in the cookie jar.
@t-hale Yes, I've been reading about that on BWIllustrated. Its hard to say at this point how much of it is true let alone legal but it as they say, where there is smoke there is fire and Minneo is adamant around the details he has. I guess we will see what comes of this. That said, the whole Larry Lee thing was kind of funky beginning from his high school days. Larry was employed by Allegany College in Meadville, Pa while Spencer wrestled for tiny Saegertown high school. Spencer then transfers to powerhouse Franklin Regional HS near Pittsburgh, understandably he can get better coaching to fulfill his goals (though Saegertown has some really good coaches too). From there I'm not sure where Larry worked but I don't think it was Allegany. When Spencer committed to Iowa, Larry gets a job at tiny, (near to Iowa) Coe College. Of course none of this is illegal but its certainly not normal.
@lakerie : Pretty sure I read somewhere that he worked at Carnegie Melon before landing his job at Coe. He's the VP of finance. Go figure.
