50% of wrestlers go 0-2 or 1-2 at every tournament. That means 50% of wrestlers sit in the bleachers all day and wrestle for at most 18 minutes. However, many of these kids get pinned and for a lot of wrestlers their mat time is less than 6 minutes. This is a waste of time for the kids, for the parents, and for the coaches. We want these first and second year wrestlers to improve, and there are so many better ways to do that then just trying to seek out the right competition. I just think many wrestlers would actually benefit from instruction with different people than trying to find JV tournaments that I don't have the staff to send them to.

Tournaments are the worst venue for new wrestlers and fans. "When am I up?" "When will my kid wrestle?" "What mat will I be on?" I literally can't answer those questions. It is all guess work. I am not just thinking about right level of competition - I am suggesting that we make tournaments useful for the 25% of kids who are just going to lose their first two matches.