I was only responding to the lead post--4 state champs per weight class in AZ has always led to conversations about State Championships being "iffy", was my only point...
It's down from six when I wrestled--so there's been some improvement--still need to change each divisional state title, to simply a divisional tournament--then have the top 4 go to a REAL state championship tournament.
I used to always want to see a tournament like this to see who is the best. I miss the old Senior All-Star tournaments, I know most of the time you had guys coming in way overweight, I think they used to give like 7-pound allowances things like that.
Yet I still remember when guys came ready to wrestle, and when you had the consensus top guys from a certain weight class, it made it even that much better. I still remember the Deberry vs. Gaethje match in 2007. The buildup for it as Deberry beat Gaethje, in the Flowing Wells Finals the year before, and we thought there would be a rematch, as Deberry went 160s at Peoria and he had been at that weight class for most of the year, but he dropped down to 152s for Flowing Wells the next week and they did not wrestle, and Gaethje wrestled Ochoa instead I believe. And yet Deberry ended up wrestling 160s at state, as Pina ended up at 152s. That is the year when Sunnyside had 14 placers, 9 finalists and 7 state champions, and had the tournament been scored the old way (they were doing dual state championships at the time) they would have obliterated the team scoring record and it would still be standing to this day I want to say.
So, it was very interesting when the matchup was announced, I remember there was a decent crowd there at the old GCU gym. There were some good matchups before, but everyone was there to see that one match. It was like a main event and to my mind, probably one of the more hyped-up and anticipated matches for Arizona wrestling in recent years. The match sure did not disappoint, with it going to Overtime and Deberry ending up catching Gaethje in the end.
My whole point about that match was these two guys were the top guys at 160s for Arizona, you might be able to say they might have been the top P4P guys in all of Arizona wrestling that year, just the way they both dominated everyone they wrestled that year (no disrespect to any other wrestlers from that year, there were great ones).
So, when it came together, you had something that does not happen often, just due to the different divisions and things like that. I know it may seem like I would be using this to support doing what you say and just having 1 state tournament, but actually I would not want this.
I believe the divisions are what they should be at for a few reasons. One, the talent disparity appears to be getting more greater between the bigger divisions, Division I and Division II, then there has been in the past. Now I know you have teams like Santa Cruz (DIV), the past couple years who could compete with every team or you have certain individual wrestlers like Keller Rock (DIII), last year who we just knew was the consensus top guy. Yet, for the most part the better teams are going to be in Division I and Division II now.
Now this isn't meant to knock any of the Division III or Division IV teams, there are some great teams out there in these divisions don't get me wrong, but overall, these teams are going to lack something that Division I and Division II teams will tend to have... and its depth. What I mean by that is these Division III and Division IV schools, some of them may have a great lineup, but what happens when someone gets hurt or kids just do not come out? Who do they have to replace these kids? Look at what happened in Division III last year at state, Yuma won the state title with 111 points and no other Division III team broke 100 points. My point with this is that if this would have been a 1 state tournament there is no DIII team that would have been able to compete. Yuma's state title score of 111 points would have been tied for 13th place and the 2nd place team from DIII, Sahuarita with their 91.5 points would have been good enough to be tied for 20th place.
Now this was due to a variety of reasons, primarily injuries, kids not coming out, a little bit of bad luck, as this appeared to be the case for all the D3 schools as there was no DIII school that brought more than 9 kids to state last year. There were 15 schools in DI and DII that brought at least 10 kids to state, and 5 in DIV. Meaning you had 20 schools across the state that brought at least 10 kids to state, and there was not a single DIII team that brought more than 9 kids. This is a perfect example of why there needs to be 4 divisions for state. While last year for DIII may be an outlier, still it would not have been fair to have these teams if they were competing against all these other schools that just had more depth. Again, this is not to knock on Yuma, as they only brought 8 kids to state last year, and they scored a good number of points for only bringing 8 kids, which if you look is right on the mark for the some of the other DI and DII schools that brought 8 or 9 kids to state last year.
The reality though is that DI and DII schools just have more depth than most of the DIII and DIV schools. A kid gets hurt, a kid does not come out, there's likely going to be a better chance there will be another kid to replace that kid in DI and DII. Most of the time in DIII and DIV, when a kid gets hurt, there isn't another kid to replace him; it just ends up being an empty spot on the roster, and this is what happened last year in DIII and it is starting to get more and more common, as you will be hard pressed to find a DIII and DIV team that will be fielding a full lineup; especially with all the stuff going on this year (wrestling cancelled, COVID).
And this is due to 1 main reason, enrollment. There are 11 schools in the that state have an enrollment of over 3,000 students, and there are at least 63 schools that have over 2,000 students (all Pre-COVID numbers). The average DIII school has an enrollment just over 1,160 kids and the average DIV school has an enrollment of just under 430 kids. While a few of the DIII and DIV schools have wrestling clubs that will produce kids for the wrestling team year end and year out, for the most part they there's no way they can compete with these bigger schools. And again, most of the bigger schools will have bigger clubs than these smaller schools. This is the reason why there needs to be 4 divisions... 4 state divisions and not just 4 regional tournaments.
The kids should be competing at an even playing field, and to me that is what 4 divisions brings. While I agree that 6 divisions were way too much, 4 seems to be the right amount.
Now where the whole Deberry and Gaethje match is relevant to this is that if there was a 1 state tournament, then this match would have happened no matter what. And to me that's where my desire used to be, to have just 1 state tournament, so we could have more matches like this. And this is where my other point is about not wanting a 1 state tournament. Just because there's 1 match like this that comes around every so often, doesn't mean we should have a whole 1 state tournament just to cater to 1 match.
Most of the time we all know who the #1 wrestler in the weight class is, as many of times these wrestlers will wrestle each other at the bigger tournaments in the season: Moon Valley, Mile High, Flowing Wells, Winslow and so on, and many times they wrestle each other in practice (club and school practices). Furthermore, most of the time we just know which kids wrestle at a higher level above the other kids, and we tend to see some more matchups, in the offseason National Qualifiers and Freestyle state; while this is not Folkstyle wrestling, we still get to see the matchups. And of course, in recent years there has been the One State Tournament, which I believe is usually an open invite for the state champs, placers and the prep kids in the state. So, my point is why do we need to change it to a 1 state tournament if most of the time we usually know who the top guy is.
The great thing about the Deberry and Gaethje match is that nobody forced it to happen. There was an opportunity for it to happen, and they on their own made the decision for it to happen. To me this makes the match even more special, because they chose to wrestle, they chose to see who the better wrestler was. It was not any forced decision, and if one of them would have chosen not to; sure, we all would have said some stuff for a bit, but it would have let down eventually. Yet, those young men for that moment of time, had the desire to truly see who the better wrestler was, and this is what made the match great.
You see by having 1 state tournament, all we would be doing is trying to force the kids to wrestle. Force the kids to keep cutting weight, and to keep busting their butts in practice; so, that maybe we could see a replication of what happened with the Deberry and Gaethje matchup. But you cannot force something like that to happen. The beauty in the matchup was how it all came about, and to me that is why we should not adopt a 1 state tournament. Just let the kids have their moment in the sun... if that is enough for them, then it should be enough for us.
However, if that one matchup comes along, and you get the kids who desire to see who the better wrestler is, and they make the choice to wrestle. Then by all means I will be the first person buying a ticket to see the matchup, but it must be their choice and no one else's choice.
Long story short, while a 1 state tournament would be cool; it should not be our choice for it to happen, is should be up to the kids.
