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2022

He seems to have a lack of offense. I was hoping he would be the one to bulk up to heavyweight where you can still be top 5 without much O and maintain an amazing D like his brother. His new light weight puts him at an even bigger disadvantage in my opinion. However if he is willing to put in the work anything can happen.
One would assume if he has an “amazing D” there’d be plenty of Os to go around.
 
Haas will be fine IMO. It's admirable that he even chose to compete at Junior Nationals after missing his senior year. Let alone cutting down to 86 kg after being in the 200s the past couple of years.

He's had 3 losses during those 2 years. To Cade Lautt, Jack Darrah, and Nick Feldman. Lautt ended up #44 PFP in 2020. Feldman will be top 5 PFP in 2022. And in the Darrah match, Darrah basically backed up until Haas got tired and started wrestling carelessly. The match immediately after that one, Haas easily beat Bennet Tabor, the #41 PFP in 2021.

That said, he's not a finished product. As Harley pointed out before, Haas is overly reliant on throws and doesn't have a solid leg attack yet. But he has 2 things going for him - he's athletic and he's aggressive. He wrestles like he wants to fight you (a great quality BTW). Right now opponents are using that aggression against him. The coaches will fix that.
 
This seems true. I've been a Flo subscriber for several years. When the Big 12 made the move to ESPN, Flo's coverage of OSU decreased significantly. Flo was great for those wrestler-by-wrestler analyses and match replays. But I didn't watch a single thing on Flo this last season - we just got so little attention from them, and very few of our duals or tournament matches were on there. I won't be renewing. It isn't just the lack of coverage, it's the change in attitude. I always try to check myself for butthurt before jumping to intagible conclusions, but with the exception of AJ they are pretty obviously not invested in our program the way they were before the move to ESPN. OSU wrestling makes for accessible filler content.

Flo has pet programs and we are definitely not one of them. You would think programs like Michigan, Rutgers and Cornell have been ripping off top 3 finishes for a decade the way they consistently talk them up. Not knocking those programs and the coverage they get but we are definitely an after thought.

I was never a huge Saylor fan and I was kind of excited for Askren to be involved. It has been terrible. Saylor was a big, big loss for them. Askren consistently doesn't think much of our guys for whatever reason.
 
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They are butt hurt about losing us to ESPN. Askren is butt hurt about Pendleton owning him. I remember when Askren got his one(1) win against Chris. I was really nervous that Ben had figured out how to beat him. Chris then beat him down one last time in the NCAA finals....it may have been a major decision.

Disclaimer: I’m getting old and some facts may be skewed.
 
They are butt hurt about losing us to ESPN. Askren is butt hurt about Pendleton owning him. I remember when Askren got his one(1) win against Chris. I was really nervous that Ben had figured out how to beat him. Chris then beat him down one last time in the NCAA finals....it may have been a major decision.

Disclaimer: I’m getting old and some facts may be skewed.
Ha! I forgot about Askren. I enjoyed Flo's podcasts until Askren joined. Dude is so obnoxious, loud, interrupts, derails the conversation. Before Askren, I loved the banter and camaraderie between the presenters. Those guys oozed passion for wrestling and making it accessible, and even when they disagreed it was pretty amiable. Askren though doesn't share the spotlight very well and makes for a much less enjoyable listening experience.

+1 on the pet program comment. I wouldn't mind if they simply covered OSU less after we moved to ESPN. That makes business sense. Do what you gotta do. But the attitude shift was plain as day, and not like I need someone to stroke my ego about my favorite wrestling program, but I also don't need to give money or clicks to an organization that has at times appeared to get a kick out of doubting and discounting us publicly.

Of course I post my original Flo complaint on here the other day, right after Flo posts a too-early look at OSU's lineup. Maybe I'm full of it.
 
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I don’t think it’s very likely but the idea of RS everyone who has the ability to do so next season to put us in the best position possible to make a NC run in 2023-2025 is absolutely something being considered.

We must capitalize on the talent and incoming talent and win a NC. As a program we literally can’t afford not to.
It ain’t happening. Just let them wrestle when they’re ready. Punting an entire season is one of the things wrong with college wrestling. It’s ridiculous.
 
I don’t think it’s very likely but the idea of RS everyone who has the ability to do so next season to put us in the best position possible to make a NC run in 2023-2025 is absolutely something being considered.

We must capitalize on the talent and incoming talent and win a NC. As a program we literally can’t afford not to.
Yeah that makes absolutely no sense to any who have been watching wrestling and Penn St. You don't beat Penn St by waiting for them to have an off year or waiting for them to reload. Iowa couldve lost it this year as they were very close, by the rules, of having all of DeSanto's points erased. Who shouldve been in 2nd and who actually finished in 2nd?
 
Yeah that makes absolutely no sense to any who have been watching wrestling and Penn St. You don't beat Penn St by waiting for them to have an off year or waiting for them to reload. Iowa couldve lost it this year as they were very close, by the rules, of having all of DeSanto's points erased. Who shouldve been in 2nd and who actually finished in 2nd?

Ok… then how do you beat Penn St? I mean it’s not crazy to think that the coaches will be discussing strategies, weights, red-shirts, etc as they plan to really make a run at our next team title.
 
I think we do a little bit of both with the redshirting options. I think The older smaller Mastro will wrestle but get his redshirt down the road. I think if we get Woods and Bouzakis to commit before the season starts then Voinovich would also wrestle but get a redshirt down the road. I think AJ Ferrari would be the only wrestler to not redshirt at all.
The year Oklahoma st needs to look at as the year to win a title is 2024 as it will be Fix, Wittlake and Montalvos last year and the rest of the team will be older by then. With that being said I don’t know about how everybody else looks in 2024
 
I think Penn State going 4 for 4 in the finals makes it easy to forget that we were in 2nd place and had a legitimate chance to beat them this year. Just have to keep getting recruits that have a chip on their shoulder and aren’t into drinking or substance abuse.
 
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The 2022 recruits and transfer targets we are after want to take visits so I don’t think anything big will happen until June when the dead period ends.
 
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Fix won’t be here past this year. He will be ready To move on I’m betting
 
Fix won’t be here past this year. He will be ready To move on I’m betting

I don’t think we will see him stay all 3 years he can but don’t see him leaving after next year.

Would be very surprising to see him not wrestle in 4 national tournaments.
 
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In terms of our title chances, Olympic years are always hard to predict.

For PSU, Kerkvliet & Brooks could take ORSs. For us, Daton's extra year would be 2024. Hard to see him wrestling folkstyle again during an Olympic year. And if he took another ORS, he'd be 27 at Nationals in 2025. That seems unlikely (getting Bouzakis would solve a lot of uncertainty @ 133). AJ could also ORS in 2024.
 
What am I missing on Daton? I thought he didn't make the Olympic team, plus John explicitly said that he needs folkstyle matches to be competitive in freestyle. Also, surely going 0-2 in the finals isn't enough to make him quit the team... right?
 
Like a lot of the top level guys, I think Daton's #1 goal is Olympic gold, that's why he took the ORS in 2020. Also, I think with his long layoff, John believed Daton needed matches in general, not necessarily folkstyle matches to help his freestyle.

I could be wrong, but I would be surprised to see him wrestle folkstyle in 2024.
 
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