Are injuries contagious?
- Thread starter tom_v31
- Start date
Nope, not campfire stories, that's true. The contrived part is having wrestlers constantly saying "fun" during interviews. But the sports psychologist part is real.
You may have seen an older, gray haired woman sitting by the bench at PSU duals/tourneys. Her name is Bonnie and she's a counselor that Sanderson has known for years. While he was still competing I think.
She has the wrestlers do success visualization type stuff. Things like drawing pictures or eating a cupcake before wrestling (the cake represents celebrating). Read an article about it years ago.
I'm looking at injuries from a perspective of 61 years watching OK State wrestling. I believe for the most part this year is an aberration. I do not believe it is in any way a fault of the coaching or the wrestlers. If you have a torn ACL, continuous shoulder separations or pec muscle tears you are just not going to be able to wrestle or wrestle effectively and young athletes today are no lazier, weaker or less inclined to wrestle hurt than those of the past Sheets and Plott for example are wrestling with serious injuries and this takes dedication and courage. No amount of psychology or mind set is going to make these injuries go away There always has been and always will be injuries in wrestling. It is just the nature of the sport.
I never said anything about laziness or weaker, and I maybe looking at this from a myopic perspective, but it seems that there has been a rash of injuries in the past few years. I don’t think there is anything wrong with questioning the status quo. I can guarantee that Cael Sanderson does all the time. It is healthy to question and redirect efforts. No one is immune to mistakes, not saying that I know more than John Smith, but if in some way I can help OSU win another championship, I will do it
What will get us #35 is better Oklahoma wrestling HS, JH , and Elem. Best high school wrestling is in Pennsylvania which is why Penn State and Iowa are recruiting and winning period.
I mentioned before that Sanderson seems to target recruits with great gas tanks (or said another way, he avoids recruits with average to poor gas tanks). Another observation - he also goes after athletic guys. Nickal, Nolf, Suriano, RBY, Kerkvliet, Howard, Bartlett, Van Ness, Facundo, etc. Even off the radar guys like Cassar was super athletic. No surprise he went after Daton, Wittlake & AJ.
It might seem that all top 10 PFP guys are athletic and have great gas tanks, but that's really not the case. Some just have excellent technique or are strong and hold great position.
