Boy In The Ring

Have you ever participated in a sport before you've even seen it played? I mean, before I played my first baseball game I'd seen a lot of baseball games. Before I played my first football game I'd seen a lot of football games in person and on TV. Before I went golfing for the first time I had watched it on TV many times. But for me, that's not how it was for my first wrestling match. Here's how it went down.

It was the day of our first meet and I was nervous. We were to wrestle Peoria Manual that night and I had no idea what to expect. All I knew was I was the 95 pound varsity wrestler. Now my normal weight was right around 97 or 98. All I had to do to make weight that night was to skip lunch and go easy on the water. The match was scheduled for 7 p.m. and weigh in was at 6 p.m. Well, I made weight with no problem; I think I weighed about 94 1/2. But when Manual weighed in I noticed that they didn't have a 95 pounder. My teammates told me that meant I was going to win by forfeit. I was a little disappointed because I was ready to wrestle, but at the same time relieved because I had been pretty nervous. Everything was a new experience for me, from team warm-ups to introductions. As we were warming up on the mat my coach, Mr. Gross informed me that he was bumping me up to wrestle at 103. He was moving me up to 103 because since I could beat our 103 pounder he figured I had a better chance to win. My first thought was, "I could have eaten lunch".

Okay, now it was time to get nervous again. My teammates informed me that my 103 pound opponent was a junior named Steve Empson who was the conference champ last year. "Conference champ?” I thought. "You've got to be kidding me." So here I was, a freshman with two weeks practice under my belt, weighing 95 pounds, and wrestling up a weight class against a junior who was the defending conference champ. I knew I was in trouble. "Oh well, maybe not too many people will watch my match". You see, I thought wrestling matches would be like practice. In practice everybody wrestled at once, 20 or 30 guys on the mat. I figured there would probably be four or five matches going on at a time and maybe no one would notice me. That's how naïve I was.

The mats were cleared, coach told me to take off my warm-up top, and shook my hand. He gave me a slap on the rear and sent me out to the mat. As I went out to the mat I turned back to look at my teammates. I noticed that no one was following me. It was then that I realized I was going to wrestle out there all by myself! Well, me and my opponent. As I walked out to the mat, I took a good look at my opponent. He was muscular, had hair on his chest and shaved a full beard. Heck, I had barely reached puberty. I was a baby faced freshman boy going against a hardened, veteran young man. We stepped to the circle, shook hands, and waited for the ref to blow the whistle. Everything was a blur in my mind, I couldn’t think. I was trying to remember the few moves I had been taught. The sound of the whistle interrupted my thoughts and I instinctively began to shuffle stiffly in my stance. Before I could blink, wham! He was in on my legs and taking me to the mat in an instant. As we hit the mat I turned to go belly down but he caught my shoulder and I couldn't get off my back. The gym was roaring with cheers and I was fighting for my life when the whistle blew. We had gone out of bounds and the ref was taking us back to the center for another start. The whistle blew again and he was in on me before I could move, this time we landed in the center of the mat. Again I was on my back fighting for my life. I struggled to keep at least one shoulder up so I wouldn't get pinned but he kept tightening up his hold on me. As I battled I could faintly hear the crowd and my teammates urging me to get off my back. Suddenly the whistle blew and I heard the ref slap the mat. I had been pinned in 56 seconds. We shook hands and I walked dejectedly off the mat. There had been nowhere to hide; everyone in the gym saw it. That’s when I learned it takes a special person to walk out on a wrestling mat.

I sat down on the bench and looked at the mat. Our 112 pounder was getting ready to wrestle. I was finally going to get to see my first wrestling match of my life. I can’t remember if he won or lost, I was still thinking of my disastrous start. As the meet wore on it was a back and forth battle between us and Manual. The meet came down to the heavyweight match with us trailing 27-25. Our 180 pounder and one of the studs of the football team, Larry Elmore, had been bumped up by coach to wrestle Manual’s heavyweight. Elmore was one of my heroes. I didn’t think anyone could whip him. He won a hard fought 3-2 win and we beat Manual that night 28-27.

Many years ago President Theodore Roosevelt gave a cool talk about “The Man in the Ring”. He talked about how people on the sidelines can talk all they want but until you’ve been in the ring yourself, you can’t really understand what it’s like. Well, I got a taste that night, even if I was just the boy in the ring.

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My Recruitment!

You wouldn't think that a freshman in high school standing 5 feet tall and weighing about 95 pounds would be a recruiting target, but I actually was. No, I was not being recruited by Michigan to play tailback, although I sure would've liked that. After all, football was my favorite sport. And I wasn't being recruited by UCLA to play basketball, although I sure would've liked that also. So who in the world would recruit a freshman who weighed 95 pounds for anything? I was being recruited for the high school wrestling team. You see, 95 pounders were pretty valuable guys to have on the team. Some schools didn't have a 95 pounder on the wrestling team and they would have to forfeit that weight class. Meaning, you got an automatic win in that weight class if you had a guy on your team that weighed 95. One of the most basic ways to have a competitive wrestling team is to make sure that you fill all the weight classes. Well, they had their eye on me for that 95 pound spot.

Now of course, there aren't too many guys walking the halls of high school that weigh95 pounds. So early in the fall when I was on the football team I became the target of the wrestling coach. Mr. Gross was his name and he was the line coach for the varsity football team. He was an older coach, had a big barrel chest, and always looked mad. Every time he saw me out on the practice field, or coming in or out from practice, he would always stop me and say, "NL,” in that nasal voice of his, "are you gonna come out for wrestling?" At first I ignored him because I have to admit I was a little scared of Mr. Gross. Secondly, I had never wrestled in my life. Oh ,I had wrestled in the backyard with my buddies and with my brothers, but not this kind of wrestling with rules. In fact, I didn't even know there was such a thing as a high school wrestling team. I played basketball in grade school and although I wasn't great, I started on the grade school basketball team and had a fair amount of success. We didn’t have a wrestling team. So when Mr. Gross started asking me if I was going to wrestle, my response of course, was no. Now I didn't tell HIM that, because as I said, I was a little bit afraid of Mr. Gross. So my strategy was just to pretend like I didn't hear him or duck him whenever I could. Eventually, I had to answer because he continued to ask me if I was going to wrestle. My response was a very definite, "ummm maybe." Why couldn't this guy just take a hint? There was no way I was getting talked into this.

Toward the end of the football season, one night after practice, one of the captains of the wrestling team who was not playing a fall sport, grabbed me and brought me into the wrestling room. In the room was a handful of guys practicing takedowns. At least that's what they said they were doing. I believed them because I didn't know what a takedown was. Well, Mr. Wrestling Captain paired me up with another little freshman and said, "You guys are going to go takedowns for a little bit. Mr. Gross said you were interested in wrestling." "What do I do?" I asked. “Well”, the captain replied, “You just try to get a hold of him and take him down to the mat.” He looked at my opponent and winked. I wasn't sure what I was going to do, so I just figured I'd try to tackle him just like I did on the football field. The captain blew his whistle, and I charged in low and hard, grabbed both legs and took the guy to the mat. The captain was in disbelief! He had been working with this other little guy for the last two weeks and I walked in to the room and took him down in about 5 seconds. After chastising my opponent, he told us to try again. Again I tackled my opponent to the mat in about five or 10 seconds. Now the captain was really chastising my opponent. His protégé had just gone down twice in 30 seconds. He told me that was enough, and sent me to the locker room.

Mr. Gross must've gotten wind of what happened, because the next day he told me that I was definitely going to wrestle. I finally said, "Mr. Gross I've never wrestled in my life, I don't think I can do it." Well, he had a good answer for me. The old coach said, "Are you tough?" "Yeah, I'm tough." I said. "Are you a good athlete?" “Yeah, I'm a good athlete.” “ Then you can wrestle!” growled the old coach, and that was that. He sure knew how to appeal to my cockiness.

When the football season got over, I figured I'd give wrestling a try. So on the first day of practice I reported to the team. I walked in to see about 30 other guys in the practice room. Most of them were football players so I felt right at home. I didn't know the rules, I didn't know any moves, and I had no clue what was going on. The one thing that I can remember about my first wrestling practice, is that about 20 minutes into it I threw up. I thought I was in good shape. After all, I had been playing sports my entire life. But I wasn't ready for this. It took only a few minutes and I was so tired I could barely get off the mat. After barely making it to the bathroom I threw up in the toilet, wiped my mouth with my t-shirt and headed back into the room. What had I gotten myself into?

Thanks again to http://www.chiefpigskin.com for letting me share.