Wrestling: Missouri Championships
Coaches debate new four-class system
By Joe Lyons
Post-Dispatch<\/p>\n
If nothing else, the move to four classes in Missouri wrestling is prompting discussion. <\/p>\n
“I don’t like it, and I didn’t talk to a single coach who does, “Francis Howell coach Mark Malawey said in the wake of the 74th annual Missouri Wrestling Championships over the weekend in Columbia. “First off, I think the added class waters down the level of competition. Plus, I thought the added class created a lot of confusion; in 15 years, it was the most unorganized state tournament I’ve seen. “<\/p>\n
Malawey continued: “We got out of there Friday at about 11 p.m. and had to be up at 6 the next morning to get to weigh-ins – that’s not much recovery time. And in previous years, you had a chance to get away for a time to grab a bite to eat or whatever. This year, I felt like I was in Hearnes for three weeks instead of three days. <\/p>\n
“If it goes to a vote again, I’d definitely like to see it go back to three classes. “<\/p>\n
But not everyone agrees with Malawey. <\/p>\n
“First off, I like the idea of four classes because it gives everybody a chance to compete with schools of similar size, “said Whitfield coach Charlie Sherertz. “And by getting more kids involved and having more kids take home medals, I think it’s a positive step for our sport in general. <\/p>\n
“Sure, there were some long days, but I thought Dale Pleimann (Missouri State High School Activities Association wrestling championships director) and the others running the tournament did a great job, especially when you consider this was the first time with four classes. <\/p>\n
“Maybe it was different for the Class 3 and Class 4 guys, but I thought everything moved along pretty smoothly. And honestly, I can’t remember the Hearnes Center being any louder than it was at times during the finals Saturday night.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wrestling: Missouri ChampionshipsCoaches debate new four-class systemBy Joe Lyons Post-Dispatch If nothing else, the move to four classes in Missouri wrestling is prompting discussion. “I don’t like it, and I didn’t talk to a single coach who does, “Francis Howell coach Mark Malawey said in the wake of the 74th annual Missouri Wrestling Championships over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wrestling"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":6}},"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2B7Di-7O","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}