Thank You Wrestling.

Why I Write This:

Over the past few weeks, I’ve talked a lot about what this sport has done and meant both for me and to me. I had an opportunity to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of my Penn State team’s 2016 national championship. Which seems crazy to me that it’s been 10 years since that, approaching 7 years that I’ve been coaching, and over 24 years in the sport, 15 of which it’s essentially been my entire identity.

This sport has made me who I am, given me endless opportunities and helped me through many challenges. It’s given me some of my best friends, and now it’s giving me an endless opportunity to give back to it through my coaching. In short, this post is meant to say exactly what the title says, Thank You Wrestling.

From the Top: 

When I started wrestling it wasn’t really my choice. Like many athletes across any sport, your parents sign you up and toss you headfirst into the fray. This sport is hard from the onset, there’s an extremely high rate of kids quitting early on. Through out my youth career I had a ton of pressure to succeed early and for the most part I did just that. My wins were celebrated, my losses punished heavily. At the time I don’t even think I really liked wrestling, it was just something I did and knew I was kind of good at. As I got older I began to really resent the sport, and that was for someone who only did it in the winter! By 6^th grade I had had enough. Enough of the pressure to win, the pain if I lost, and the way I was treated if that happened. So… I became one of those thousands of kids who quit. I moved onto my other winter sport, basketball.

Early mornings in the gym because I had access via a before school program I trained to improve my skills in basketball, despite this I quickly realized that basketball was not a sport that often rewarded effort if you had certain physical limitations, like being short. After a couple years of a failed basketball career, I heard the call to return to wrestling.

This Time is Different: 

When I chose to return to wrestling in 8^th Grade after a year and half off it was a different feeling. This time I wanted to sign up, this time it was my decision, and this time there was very little expectation of success. My brother Danny had quit wrestling basically the same time I did, 2009. So it had been a couple years since my family was as involved, some old habits died off in that time. This time I was able to really just start slow and trust in the process to help me improve. I often credit 8^th grade as the year my life really shifted as a whole, but that’s largely due to wrestling taking the driver’s seat. 

When you choose something for yourself there’s a ton of power in that. You are in control, you decide what it means to you, and for me this return to the sport meant a lot. I was a blank slate and fortunately had some good coaches who knew how to press all the correct buttons to get me to work hard, fire me up and focus on what I needed to do to improve. In 8^th grade I began club wrestling, I challenged myself to focus on growth over outcome and everything in my life became a challenge for me to overcome, not run away from as I had before. 

The tone was set, the hooks were in, I was sucked back into the sport I had resented so much only 2 years before, it was not simply a sport I participated in, it became my identity, I was a wrestler, not just someone who wrestled. 

The Pressure Returns, but From the Inside: 

One of the best things, and one of the worst things about wrestling is that from the very beginning, it’s 1 on 1. Other sports  insulate your performance by surrounding you with a team. While it’s not the only sport that starts like this, most other sports offer a learning curve, wrestling does not.

When you begin to work hard, you want results, it’s human nature. Studies show that we are motivated by two things generally, pleasure, or avoidance of pain. We either do something because we want to feel good, or to avoid something causing us discomfort. Wrestling more or less challenges you to endure both. You will feel the highest of highs and the lowest of lows because it’s only you who experiences these things. 

As a coach now I often tell many of my wrestlers with high goals and high expectations that pressure is a privilege, but I am learning that I need to caveat that a little, that the focus needs to be internal pressure that matches the outside pressure you feel.

When I was in 8^th Grade I was thrown into tourneys and hard practices, as I began to find my footing again, expectations were shifted. There is a biblical parable about Talent (a term used for money, not in the sport sense) 3 servants are given money by their master. 2 use the money to make more, 1 simply hides it and returns the original amount. (Matthew 25 14:30)  The lesson is that the two who earned were rewarded, the one who simply stayed the same is punished, Jesus finishes the story by saying “To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance”. Essentially, if you are working hard and doing the right things, you will get more attention, more resources, and thus higher expectations.

I share this story because this is the snowball effect that happened to me, and happens to countless athletes across every sport. A little bit of success gets you noticed, sustained success begets more success. “The cream will rise to the top” as the saying goes. What is important about this though is that if an athlete isn’t feeling the same internal pressure that the outside world places on them, they may very well crack. In 8^th Grade I didn’t, I enjoyed it, I pressed forward to endure more. But by sophomore year I did crack.

The Best Lessons are often Setbacks: 

Sophomore year of high school I came into the season with high expectations. After a successful freshman year by many measures, now the pressure was on to do even better. My coaches, my family, my school even had noticed that I was a good wrestler, and so I felt that I needed to live up to that standard. Despite a great season my sophomore season came crashing down right at the very end.

Where many people expected me to go to states that year, I lost to a wrestler I had pinned last year in under a minute and routinely beat in practice. I lost in the same match the year before but this year the loss seemingly crushed me. But now that I look back, I am extremely grateful this match happened. Though the pressure had gotten to me it also reset me a little bit, I realized that there mistakes I made that caused it, that the loss was on me in the best way. This loss took my motivation to another level but it also prepared me to realize that life isn’t really simple, it’s hard and it’s unfair at times, but that’s what makes it worth living.

While sophomore year ended in a rough way it was an important overall year for me in that wrestling provided far more positive things than it did negatives for my family and myself. The summer going into my sophomore year my older brother left for rehab for a drug addiction. Wrestling became my safe space, it became a tool to give my family something to be happy about, which is where some of my added pressure came from but it also was exactly what we all needed at the time. And for that reason this season is one of the most important of my career and one that I look back on with so much gratitude. Wrestling is often a bit of a mirror for real life, what you go through in the circle prepares you for what life may throw at you. 

The Mental Training Outweighs the Physical: 

Ask almost anyone who knows me and they will tell you that I will never shut up about mindsets or self help stuff. I have become a human encyclopedia for the stuff over the course of my adult life. To the benefit of some, and the annoyance of many many others, sorry guys.

But this is one of the biggest things I picked up from the sport, and endless desire at self improvement has led me to study and learn from anyone and any source I can. This sport teaches you that no matter how good you think you are, there’s always someone a little better. There’s always something to learn, someone to push you to be better. This aspect isn’t often physical, it’s usually 98% mental.

When I got into college one of my first lessons in the separation between good and great came from one of my teammates. By physical metrics I was taller and little bigger than my teammate but by accolades and talents he was a giant and I was an ant, and he made that very clear. This teammate is Nico Megaludis, a 4x All American, National Champ in 2016 and someone who never placed lower than 3^rd in the NCAAs. Nico was a 5^th year Senior and I thought I came close to scoring on him… I shouldn’t have said anything but Nico quickly let me know “You will never be close… ever.” And he wasn’t just saying it to be tough, he meant it. Any time I came remotely close to scoring or even just a positive position Nico turned the heat up to 1000 and raked my face across the flames.

Our separation wasn’t physical, it was mental. His technical abilities were miles ahead of mine but his mindset was in a whole other galaxy. He won his national title that year and I was so happy for him, despite the many lessons he dealt me that year in practice. 

Nico and I shared a locker space, and he was a great mentor and friend, this is perhaps the year that my career really took a turn from just being happy to be there to wanting to be more than just a part. 

You Can’t Always Get What You Want: 

Much like the Rolling Stones song says, you can’t always get what you want, but sometimes you get what you need. I am going to avoid recounting every year of my career as this post is starting to become longer than I wanted, but Sophomore Year of College really is what shifted the trajectory of my entire career. As I mentioned earlier hard work gets you noticed, doing more than is expected gets you access and attention, but it also gives you the chance to have your heartbroken.

Humans are negative creatures at heart, we fear risk at a much higher rate than we enjoy success. Sophomore year I felt like I was at really good spot, I was the backup to our starting 125, but then my friend our starting 133 got hurt. His season was over, I wanted to see if I could have my chance to wrestle off for that spot. The backup at the weight was someone that I knew I could beat and did routinely beat in practice. Despite this, I was never even given my chance to wrestle off. Instead, I was told to go to a tournament, and wrestle up at 133. This tourney happened to be one of the hardest Open Tournaments of the year, I lost my first match to a very good Michigan State wrestler who ended up taking 2^nd. Then I lost again in my next match. Just like that, my chances were crushed.

The wrestle off was never granted, I watched another teammate cut down from 141 and take the spot for BIG10s. However, this became a huge motivator for me for the following season, I knew that the 133 spot would essentially be a battle royale and I began my plan to give it my all for one true shot at starting. I lifted, ate healthy, trained a ton to become the strongest I had ever been, the biggest I’d ever been. Junior year came and I had my chance, wrestling off a 2x PA State Champ and 3x NCAA Qualifier… and I lost. It was a great match, I wrestled well and got a lot of compliments from my coaches and teammates, but that was the closest I ever came to starting. However, I discovered a new role I came to love, player-coach. 

Coaching is a Calling: 

Any of my Penn State teammates will tell you that my favorite time of year was camp season. I loved teaching and helping athletes enjoy their time at our camps, I built relationships with campers who returned year after year, some of which became my teammates, others are college wrestlers now or have even finished their careers already and are coaching themselves. But all the lessons, setbacks and chances this sport gave me led me to the path I am on now. I learned how to mentor others and help be a part of the development and career of countless others.

When my high school coach reached out to convince me to come back and coach my middle school team, I was tentative but then I figured, “why not, I love coaching at camps.” Then it happened then I fell face first into something that has turned my identity from wrestler to coach. The ultimate blessing and one of the best decisions of my life. Wrestling has given me so many great memories, and now it continues to do so, this time I am helping make that same dream true for other athletes and families. 

You Never Know What You Need, til you Need it: 

My club has been a true passion project, it’s allowed me to coach some amazing athletes over the years, meet some amazing parents, coaches and do a ton of cool things. It hasn’t been without its downsides, however. There can be a lot of pain in the coaching game, both from watching your athletes fall short of their goals, get hurt, leave you for other places or even just quitting the sport entirely.

This is a very personal sport, but at a high level it’s also a business for all those involved. Everyone wants to do what is best for their programs, their athletes, themselves and I count myself among them. However, all the trials and challenges provide an opportunity for a coach to continue to employ many of the same lessons they experienced as an athlete. But you never know how much these things train you for real life until you need them, and you never know how much these things happen because they’re meant to.

Not to make this a sad post as it is meant to convey my gratitude to the sport of wrestling as a whole, but this past year has been a ride. I lost the room that I practiced in for most of my club’s life (for the second time in 5 years) in April of 2025. Luckily, I found a new home and some amazing people who really opened up to me, athletes who bought in and trust me like they’ve known me for years and not months. Then, in July I was told I’d be losing my job of nearly 2 years in August. Following that in September I lost my 2nd oldest brother tragically in a work accident. This was an incredibly hard time for my family and still is, but I felt that wrestling and the many lessons it taught me had prepared me for these moments. When I needed strength, I found it in the core of what countless coaches and people had taught me. When I needed support, I had it in a lifetime of people who have seen me at my best and my worst.

I heard from a parent that many of the wrestlers who had really only been with me for a couple months immediately reached out to each other when they heard the news about my brother Mike and when I was back at practice the following week they all came in and gave me big hugs, and did a great job giving me a sense of normalcy. Kids have a funny way of showing you that there’s still plenty of joy to go around. This is perhaps one of the things I am most grateful for when it comes to this sport. 

There’s Way more Good than Bad: 

One thing about coaching wrestling that I enjoy the most is the hope it gives me overall. Not just for myself but for the world as a whole. If you’re as chronically online as I am you hear so much doom and gloom about the world, that things are so bad and the world is ending. But when you spend time around children you see that the more things change, the more they stay the same. We’re told kids don’t go outside anymore, I don’t believe that. That kids can’t focus, again I don’t see that. If wrestling has taught me anything it’s that for every loss there’s often countless more wins, for every failure is a ton of measures of success.

If you look for the good, you’ll find it, if you look for the bad, you’ll find it. But there’s a lot more good out there than bad. I see it daily, kids who show up to practice happy to be there, they laugh together, fight each other but at the end of the day they remind me of all that is good in the world, all that is positive in the future ahead. Maybe I’m not coaching a future president, maybe no one I ever coach will win a state title, but to me none of that means anything because these kids give me their effort and their heart. They give me a reason to smile, a reason to laugh and they provide me the chance to change lives in a positive way. For that I am always going to be grateful, and so excited to play my small part in this life. 

Thank You Wrestling:

This sport has given me a lifetime of fun, a lifetime of pain, a lifetime of lessons, lifelong friends and family, and now it is my turn to pay that all forward, so that others may look back and say the same. Thank You.

I don’t know where this journey will take me exactly, but I know that I look forward to each step along the way. That my days are brighter because I have wrestling, that my life is better off for it. The list of things that I write down daily that I am grateful for includes three major things, My wife Rachel, my family and friends and wrestling. All of these things play a crucial role in my happiness and identity, and I will keep doing my best each and every day to pay it back to all of them.