#90 Justin Basch's Tale of Wrestling, Media, and Web Mastery

I never imagined how a blind email sent on a whim to wrestling legend Cael Sanderson would spiral into a journey of deep connections within the wrestling world. Justin Basch did just that! Today, I'm joined by the brilliant Justin Basch of Baschamania! We discuss the unpredictable paths our passions can lead us down. From discussing the frosty climate of Rochester, New York, to delving into the early days of internet dial-up, we traverse through his story, laughing at the contrast between his youthful wrestling commitment and today's dedication within the sport.

Our conversation takes a turn into the essence of wrestling media, where characters and personas elevate the drama of the ring, much like in MMA. Fans are captivated not just by the sport, but by the athletes' narratives that unfold outside the bounds of the mat. We swap tales of unexpected kindness from these giants in singlets, challenging the notion that their competitive ferocity translates off the mat. The episode also peels back the layers of NCAA eligibility extensions, a topic hot with controversy, examining the intricate decisions athletes like Vincenzo Joseph must navigate amid extended collegiate careers versus pursuing professional ambitions.

As we wrap our discussion, I extend my gratitude to Justin, whose expertise in web solutions is only rivaled by his love for wrestling. His insights illuminate the powerful blend of technology and personal interest that can lead to a fulfilling career intertwined with one's hobbies. Listeners are encouraged to explore past episodes of Baschamania to hear the myriad voices from the wrestling community that have graced the podcast, each adding depth to the vibrant tapestry that is this sport. Join us for this episode, where we share not just the tensions and triumphs of wrestling, but the life lessons hidden within its grips and takedowns.

Below are all of the links to Justin Basch's ventures! AND TUNE INTO HIS PODCASTS!

Basch Solutions:
Website - https://www.baschsolutions.com/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/baschsolutions
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/baschsolutions/?hl=en
Twitter - https://x.com/BaschSolutions?s=20

Baschamania Podcast:
Website - https://www.baschamania.com/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/baschamania
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/baschamania/?hl=en
Twitter - https://x.com/baschamania?s=20

Transcript

Speaker 1: 2:44

Thank you, guitar solo. Thank you.

Speaker 2: 3:19

And we are live, we are a go again I would say I don't know what, 10 hours after I hung up with Pat Lugo. But we're ready to rock. Man. We are here, joined by none other than to me you're kind of the reason why I kind of did this as far as the wrestling thing and getting into this but we're joined by Justin Bash of Bashmania I pronounced it with the A this time man giving me too much credit and pronouncing it right, you're getting all the points, man.

Speaker 2: 3:52

Let's go, let's go. So I kind of explained it to you a little bit. You know, obviously I've had wrestlers on, but you're a big part of the wrestling community, man. I mean the things that you do, the guys you talk to, I mean it's all wrestling. So I figured it would be the time, kind of like I do with the local guys here Teague, fenwick and Steve and talk to you a little bit about what brought you to the scene and where you're from and what drove you to this. Obviously you have a separate business with uh is that bash, uh, bash media?

Speaker 3: 4:20

so bash solutions is my main, is my main 16 year running now company nice, okay, okay, so where just let's talk about where you kind of started from.

Speaker 2: 4:31

Where are you from?

Speaker 3: 4:32

from rochester, new york, which some would like to just say is southern Canada, because you get the cold and the gloom of Lake Ontario in Canada. If I pan my camera to the left right now, you would just see another rainy, gloomy morning. At least you were saying we got like 10 inches of snow coming from your way. So you know, misery does love company. I'm glad if it's not beautiful here, like the whole northeast is just a shadow of a cloud right now.

Speaker 2: 4:56

But yeah, yeah, rochester beautiful here like the whole northeast is just a shadow of a cloud right now, but, yeah, yeah, rochester, new york I'm from spencer port new york is where I went to high school, nice okay okay, so with, with, uh, with kind of where you're from and obviously the new york area where I, you and I talked a little bit about sports. I mean, obviously you were in sports kind of growing up, just like every kid was there. When you're kind of in sports, did you? Were you like I'm gonna do this? What was your main sport as you're a kid growing?

Speaker 3: 5:20

up man, I didn't really have too many sports through like elementary school, and when I got to middle school I just had like an itch to do something and I actually did modified uh volleyball and that was kind of boring yeah, it just random, like the first day of school somebody was going to volleyball practice.

Speaker 3: 5:42

I'm like I'll go do that. I got nothing to do after school and then um did that that first year and then wasn't that great. And then um, a friend I had met, was going to go to wrestling practice and I grew up a huge wwe fan. Oh so I'm like wrestling all right, let's go powerbomb and do this and that. And, uh, the gym. My gym teacher in middle school was bill jacketto, who's a legendary coach here in new york and he's he's one of the greatest humans I know, and he kept telling me is that you should come wrestle, you should come wrestle. So I'm like, all right, that heck else do I have to do it? You know, so started wrestling and, you know, wrestled for the next six years and that was kind of the only sport I did, thankfully, because I wasn't that great. So I only really failed at one sport. It wasn't either. I was that good it sucked.

Speaker 2: 6:34

It's in fact. I tell this story once in a while, but I remember when I was I think it was a sophomore and we were going to a tournament, I knew I wasn't going to do good. Anyways, I was always getting my butt kicked up For food. I brought along a six-pack of beer. Yeah, kids, don't take that advice. That was a horrible decision. And my coach caught wind of it and he brought me over Coach Bill England. And my coach caught wind of it and he brought me over coach bill england. He's another great dude. His son actually was a coach in town here too. But uh, he's like hey, what'd you bring for food today? Did you bring any kind of snacks along? He's like oh, you know, just some stuff and something to eat on. He's like, yeah, let me see what you brought. I was like, oh no, he found out and I opened. He's like yeah, you're not wrestling today, we're gonna talk and we get back. My dedication was not not where the kids are nowadays, that's for sure.

Speaker 3: 7:19

Oh it's crazy. I didn't really work out too much, like I just went to practice and wrestled and when there was a tournament I went to it and you know, it's like I, looking back, I realized why, you know, for not being as committed as wrestlers often are, I'd wrestlers often are. I'd say I was good in that realm, yeah, but yeah, it's crazy. If I could go back, what?

Speaker 2: 7:41

I would do differently, knowing you know right knowing what I know now, obviously so, as you're kind of going through, you know, getting through school and stuff, what were your, were you, what were your interests, as you were kind of growing up, like especially in high school, when you start to kind of make up your own mind about things- yeah, my, my big thing was I was just enthralled, if that's the right word, with computers.

Speaker 3: 8:04

Okay, so you know, early on thankfully there's a computer in my house and you know I was on juno and frontier net, for those who remember that and just trying to use dial-up internet any way I can. And I actually at one point I think like domain names were free for a while and I had gotten jjbnet and it was just this neon blue website with neon green text and kind of taught myself a lot about websites. And it's the same thing back then where you can right click on any website and go to view page source. Then you can, you know, see what. It is a lot more complicated now. Back then it was very simple. This means bold text, this means that.

Speaker 3: 8:48

So throughout high school I was actually running some pro wrestling news and rumors websites so you were already in the mix, man like doing yeah, so I was on like you know there's websites we built, like wrestlemagazinecom, and you know if there's any old wrestling news people like, even fans like the that 2000, 2001, 2002 era, even 99 of like pro wrestling news. That's what I was doing, like I would skip class and go to the library, get on the internet and I would start like writing news articles for you know, pro wrestling. Hey, rumor is this guy showed up at the airport, he's going to be at raw tonight, this and that, and I did that all through high school, so websites was kind of my thing.

Speaker 2: 9:32

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 9:33

And um, yeah and um, you know, obviously there was that tie between pro wrestling and amateur wrestling. That was kind of the fun back and forth. But yeah, websites in in in business was kind of an early interest so you.

Speaker 2: 9:46

So you started even with amateur wrestling as well. You were doing a little bit here and there, dabbling, I guess you would say yeah, because there was, um, a section five website called armdragcom shout out tim herman.

Speaker 3: 9:56

Yeah, um, and he let me you know. There was a Section 5 website called armdragcom Shout out Tim Herman. And he let me you know, there was events that I wasn't even on the lineup and I wanted to like do stuff. So I'm like I'll just write an article about this and like cover it. And so I wrote some articles in high school for armdragcom and back then there was no social media. I mean, you're talking 2001 and 2004 when I was in high school. Yeah, so that's like I tell a story. Often I got a pair these were a pair of wrestling shoes I had in high school oh nice, and they were Kale's shoes.

Speaker 3: 10:29

Kale's yeah, I had no clue who he was at the time. Right, I just went to Dick's and bought shoes and they happened to be his. Yeah, and when I started working with him I found these after and I'd send him a picture. I'm like I guess I was supporting you before I even knew it. Yeah, because in high school there was no really following these guys like there is now. We have, you know, a podcast, like yours, like mine, and you get to know these athletes. Back then it was nothing. So Section 5, you know, arm drag was a nice resource where you could see. You know, back then it was like gregor gillespie and troy nickerson and other new york kids who were incredible and you could go on and see the results and the rankings and this and that, because there's nothing like there is today. Back then, absolutely not.

Speaker 2: 11:14

You know, and that was kind of the the thing that, especially with soccer, because that that was my gig was running around fields and kicking balls and um, there was none of that. I mean, you got your magazine I know we had score magazine and then we had there was soccer, I think soccer digest or whatever, but otherwise, like my brother and I had to go like buy vhs tapes to go watch guys, we didn't have even internet at the time, you know, not until what was that? 96 or something?

Speaker 3: 11:38

95 when yeah, mid to late 90s and even then, there was nothing on the internet that was really worthwhile, not at all I mean the old designs of what a website used to look like then, and I think that's why, being able to learn it at an early age, it's like you could build the website very, very quick because there wasn't much to it.

Speaker 2: 11:59

It was very, it was very simplistic back then so was that coding that you were dealing with then? Was that is a code? Because I didn't, I mean, I didn't know websites until this, all this internet stuff became bigger yeah, it was a mix.

Speaker 3: 12:12

Initially, like very early on, it was very easy to develop a website. So you know, I know I would code them, design them, kind of do everything. Wow, then it quickly evolved into more so of managing them. Yeah, and you know you're talking to pro wrestling websites and there's other websites. A buddy of mine down in Florida, mike Farron, we kind of met through working on a mutual wrestling news website back in like 2000. We still work together today. My CTO at Bash Solutions, kevin Resendez, same thing. We worked on a website together back in like 2000, 2001.

Speaker 3: 12:48

And so as it quickly evolved, people kind of did their own thing, like what they specialized in and I didn't code for very long. I'd say you know, specialized in and I didn't code for very long. I'd say you know 101 back then would get you to a full website. 101 nowadays barely gets you to edit the content on a page because there's so much to do. So I stopped coding pretty quickly and just managed the projects and, okay, ran the websites into that kind of stuff so you're like a vet man, like you're, you're, you've been steeped in it for quite some time.

Speaker 3: 13:17

So because I mean think I've been doing this for 25 years and it's like my gosh, how old am I?

Speaker 2: 13:25

yeah well, and I sit back and kind of look at you know, like either you or even willie, you know too like you guys, connections and that's the biggest thing too that I think with a lot of this, especially for me um, the connections that you get to make you know, and the people that you get to meet and the personalities and everybody's pretty genuine. Everybody that I hop on with is always kind of you know. I always tell them I'm not, I'm not here to dig into dirt. You know, I'm not here to spread stories, things like that, I'm here to just talk about you. And they open up pretty well, and so I mean seeing the guys that you've been able to talk to and obviously the business that you have deals with those guys as well. So how did you, being that you were already kind of into the amateur wrestling thing? Did that just come naturally? Was that just like? Hey, man, I really love this computer stuff.

Speaker 3: 14:11

No, it's almost the opposite. It's funny how God works things full circle, because all through high school built websites. My buddy Mike, farron and Kevin. We were all kind of working on websites and then we all graduated around the same time and Kevin's in Boston, mike's in Florida. Once I graduated high school, I kind of like walked away, I moved out of my house and I didn't even own a computer for a while, wow, and I worked at wegman's warehouse, I worked at burger king, I did driveway sealing. I did everything for a couple years.

Speaker 3: 14:45

And then my buddy, mike, in like 2006, reached back out and we hadn't talked in a couple years and he's like dude, everything we were doing back then like we should do for for businesses, like we're so far ahead of everything we were doing back then, like we should do for businesses, like we're so far ahead of what people are doing. So we started like working together more and more and I slowly got back into it and in 2008, I finally launched Bass Solutions because so many people were like hey, I see what you're doing here. Like, can you help me with my electric surplus company? Can you help me with this? I'm like okay. So I started the company and then I want to say that. So I started the company like the summer of 2008. And then in March of 2009, I'm watching NCAAs. It's like once you wrestled. There's this affinity with watching NCAAs. If you do do nothing else, if you went to a practice, you're probably watching ncaa's. And that was my extent at the time of following wrestling.

Speaker 3: 15:45

And I had reached out blindly to kel sanderson and said you know, I was watching ncaa's and that was the first time I was learning of who he was. Yeah, and they're saying you know this four time undefeated champ, and I'm like man, this guy could have a monster brand potential. I went to his website. It sucked, yeah, and I'm like dude, I think I could really help elevate your brand. I'm sure you don't necessarily need my help and this is a blind email, but you know, I went on and I gave him this whole thing. I said I'll even build your website for free. I really don't care. I'm like I think we could do a lot of great stuff together. Yeah, he ended up reaching out a month later and was like I'm in, like this sounds cool. Just, you know, I like your ideas and so we built his website starting.

Speaker 3: 16:30

Then I started following wrestling because now I'm a kael sanderson guy, he's a client of mine and so I started following him. And then a couple years later he asked me if I would help varner. Varner was getting ready to go make an olympic run. I said, yeah, let's do it. So I worked with varner and then cal moved to state college and that was cool because he's here's a client varner's moving shortly and I went down to State College and that's why I'm a Penn State fan, because Cal made me almost feel like I was an honorary alumni.

Speaker 1: 17:04

That's pretty cool.

Speaker 3: 17:06

He basically had me stand up in front of everybody. He's like hey guys, this is Justin Bash. He owns Bash Solutions, he helps me with my website, he helps me with this and that, and everybody in the room was very welcoming and, you know, open to it, and so I started following wrestling then more and more, and then you know me and burrows, linked up on twitter, started working with him and when you got cale varner and burrows as clients, that's kind of like catapult you to the top of the wrestling world. As far as like, who is this guy?

Speaker 3: 17:36

and I started working with usa wrestling on save the olympics or keep wrestling olympics, all that okay so I I tell all that because that's kind of how I got back into wrestling, where now I'm working with these guys, I'm following them, I'm following what cal's doing, I'm following varner burrows in the senior level. Um, then it was, you know, david taylor and these other guys and I want to say it was like 2018. Podcasts were really starting to come about 2018, 2019. Thank you, joe Rogan. Yeah, and being an entrepreneur, I kept telling him you should podcast, you should podcast.

Speaker 3: 18:13

And a buddy of mine, billy, we teamed up and did a faith and political podcast, because that's what he does, and he was struggling. He had so much on his plate, we were struggling to actually get episodes out and I'm like, dude, I want to go full bore with this. So I said, well, I'm just going to try my own thing for a little bit and I started bash mania and initially it was just going to be my clients. I work with a lot of interesting non-wrestling clients athletes like carly lloyd, who's olympic gold medalist um world uh cup winner, player of the year, all that.

Speaker 3: 18:50

Actors like kevin sorbo, who played hercules, jim miller, ufc fighter. So I started having like the early episodes. A couple of them were guys like kevin sorbo, jim miller, non-wrestlers yeah but then it started to be a thing where it's like I think one of my first episodes had bo nickel that was number two.

Speaker 3: 19:09

Yep, yeah you know, all of a sudden it quickly became into a thing like you know what? I have all these connections in wrestling and I enjoy the conversations I have so much and being like in the room. I think people would be floored at how humble a lot of these guys are. And just having a conversation and you know, if you wrestled, you know that, like the 20 minutes before practice, the 20 minutes after practice, just kind of hanging out in the room, like that type of fellowship, you have such great camaraderie, such great fellowship and conversations and that's what I'm like. This would be pretty cool like bo and I have had 100 conversations, you know, going to get breakfast in the room, whatever. It'd be cool to have them on the podcast, have that publicly and give these guys a platform to talk about their faith, to talk about what they're doing.

Speaker 3: 20:03

So it was kind of funny that I was in wrestling, got out of it, I kind of roped back in through having clients that were the best of the best. And then the podcast. I never intended to start a wrestling podcast. Obviously, bashamania is a play on Hulkamania, which is more adage to my childhood wrestling fandom. But it's funny how it was one of those things where just let's have clients on Okay, another wrestling client, another wrestling client, and I think, like episode 10 or something, I'm like okay, this is a wrestling podcast. We might have non-wrestling guests on at some point, but this is, this is a wrestling podcast at this point.

Speaker 2: 20:43

Yeah, and you know some of the episodes I've listened to, even with cause, like you said, you've had non-wrestling guys. I mean those are still good. It was the same type of conversation as well. It's not like you change the dynamic of it at all and it's kind of the same with me. I watched it growing up thousands of times. Nick Siriano his dad made him watch it three times a day. That's when he was a kid and that's why those things kind of pop up.

Speaker 2: 21:06

But I agree, I think it gives these guys an opportunity.

Speaker 2: 21:12

Plus, I mean, hey, you're getting to talk to some pretty high-level athletes and just getting an insight on those guys, without the noise of and not to knock flow, but looking for the crazy story to talk behind.

Speaker 2: 21:22

It's about those guys and they live enough with what they're doing and I got the kind of the same thing. That's kind of why I wanted to do this was just to expose these guys for the truth, you know, of who they are and just have conversations about where they came from and how they're. You know how they decided to do what they're doing, cause this is a long road. You know some of these guys as far as 20, 25 years of competition. You know and I can't attest to it because I was again I was not that good. But when you started working with these guys though top level and you started kind of getting some traction, I mean, were you, were you ever thinking that I don't even want to do this other stuff, I just want to podcast? Do you ever think you want to try to get paid, like, just do podcasting?

Speaker 3: 22:07

No, no, because I enjoy podcasting, but part of why I like it so much is I have guys on and you know there's a part of the podcast that is very selfish. You know, if nobody listened to the podcast I would still do it and I try to tell business owners that all the times it's like selfishly. It's a great way to meet people if I text levi haynes, who I've never really talked to, and be like hey, you want to come on the podcast and we talk for an hour. That's a great introduction and great way to meet somebody. And there's a lot of guys who came on the podcast, initially like Roman Bravo young, like Nick Lee, who we then kept in touch, and they became clients and it's fun because it's like the podcast is great. But I love helping these kids grow their brands. I love helping them, you know, build websites and get the word out and you know, having we're in such a diverse place of how people can monetize their brand, especially with nil. So I think if you took that part away from the podcast I wouldn't enjoy it nearly as as much, because there's an aspect of you know best solutions, being able to work with wrestlers and even people that listen to my podcast that own businesses. They reach out hey, I own a construction company. Hey, I own a finance company. Can you help us? Us like we want to work with other wrestlers. We want to work with other wrestling people. So I think the bash solutions aspect keeps it so fun for me, where it's like I never wanted to be an on-camera person never. I always like being behind the scenes, um, but I preached so much to business owners like my buddy was a chiropractor, like, dude, you should have a health podcast and have other doctors on, have other people in health. My buddy, who's a local um contractor, like have other contractors on, start a podcast because I think it's so fruitful for your business.

Speaker 3: 24:16

And, at the same time, like, while it is selfish for me to grow those relationships, it is also covering the sport. It is also getting stories out there. You know, one of my favorite things that have happened since the podcast is when I had mark hall on. I asked him about um, like his favorite matches and some different questions, and brandon slade called me the next day and he's like hey, I just want you to know how much I love that episode with Mark Hall. I'm like well, first of all I didn't realize you even listened to the podcast. So you know, thank you, thank you. And then he said it meant a lot because when Mark was talking about one of his favorite matches ever, it was I think it was when he won the Junior World Championship against the Iranian and Slay was in his corner. So that meant a lot for Slay to hear that and that's just something that he never got the opportunity to hear Mark talk about because nobody's asked Mark that question.

Speaker 3: 25:18

And for a lot of these guys you know there's a lot of guys who don't get to talk about their faith often and when they get that out there and they get that opportunity to talk about it, you know there's some guys that I think are going to want to talk about it and I bring it up and they kind of just like don't want to talk about it. I'm like, okay, that's cool, but I'm glad I gave you that opportunity. So there's both a selfish aspect to podcasting that I also think the selfless part of I mean we were talking beforehand about. You know there's there's potentially money in podcasting, but it's also just a lot of like throwing money away and kind of just hoping you get a return out of it, whether it's just helping people, whether it's whatever.

Speaker 3: 26:02

Um. So there's that aspect that you know, bash solutions kind of funds this podcast because of the nature that it does bring in clients and it does help.

Speaker 2: 26:11

But yeah, yeah, I think it's a nice one-two punch having them in tandem yeah, for sure, and I love the the part that I look like I gary may have on. That was like a two and a half hour conversation, and that was one of my first ones. But I mean, you get stories from these guys, too, that you know you get a second if you breeze by some of these guys at a tournament. You know you kind of get a question or two and then you're on your way right. Well, these, these guys get to tell a story that you may not have otherwise heard. I mean, I I shed tears with gary may the episode. You know there's some pretty sad stuff. You get emotional because you're hearing some of these things from these guys that are life situations.

Speaker 2: 26:48

Again, it's selfish, you get to hear it, but then you also get to give it to the people, and that's kind of the big reason why I do it too. It's a selfish thing to be able to have the access to those guys and talk to them and be able to have that insight thing, to be able to have the access to those guys and talk to them and be able to have that insight. But at the same time, though, too, I I feel that I need to take that selfishness and turn it into selflessness and give it to others and like that. Again, I do this for free, man, you know I don't. I don't charge a dime for anything there's. I think I just asked for a couple donations. I just do it because I love doing it, you know, and that's the biggest thing you know.

Speaker 2: 27:19

And so I know I know there were some questions, cause there's some pretty big, big stories that are out there right now as far as in the wrestling world talking about, like JB and Starachi and and that whole beef going on back and forth when this goes on. So that was kind of interesting. I was thinking about it a little bit when this goes on, cause some of these guys are your clients, right, I know your business man, you're not dumb, you're not just going to be out there spouting, you know things like that. But where are we as a community when something like that is said or done, like what JB said? And then I know Bo is kind of on the tip of UFC and trying to make his name known and what are your thoughts on the whole kind of smack talking situation when it comes to wrestling versus?

Speaker 3: 28:07

UFC. Yeah, it's interesting because there's an aspect of promotion that I think lacks in wrestling and I think we're starting to see it more and more, where we are building up characters and personalities within wrestling. I think we're starting to see it more and more where we are building up characters and personalities within wrestling. I think you're seeing it with Carter Stracci a lot, because he he almost plays this villain. You know, on social media he's one of the nicest dudes you can talk to. He'll randomly text me to ask how I'm doing, how the family is doing, like he is such a genuinely good dude. Yeah, and it's. It's very hard to. You almost have to take a lot of what you see publicly with a grain of salt, you know, and you kind of have to almost ask yourself like, even if I don't know the answer, is there a level of this just being promotion? And there's a lot of fans that don't care, they just want it. You don't know if Bo's saying that because he has a fight coming up and he just wants to get an opinion out there. You don't know these things and I don't like when my guys go back and forth.

Speaker 3: 29:19

Jordan has been at my wedding. I've been at his wedding Bo's my guy. I've driven to state colleges. Guys go back and forth Like Jordan has been at my wedding. I've been in his wedding, bo's my guy, I've driven to state college just to have breakfast with him. So I saw somebody a couple of people actually were tweeting me like hey, you really got to do a show and talk about this. I said, listen, I ain't touching their beef with a 10 foot pole. I'm like when, when. I'm like if you're in a family and your brothers are fighting number one, you don't pick sides. Number two, your true intent is my brain goes to. Can I get Jordan and Bo, both in the podcast, to squash the beef? Like that's where my brain goes.

Speaker 2: 29:54

Sure, yeah, you know.

Speaker 3: 29:55

Right, and I honestly think Carter's kind of like a byproduct of this. He's almost like cross, you know, friendly fire, crossfire, whatever. Because you know he's just like all good, whatever. I'm gonna wrestle him in a couple weeks and, um, you know, I I think overall I like the, the banter. I think you gotta have good guys, you gotta have bad guys. There's this notion that you know, I think wrestlers sometimes get more credibility than they deserve.

Speaker 3: 30:27

As far as like there are a lot of good humans in wrestling. There's also some bad ones. There's good guys and bad guys in everything and I think sometimes when you don't see a personality, you just assume they're a good guy or whatever. But I think letting people have have the character, whether it's good or bad, and there are some that are definitely playing the villain, some that are definitely playing the good guy you can. But I do think wrestling could benefit more so from that mma style of banter where I posted before NCAAs, before the finals, carter posted something and Rocco Welsh posted something. I just tweeted them both side by side and said 7 pm, saturday night, you don't want to miss this. And it got crazy engagement. People want to see that.

Speaker 3: 31:18

Here's a true freshman talking his talk. Here's the three-time national champ on one leg going for his number four and they want to kill each other. Let's watch what happens now. So I think you need that. You know, there's so much room in the sport for promoting it as far as a storyline and it's very hard when we don't know often who's going to meet. You know, know, willie and I are doing an olympic trials preview next week and it's like you don't know who the finals are going to be or be almost a completely different show. Yeah, does somebody like a young guy, like otul or messenbrink, go on a run and make the finals? Does you know how does burrows play out? Is it burrows dake? You know so again yeah it's.

Speaker 3: 32:01

It's very tough to build the storylines and I think the more banter we can get, the more I do think that helps the hype and the promotion and let people kind of pick their sides and go from there I, I agree, I agree, I think, just because my standpoint is and I have a 15 year old right and I I'm not the guy that doesn't say that you can't be doing it.

Speaker 2: 32:25

Here's my thought on it. Um, I love the banter live when these guys are wrestling each other. I love the back and forth that a coach might have, you know, because we talk a lot about, especially in amateur wrestling. We talk about respect and we talk about sportsmanship. And, yeah, I used to get mad at ben askren a lot because he was running a youth club. But then he's out in the ufc talking, you know, smack to everybody, and it's like you got kids watching you man, like what's going on? You're running a youth club and I wasn't too like I didn't watch ufc. I'm not a ufc crazy kind of guy. I kind of watch it once in a while. I get into the characters. But then I kind of understood okay, he, he's trying to, I see what he's doing, I get it.

Speaker 2: 33:01

But then we also lose the faith of of parents, of actually parenting their kids properly and teaching them. Hey, you know, somewhere down the road this'll, this'll be okay, but right now we're kids, we need to learn this kind of stuff and I get lost in the fact of that. We're constantly trying to teach kids sportsmanship and then, and like you said, like the, the two tweets beside each other I I'm game with that. But like it was hard listening to bo talk smack about jb like that, because it's like number one. Jb is never going to have an opportunity to write that with bo unless there's like some special event where those guys you know, like you know, bang it out with each other but it's like he's not even going to be able to do anything like.

Speaker 2: 33:40

It's like. So now you're actually upset about something, yeah, and now he had a place to put it out right, and I respect that the the opinion. But to me it's like these guys we, our kids, grew up watching them and now bo's another one of those guys. That's kind of like sitting there talking smack. It's like man and I can't buy it for him because he seemed so nice before in college. So it's hard to hear that coming back. So that's kind of where I get kind of conflicted with a lot of it. It is exciting and it adds another element, but at the same time too, are we crossing information for all the kids coming up. I love the bad side stuff.

Speaker 3: 34:16

Yeah, I think it's one of those things that my kids are young. Kids are young. I got a two year old and a little girl is going to turn one next month.

Speaker 3: 34:26

So I haven't hit that. In all sports, whether you have, whether your kids are watching football, whether they're watching baseball, you're going to have good guys, you're going to have bad guys, and I think the athletes have to. You know, number one, I think there should be. Somebody was texting me about. You know, I love Bo. I can't believe he said that. I said, well, I said if that's the case, I'm like, and he says one thing that you don't agree with in seven years I'm like there there's an aspect of grace and saying you know what I don't agree with this.

Speaker 3: 35:15

But maybe X, maybe Y, and you know, I think with athletes there's sometimes anybody in the spotlight is hard to hold to a standard where it's like, hey, you know, you can look up to this person. You know, as a christian, my kids should look up to jesus above everybody else and say that's your role model. I think you, you have athletes that you can look up to, but it's tough because, no matter what you do, there are going to be athletes that just, even if they're 99, that one percent, we're all human, we're all going to fail. Yeah, you know. So it's one of those things where it's like I think wrestling is is behind the other sports where it's like you know, we people, I don't like Patrick Mahomes.

Speaker 3: 36:01

I hate his guts from a fan standpoint. He's a Buffalo Bills guy but he hasn't done too much wrong in football until the Bills game this year when he was yelling at the ref and pouting and a lot of people were like, oh, patrick Mahomes isn't a good guy. It's like, well, if you were playing sports in front of the public eye for 10 years and you finally had a moment where you're like, hey, you acted out of line, it's gonna happen. I don't know that I would tell my kids like, hey, patrick mahomes um, yelled at the ref. You're no longer a fan of patrick mahomes. Or beau called jordan burrows a fraud, you're not. You know what I mean.

Speaker 3: 36:39

It's like yeah, yeah, I think there's an aspect of just realism, but we're not used to it in wrestling and I think that's where you're the disconnect you're mentioning kind of comes from. It's like we're used to these guys having so much respect for each other that all of a sudden somebody has an opinion, yeah, and it's almost like you know it gets. I don't want to say it's something out of nothing, but it does have that vibe where it's like you have guys that disagree and we're like oh, I love jordan, I love bo, I don't really like this. Who do?

Speaker 2: 37:14

I pick. Ah, yeah, you don't have to pick anyone really. So in that I in the same point too, because I you made a good point about the other sports doing it because I just got done defending caitlin clark right with the whole, the whole f you thing or whatever, stand up or thing, kind of whatever she did on the court, and I was kind of I'm defending her and I'm thinking like this sport kind of needs it. And she wasn't even. She was at home, she wasn't telling anybody to shut the hell up, she was telling them to stand up. And I was like why would you tell her home base to shut up?

Speaker 2: 37:43

But so I watched some other games with her and I was like, holy cow, these guys got me watching women's college basketball, holy cow, okay. So now it's kind of like you know, I, I, I don't again I it was one of those things where a snap kind of reaction with the bow, nickel thing and I kind of was like, yeah, maybe I gotta kind of back up I'm. So I'm a hawkeye fan, okay, it's just the way I've been since I was five and penn state friends of mine can throw it in my face now for 10 years, 20 years hey, you guys still have a legacy.

Speaker 3: 38:11

There's nothing to uh be upset about that right, right, and it helps.

Speaker 2: 38:15

Again, it's another storyline that helps the sport, um, but I never, ever, got to a point where I would say because I mean, hey, if Liam wants to go to Penn State, I'm a fan of wherever he goes, I don't even care what it is, he could go to Grand Canyon State, I don't care, I'm a big fan. And he's going to have guys that are in his team that are going to. Just right now in high school. There are certain guys that do certain things you don't agree with. I think you make a good point about the, you know, just kind of hey, everybody's human. They have a reaction to things and they have feelings and emotions. You know they have to let them out, and that's what I said about Caitlin Clark. Like, these guys are high level athletes that are doing things that people see, you know, and not every single moment is going to be the best moment.

Speaker 3: 38:58

Yeah, and don't in not every single moment it's going to be the best moment. Yeah, and I think you know it's, most people in the sport look up to both bow and look up to jordan, so if there's beef, it's kind of one of those things where it's like, you know, I feel like the general reaction was, hey, bow overreacted, and if that's your stance, it's like okay, great if that's the anomaly and you know, whatever, whatever yeah.

Speaker 2: 39:22

So moving on to the, I think there's a lot of flack and we'll make this quick because I know you gotta get going. But the thing that I kind of question, because I don't know every intricate detail that goes on with ncaa rules, things like that, I'm not. I'm not as well versed as you guys are. I'm working on it. I'm just, I think I'm building, hey, I don't know the rules at all.

Speaker 3: 39:40

I always. That's why I have willie on the podcast. I can just defer to him the brain. Be like all right, willie, tell me here and I'll I'll text some screenshots. I'll take a screenshot and send it to him. Be like, before I tweet something. Sometimes I'm like am I really wrong on this take? And he'll be like you're an idiot or no, post it, you know. So sometimes I still defer to him for the for all. I say something yeah.

Speaker 2: 40:03

So the date and fix thing with these guys. A lot of guys got lucky because of covid, right? I mean, they got an extra year out of it. So I think I was a little mixed on it. But I sat in my car the other day and thought about I was like you know what, if I had another opportunity and I felt like I was good enough to keep rolling, I would probably go to like I'm an athlete, you know I don't blame the kids at all.

Speaker 3: 40:27

I I hate that. I think it is asinine that the ncaa gave him an extra year. Asinine, sure, I think, the fact that you have vincenzo joseph, who I'm obviously biased to. He's a co-host of mine, he's a good friend. Vincenzo Joseph was in the NCAA finals three times and he won twice and he was arguably a shoo-in for the fourth NCAA championships to at least make the finals. He got robbed of that and he never got an extra opportunity. But here comes along some kid who starts in 2021, wrestles four years and gets a fifth year when he never had ncaa championships taken away. It's an asinine decision by the ncaa, but if I'm a kid and you want to have a shot, I don't fault any of these kids. If anything, I think they're crazy for wanting to stay in school one more year. I couldn't last in college three months before I dropped out so, if anything, I'm like you know willie and I were talking about bo barlett.

Speaker 3: 41:29

Will he come back? And I'm like my conversations with bo is that he really doesn't want to go to school for another year. I'm like you know, if you're runner up in the ncaa's, does that incentivize you to maybe deal with school for another year to have one more shot? Sure, would I blame beau for coming back one more year? Absolutely not at all.

Speaker 3: 41:46

Caitlin clark, in my opinion, has more upside playing college for one more year than going to the wmba. I had that uh iowa lsu game on. My wife goes you don't watch basketball, what are you doing? And I go, you have to watch this caitlin clark versus aries rematch. I'm like you, just you have to. And it was. It was electric, the game was electric away and I don't know that people are tuning in to a wmba match like they are college basketball.

Speaker 3: 42:16

So there is upside and I think, as these guys build your brand, if you're dating fix and you have the opportunity to leverage the college audience, the college fan base, the Oklahoma state program, I do not blame him one bit for wanting another year where I think is crazy as the NCAA giving it to them. But I don't. I don't fault these kids at all for saying hey, you're going to give me one more shot to accomplish my dreams. I'm taking it. And I also understand the kids who want to move on. Everybody's asking you know, will Carter come back for another year? And it's like I don't blame Carter because he's the only kid who could ever become a five-time champ. Okay, understood, but kids do not grow up dreaming about becoming a five-time NCAA champ.

Speaker 3: 43:06

They dream of being a four-time NCAA champ. And if you're one of these Penn State kids and your coach did it and you say my coach was a four-time champ, I want to be a four-time champ and he goes and accomplishes that dream, I'm not surprised if he doesn't come back for another year. But I do get leveraging, especially in wrestling. The college audience is bigger than any other audience in the sport. I agree, you have Penn State fans that only care about watching college wrestling. You have Iowa, you have Oklahoma State. You have all these programs that only care about what their program does. Because they're alumni, because they're fans yeah, it's, it's wrestling's had a hard time of converting a casual fan which in my opinion is a college wrestling fan that just tunes in because they're an oklahoma state guy. They watch oklahoma state football, oklahoma state wrestling, they wrestled whatever.

Speaker 3: 43:59

Converting that to following the Yasar Dogu in Turkey at 2 in the morning for a prelim match is a very hard transition from NCAAs on Saturday night with 20,000 people in the arena. On ESPN primetime you can watch with your kids after dinner versus. You know I got Jordan's wife lauren um, great, the whole family's family friends and you know she's knows that I pay attention to everything. She's like hey, have you seen the stream link for jordan competing in the usardo goo? Nope, it's like. So here we have even spouses of competitors trying to follow it and saying I don't see a stream link, do you like? So I think it's very hard. So if these kids want to stick around for one more year and leverage that audience and build their brand, go for it. I don't blame them, but I do think the NCAA is asinine for giving them the year to begin with Give the kids who lost a year, another year, totally correct and I was was just gonna bring that up.

Speaker 2: 45:03

I mean, you could have done it where it's like, hey, the kids that are gonna be run and they didn't get that chance to compete, you can siphon through that and make sure that they get that that year to be able to do it kind of thing you know right, the kids who lost their senior year at ncaa's.

Speaker 2: 45:16

That's who it's like let them bring it on back. You can even make some special rules where they only have to compete so many times, because now they're going to go back to class again, you know right and I mean, carter stirachi didn't wrestle in 2020.

Speaker 3: 45:32

He was a redshirt freshman, so it wasn't one of his official years. His first year was 2021. But you have other kids who literally, let's say you did not red shirt, let's say you just came in and 2021 happened to be your first year. You literally get five chances and the kids who graduate in 2020 got three.

Speaker 2: 45:57

It's just like what, what is going on?

Speaker 3: 45:59

but this is finally the last year, because this is the last year of this covid eligibility where, starting in 2022, you know dean hamity, these other kids are, you know, don't get that extra year, which I think is good for the sport yeah, I agree, I agree.

Speaker 2: 46:18

So you know, I, I, I want to wrap it up with you here, because you had, you had, uh, you got stuff going on and what I want to do is I'd love to have you back on again. Uh, I'd love to be able to kind of podcast with you. Um, I know that you have a busy schedule and please, penn state fans, just because I'm an iowa fan, please don't hate me.

Speaker 3: 46:35

It's okay, it's all right, it's only the extreme fans because I get being a penn state guy and I even told a story today like I'm a penn state guy because I was a kale guy. He went to penn state, I didn't go to college and so that's where the fandom comes in. But I have had spencer lee, alex marinelli, kemer. I've had him on the podcast. I'll have anybody on the podcast that I think has a great story. I'm like I think wrestling and sports in general needs more podcasts that have a bias.

Speaker 3: 47:08

I don't know if you tune into Barstool Sports at all, but one of the biggest sporting media companies in the world and you have the owner, a monster Boston sports guy, dan Katz, big cat, a monster boston sports guy, dan katz, big cat, a monster chicago sports guy. You have people who have these biases. What makes it so fun when you they have like these takes that are either so high above high because they won, or low upon low and it's entertainment. And I think the more we have guys who you I think we're starting to see it now where you know Zach Bogle, stalemates, iowa State fan has that bias Me.

Speaker 3: 47:49

I'm a Penn State guy, I have that bias. I think the more you have this, the better. Let people tune in and have that bias where you have an edge, whether it's for your guests, whether it's for your guest, whether it's for your take people love crucifying me if I take a penn state guy and it's a bad pick. You know it's like, but that's what makes it fun. It's like you're not going to agree with everybody you listen to. Sports takes from.

Speaker 2: 48:12

I think that's what makes sports great, yeah and I'm not afraid of any kind of criticism. I mean, man, I've been called dumb, all kinds.

Speaker 2: 48:20

I can imagine you've had your own thrown your way oh yeah, as far as all kinds of crap, but I I love the banter and I love the talk and I I especially love the fact when podcasters can kind of get together, because a lot of times we're doing our shows with guys that we want them to talk right, and they hear we get to, we get to do our thing, like kind of, hey, I think of this, I don't go on forums too often because I think they're they're I'm not willie, willie loves them.

Speaker 3: 48:45

I think they're toxic and I don't like people hiding. If you don't like me, you don't want to. You know that's fine hiding behind an avatar and, just you know, having your take. It's like somebody sent me one because people know I don't really go on them too much and they're like they're trying to support me. But it's like I've I've seen comments of people saying you know, I don't really mind, bash mania, but he should really talk more and let his guests just do the talk, or he should talk less and let his guests do more talking. And I'm like if I had a conversation with somebody who had that taken person, I'd explain it to him Like listen, you have to have a conversation with your guests to get them to talk.

Speaker 3: 49:26

If you just have 20 scripted questions, which I've done. These shows where it's like okay, first this to this and you don't interject Number one, you're not going to build a rapport or relationship with that guest at all because, because you could have just emailed them 10 questions and give them a Microsoft word doc to type in the answers. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 49:47

I love, I love the banter, I love it, you know, just being able to talk back and forth, and I think the freedom of giving these guys that is, is the best part. You're doing an awesome job. Appreciate everything that you're doing. Um, you know, I I've been again. We started around the same time, but I started after you because, like I said, you're kind of the reason why I started to befall myself it looks really good, like he's got good cameras, like I'm dealing with a phone here, like I gotta step my game up.

Speaker 3: 50:12

I actually took a break for about a year because I couldn't afford stuff to make it right you know quality matters, man, I think you know it's like there's a barrier to entry around having to have the right equipment and this and that, and I don't think that should be the case. But I do think the easier your podcast is to listen to, yeah, the more people are going to appreciate it. They have good audio if you have a good camera. I mean, I didn't do video for the first like three years. I just I wanted to keep it, just audio, limited resources, and I knew that once I got started I wanted to, just I wanted to just make sure whatever I did I could commit to, and I know that adding video is a whole nother layer.

Speaker 2: 50:57

So I didn't.

Speaker 3: 50:58

I didn't do video for a long time and then, I think when I opened a rockfin account, I started putting the video versions on there. People were liking them I'm like all right, well, just start putting them on youtube. Why? Not yeah, I think quality definitely matters. People got to. Yeah, I hear some of these podcasts.

Speaker 2: 51:15

I'm like man, I'm glad you're you're doing and trying and making things happen, but like, go spend a hundred dollars on a microphone because you're gonna please please, because I mean, if I I've uploaded some of those older ones that I think they're on youtube now they're just under the, there's no video or anything. But if you listen to the scott cleaver one and even the gary may have I had mark schultz, you know all that stuff on all very hollow echoey because it's through my cell phone kind of just garbage.

Speaker 3: 51:41

You know, I was like I gotta stop doing this crap, man I know, but you evolve, you, you're, you naturally evolve as a podcast and listen. Even if the audio was perfect for the first 50 episodes, I wouldn't want to go back and listen to myself I can't, I can't.

Speaker 2: 51:54

My wife was like, hey, you done with it, she goes. I want to listen to it. She'll turn around like, can you turn that off? I'm still in the.

Speaker 3: 51:59

Yeah, you know that's not allowed in my house. My wife has to put in headphones if she's listening to the podcast, or I have to go outside, something I don't want to I concur.

Speaker 2: 52:07

Well, all right, we'll wrap it up. I just want to talk to you for a quick second once we get off the air here. But uh, hey, everybody, this has been justin bash man. I appreciate your time. Check out, bash man yeah, check out. Go check out. You guys have any website questions needs check out bash solutions. Uh, I'm guaranteeing, once you see the nittany lion wrestling club website, you'll be sold go live soon.

Speaker 3: 52:28

New one that's right.

Speaker 2: 52:30

That's right. So pay attention, but go check out all of his episodes. Man, he's had some great guests on uh, but we're gonna leave you with that and we're gonna to end this. Peace, folks.