#107 Thomas Kelly The Low Single: Wrestling, Podcasting, and Community Connection

This episode features Thomas Kelly, known as "The Low Single," sharing his journey through wrestling and his passion for building community through podcasting. The conversation dives into his childhood experiences, the lessons from high school sports, and his aspirations to create a platform that celebrates wrestling culture.

• Discussing early athletic experiences 
• Accidental entry into wrestling 
• The importance of listening to coaches 
• Pursuit of a podcasting career 
• Engaging with the wrestling community 
• The impact of NCAA regulations on wrestling 
• Future aspirations for the podcast 
• Encouragement to show up and support wrestling events

Chapters

• 1:43 Sports and Wrestling Journey
• 11:21 Podcasting and Starting Fresh
• 17:45 Technology Struggles and Wrestling Memories
• 24:08 Navigating Social Media in Wrestling
• 27:22 Building Relationships Through Wrestling Interaction
• 37:48 Transitioning Loyalties in Coaching Changes
• 41:48 Wrestlers and Coaches Discuss NCAA Rules
• 48:00 NCAA Challenges and College Sports
• 56:33 State Wrestling Culture and Future Expansion
• 1:00:55 Tech Savvy Podcasting and Apparel Plans
• 1:08:58 Wrestling Coverage and Future Plans
• 1:19:21 Fan Dedication and Paying It Forward
• 1:28:42 Goodbye Message to Wrestling Fans

Transcript

Speaker 2: 1:43

and we're alive, man, we're not doing two minutes 11 seconds anymore. The song I used to do that. I love the song the guy created for me that's in town here, but we can't do the whole thing. 30 seconds, everybody, we are here. It's another episode of the Vision Quest podcast. We are joined today by, I would say, a fellow podcaster who I wouldn't say you're new, but you've been around. You started kind of chirping a little bit on Twitter and then, boom, all of a sudden he's got 10 episodes out and we're joined by the low single, and I'm not going to tell him your name, we're just going to joined by the low single and I'm not gonna tell them your name, we're just gonna call you the low single. How's it going, man?

Speaker 3: 2:20

it's going good. Uh, I will say my name it's thomas kelly. Everybody listens, they know. Uh, I appreciate you. Having me on. This has been a long time coming, like you said, not too long doing this, about, I think, eight or nine episodes. I think I just dropped eight, but I'm looking forward to continuing and just keep on going.

Speaker 2: 2:35

So nice, nice. So we were talking earlier and just kind of getting to know each other and figuring you know kind of who we are out and all that stuff, but kind of asking you some questions about. You know, obviously, where you're from, things like that. But you said you are originally from stillwater oklahoma yes, sir, yep and then you had the unfortunate. You unfortunately had to move to kansas, right, yeah?

Speaker 3: 2:56

I making their way up.

Speaker 2: 2:57

They're making their way up in wrestling and high school wrestling it's okay, I get it.

Speaker 3: 3:00

Yeah, it's definitely a lot different here in wrestling than being back home, for sure.

Speaker 2: 3:05

So did you? Did you enjoy just athletics or anything when you were a kid? Did you play sports when you were a kid?

Speaker 3: 3:14

Yeah. So I kind of started at a young age and then different stuff. I played hockey because we got semi-pro hockey teams here, stuff like that. I played soccer for a long time, yeah, anything. I could really Okay cool.

Speaker 3: 3:28

Yeah anything I could get my hands on. As far as sports, I would. Even in high school I played tennis, joined the tennis team by accident, the wrestling coach told us we had to do a sport and I was like he's like, yeah, he's like, and I want you to run track. And I'm like, come on, coach, I've always been a big boy Like, come on, coach. I was like I don't run. And he's like, no, it's well, that's what he said he's like, but you still got to run before practice and we run miles. And I'm like, okay, well, that's not going to work for me. So I was like, oh, I'm on the tennis team. And he's like, okay, cool, I'll come out to practice and see you tomorrow. And I was like, oh crap, so, yeah, so I like accidentally joined that, but it was actually so fun.

Speaker 3: 4:11

But I didn't actually start wrestling Kansas, like you said, it's not as prevalent as it is back there, you know, back in Oklahoma. So I didn't really do it literally until I got in high school and then, like the way the coach got me to do it is he's like you ever wanted to fight in school but you're not allowed to. And I'm like, yeah, because I grew up doing karate. My family, my grandpa, taught karate for 45 years, so I have like a karate background, my whole life doing it and up to high school. And then he's he's like well, you can fight. He's like, and the teachers and the principals all cheer you on and I'm like what, how's that possible? And then he gets me in the wrestling room and I'm I'm working out with him every day and he just he worked me over every single day, every day.

Speaker 3: 4:50

I got coach. I try to get somebody different. He's like nope. He's like where's kelly? I'm like hiding in the back, like, oh crap, like I'm sick today, coach. He's like nope. He's like where's Kelly? I'm like hiding in the back, oh crap, I'm sick today, coach. He's like nope. And my uncle ended up being like a volunteer coach. So even trying to get out of practice wasn't happening, was not happening. My uncle's like no, I'm about to go pick him up right now.

Speaker 2: 5:20

Like, even if I didn't go to school, my game and wrestling was my brother's, but we both did the same sports together. So, like he did soccer, I was better, but he still loved it. He was really good at wrestling and just kind of kind of liked it. If I was as good as he was, I probably would have won state, but he didn't give a shit enough, so he didn't win state. But I got drugged to the, the badger camps where you easily, even as a kid, you're running with guys up the steps. At camp randall and it was horrible. It was the worst thing on the planet. I was a soccer player already. I didn't need to run. I was good on running, right, right, I was trying to ben askren my way out. I'd be like I'll just wrestle more.

Speaker 2: 5:54

Don't make me run, don't make me, you know, do all that stuff. But I wasn't very good. I think I think I did. I think I did. Maybe I was below 500 in wrestling dude. I'll admit I sucked. I mean I was probably in the 150 range, but I was that kid that wore the singlet that his sides were pouring out of it a little bit, but I wasn't. I was like 150 kid that was doing that, right, like I was not appropriate to be in a singlet whatsoever, but it was fun. I had fun doing it and I didn't do the workouts. So were you a big lifter?

Speaker 3: 6:22

no, um, not like, yeah, not so when, like we're doing like karate, we didn't really do like a lot of lifting, obviously, in karate. So when I got to high school, like my grandpa always just beat it into us like if you work hard enough, you don't need to lift weights. He's like you want to get to get stronger, do more pushups. You know stuff like that. So that's the kind of stuff I would kind of just base it off of. But I did start doing a little bit of lifting but yeah, like you said, like I never like dove in really hardcore with it, I never like.

Speaker 3: 6:47

My best year I had was my junior year. I started the season like four or five and oh, and then I got hurt and then me and the coach butted heads and being a teenager and being a junior and I'm like I only got one year of school left. I thought I was Mr Hot shot, I thought I would quit, I thought he would beg me to come back. He didn't beg me to come back. They wrestled a kid that was 20 pounds underweight just because and I mean again, it was another one of those life lessons where it was hard.

Speaker 3: 7:16

You know cause, you know you, you walk around and you think like, oh man, I didn't have the, I didn't have the record to uh, you know, to have that cockiness or to have that swagger. Like I said four or five and oh, and one of those was a JV, like a JV tournament on the weekend, cause that was the first weekend we had in the varsity team, didn't have anything and I was on the varsity is my first year of varsity but yeah, like I said four, four or five matches, man. And then I thought like, oh coach, I was like we don't got another heavyweight, but closest guy to me is like, barely because there's like 215 at that time. I don't know if that's still a high school weight, but 215 at that time so that guy was like and he's like 20 pounds under that.

Speaker 3: 7:55

So I'm like, oh, this guy's like you know, there's no way coach, like they need me. No, they didn't need me, they didn't need me. And then my senior year I did online school Cause I was just done with school. I tried to like drop out. I thought I had the grades and stuff. It was literally just I didn't want to be there. But then I was like my mom was like no, like ain't no way you're quitting school. So then I did online school. So I literally never wrestled again after my junior year, which was tough for me, because that senior year I really missed it. You know, I really, really missed it. But by the time I tried to talk to the coach and stuff, he's like well, how do I know you're not going to quit on me? And again my pride flew her up and I was a world champion. It was so easy.

Speaker 2: 8:44

I hadn't made a state championship, but I sure felt like I'm on four wins Hell yeah, hell yeah, kids, don't take after us, please Don't take after us, don't do what we do.

Speaker 3: 8:54

Listen to your coaches for real. That's the one thing I say out of that. Listen to your coaches for real for real.

Speaker 2: 8:59

So and that was. That was kind of the one thing. It's funny you mentioned that because I'm pretty sure I was in school so I could play sports. My grades were only good just to stay in sports. That was a cd you know right around there, didn't? I didn't care, I was like you, I was, and I was still ballsy enough to walk into the guidance counselor's office and be like I wonder what college I could get into, pulling up all these college magazines and stuff. And she's probably just, why are you in here? You shouldn't even be in here right now. But I tried to act like. I was like, yeah, dude, I'm going to go to like Concordia or something, a little school in town here I'm going to get my education. I wasn't even worth the paper that you signed up on.

Speaker 2: 9:39

So it's, it's interesting and kind of how, how things change like that. And then when now, like with me, I tell mike, I tell liam, I'm like, dude, don't do what I did, like what I did the way that I did it. Would I turn it back now? No, but you don't need to do that and you shouldn't do that. You should not do that at all. And I think he got to the, to the point where he kind of like, listening to the stories that I tell, he's like I don't want to do that. I don't want to do it the way my dad did it.

Speaker 3: 10:00

Yeah, see, I have two young girls and yeah, if they ever came home and they're like, oh, you know, said or did what I said I did, oh yeah, we'd be going back up. We'd have the coach on the phone. We'd be like, no, we apologize, we'll coach carter it, we'll do push-ups, sit-ups. You know, whatever we got to do to get back on that team, we're going to do it.

Speaker 2: 10:18

So for sure that's right. So I can identify with the team that you identify with the most, because our uniforms are practically the same as oklahoma states. It's a little crazy, uh, being that I've been an I well, I started out an iowa fan. I mean from little as tom brands, terry brands, I mean I grew up on that stuff, right, oh yeah oh, oh, yeah, sorry brother grew up on that right.

Speaker 2: 10:41

So my brother, we would wrestle in the attic and my brother would be tom or terry, whichever one, he felt better that day. But kind of kind of going through the phases in in the in in life and just I stopped paying attention to it, right, like it didn't. I was like, oh man, it doesn't really matter that much to me. But then you come back into it you see how much it matters still to that little community, right, just the, the little things within it.

Speaker 2: 11:04

So you're, you're a, you know, like you said, uh, dynasty defined podcast. He does. He's a smart like up here, right, you and I have like the emotion, you know, and he might on a show once in a while. But we're the guys are like man, I watched him, you just really look like this. You really, you know, really look like you could do this and I can tell in his face kind of thing. So where, like, were there things that you did earlier on in life that were kind of like this, that kind of brought you to? Did you do anything similar to this at all ever?

Speaker 3: 11:30

Uh, as far as like podcasting, no, um, I'm like, I'm just like I'm a people person. Naturally, for my job, I do pest control, so I'm like interacting with customers, stuff like that. I'm like just naturally I can like this, I can get on here. We've never like met, we've never. But I just feel like wait, give us 10 minutes and bam, I'm going, you know. So yeah, I've never really done anything like this.

Speaker 3: 11:55

People would tell me like, oh, we think you're funny, we think you should do like a YouTube channel or something like that. And I've thought about it. But every time I thought about doing it I'm like, well, there's nothing that I can really like connect to, that much, you know, cause, like it's it's easy to start something, but like I'm a person that if I start something that like unless barring like some crazy life happening, I don't see myself like not doing this in a month or not doing this in two months. And that was like the biggest thing and that's why I kind of like pushed my reveal back or like my show back when I was first coming out with. It was because, like I don't really like to go into anything just half cocked, you know, like I want to go full loaded into it. I want to pour everything I am into it. And then if I can't, if I couldn't really think of how I could do it, or if I couldn't really brainstorm anything ahead of time, then maybe it's not for me. And that's another thing.

Speaker 3: 12:44

Like with the pod is like when I, when I do the episodes, I don't write things down, I'm I'm not very organized, I don't prepare. You know what I'm saying, like yeah, like I'll do a few bulletins, like hey, this is what we're going to talk about tonight. You know, like dual this, dual that. And then like I just go with the flow, you know, and I don't, I don't very often have to like rerecord anything. I usually like one shot goes. So it's kind of like, you know, I just I feel comfortable doing this.

Speaker 3: 13:11

So, like I said, there's nothing that really in my past that brought me to this. It's just really the connection of Oklahoma State. And then I was a big fan of the Dynasty Defined. I still am, I still listen to this pod, I still support them, but that's what kind of made me want to get into it. I was like, well, I would like to do that. And I was like, well, how about I do a YouTube show? But then, as we discussed before this, this is my first time ever being able to successfully set up everything, everything go the way that I would like it to go, because it just it just wasn't working well for me. But it's led me to here and I really enjoy it and I'm just glad that, you know, the community allowed me in this space, because that's what it was for me as well. It wasn't just like, hey, I want to do this. It's like do you guys want this?

Speaker 2: 13:50

you know I'm saying yeah, yeah, and that was kind of so, like I the way I started. I started the wrong way, um, with a phone trying to record next to because so I could get their voice onto my phone. So it was on a file on my phone. And then it's like, okay, how do I put this on? Something like where do I, where do I put this on? So I did it for a little bit and I cut it because I was like I don't have the right stuff, like there's something wrong here with how I'm doing it. It just didn't feel right. Right, I don't know, maybe eight months or something like that. I put it down because I was like I need to get equipment. So I was starting to price stuff and I was looking at everything and this expensive, this is not, this is not cheap, there's so, and that's the other thing I think people don't realize. That is that and I'm not crying about it. But we're doing this because it's fun, right, we're doing this because we enjoy putting this out for people.

Speaker 2: 14:38

I enjoy doing it because a lot of times people get the side of other people that you might want to ask these questions at a tournament or have this conversation at a tournament with someone, but it was like you said it in this last episode, or you in one of the episodes that you have. You don't want to bug people. You know when you, if you're walking up to someone, like the Bassets, for example, a year, I know those guys, we, we wrestled on the team with those guys for a couple dual tournaments, but I still didn't want to bug those guys because of the, the, I don't know the energy around them. Everybody else wants to talk to them. I don't want to be that dude. That's like knocking on their door, but at the same time, though, too, like this gives the opportunity for people to see them for that right, it allows them to see that side that you weren't able to ask about. And then, plus, you're getting a different perspective. You know, you're, you're, you're offering up in a visual of a duel that you saw.

Speaker 2: 15:28

Like I said, we, we put the emotion into things. We bring a little bit more of the, I guess, the more of the, the trueness, out of something. Now, it's not to say like mike miles, not not talking to someone and they don't get, you know, emotion out of something or anything like that, but it's something different, right, and you and you're bringing something different. You're bringing a different twist to to Oklahoma state wrestling. Right, I mean, that's the, that's the whole thing. Just like you know, eventually I don't want to.

Speaker 2: 15:51

I'm going to get mean for a second here, but I'm not going to talk about the badgers wrestling because nobody wants to talk about badgers wrestling. There's there was a, there was a podcast that was done here with with the coaches, and they don't even do it anymore. You know like it was. It was kind of weird. You know the environment around wisconsin with badger wrestling right now is a little different. It's a little a little tense right now. Some guys not too happy, some guys that you know that just kind of making remarks that there are things that people don't don't know.

Speaker 2: 16:18

But I would bring that flavor here. But it's like I what's going to happen next? You know, like I don't, I don't, I don't want to be a guy that's telling news about negative stuff. So I like talking to other people. But now you know liam's a part of the cavalier team, so I kind of have been watching those guys a lot and picking up a lot.

Speaker 2: 16:36

So it's, it's a different view. You're bringing a different view and your, your flavor, your taste and, like we were talking about before and you know, breaking news or anything like that, we're just telling people stuff that maybe they wouldn't have access to or maybe they didn't think of, you know. So I respect what you're doing. You know, like I said, it's a, it's a different flavor, it's a, it's kind of it's a good mix and and with the numbers side on one side and then with, I guess, what you know, like that, like I said, the emotion side. It sounds bad, sounds kind of girly, but the emotion side on the other side, you get a great mix, right? Yeah, so when you, when you you're talking about kind of starting this up, when you were looking into, like youtube and things like that, where's the kind of same thing you're kind of eyeing up, like okay, what are the schematics here? How do I get to put this together? And it's it's very kind of confusing at first. What were your first thoughts when you did your first episode?

Speaker 3: 17:25

So my, my first thing was this was supposed, like I said, it's supposed to be a YouTube show. And I get on there and like I'm like, hey, two weeks from now I'm going to start the low single YouTube show. It's going to be awesome, it's going to be great. I'm excited. I'm getting a lot of support. People seem to be excited for it. I'm like, okay, that helps me feel more motivated. And then, like you, I get down and I actually recorded one other previous recording with, like I said, the Oklahoma State. He kind of covers all athletics, the O State all day guy. And, like I said, I would use this mic, the same mic. It would not work. Funny enough, like I said, it's literally just one click of a button. Couldn't get that to work, man, my ring light wasn't working real well. I didn't even have this like set up to where it is now. I was kind of just in my bedroom and I just kind of just shut the door, because I got kids too, you know.

Speaker 3: 18:18

So it's kind of hard oh yeah, moment to just get it oh yeah, but that's why I like, and I was also like my room is downstairs, so I have an upstairs, I have a downstairs. Well, the room's downstairs. Well, the internet was terrible.

Speaker 3: 18:30

You know what I'm saying, so like oh yeah so like shout out to him for being like so, so kind and so polite to me, because after, like a couple of days later, I'm like hey, any feedback you got for me? He's like yeah, since we have paragraph of stuff, you know. And he's like, please don't take this offensive, you know. He's like I wasn't going to say anything unless you said something and I was like yeah, and like, first thing, he's like get better internet.

Speaker 2: 19:01

I'm like man. I'm like man. I'm sorry, I mean like. Even right now I'm just running off my computer. That's my, that's my. I need it right next to me because I'm in the basement too.

Speaker 3: 19:05

So if I don't have something down here, I'm screwed like it's gonna chop, it's gonna bounce all that, yeah. Yeah, mine's probably about like 10, 7 to 10 feet away from me over to my right here, so but yeah, like I, then I'm like he didn't mean it like discouraging and it wasn't like you know, nothing he said was rude but it in the end I kind of was like, well, if he thinks this like what's gonna happen, when I press yeah, I press play and I'm on here by myself winging it.

Speaker 3: 19:29

And then you know, my friends, my close buddies, got to tell me like hey, bro, because I got like a little group chat. Um, yeah, like me and three other guys have called the loyal and true, it's just, we're just in there just shooting the stuff you know, saying stuff that we can't really say publicly. Just, you know, literally just talking speculation, you know, running through like probable lineups for next year.

Speaker 3: 19:48

you know, just random stuff like that, and like those guys will give it to me straight, you know. But yeah, I just I didn't. And then I started looking stuff up and it's like I, this camera is not the greatest. I mean, it works well but it's not the greatest. Like it's not real clear. I get that, but like I had already bought the computer, I bought the mic. I look online, this mic tells me, like they tell me, like a little video I watched, like that mic's okay but it's not the best one.

Speaker 2: 20:17

The I should have bought is like 30 less. I'm like works way better. Compatibility's a bitch. Compatibility with this stuff is a bitch. I will tell you that much. There's a one thing that I worry about the most is like, like I said, that now this new camera that I have is like god, I hope this works, I hope people see me, I hope they hear me because and I hope the rest of the shit works with it. When I hook it up because you just don't know you, you hit record and you're like okay, what's kind of kind of moment like that, but you started covering oklahoma state wrestling. Now you're from stillwater, so obviously the oklahoma state war is already in your head, right like you did. You pay attention to the wrestling stuff when you were younger, in high school and stuff like that for sure, yeah, so um well, so I'm actually you're not like a new guy kind of the scene or anything like that that really loves it.

Speaker 3: 20:59

You've been, you've known about them already oh for sure, yeah, yeah, I've been, uh, I've been an oklahoma state fan my whole life um oklahoma state everything, uh, any sporting event, any, anything like. I'm there for it. And I'm actually from pawnee, which is like 27 30 miles um from stillwater, but everybody knows Stillwater more than they know Pawnee, obviously.

Speaker 2: 21:19

Well, I mean, unless you watch Parks and Rec, then you know Pawnee, but that's Indiana.

Speaker 3: 21:23

Yeah, I said I don't think it's Oklahoma, but yeah right. But yeah, so I've been. I've been a fan Like I went to duels when I was young. That's another thing I get online sometimes.

Speaker 2: 21:33

Oh nice.

Speaker 3: 21:37

Since, since I haven't came out and like, cause I had like a personal account before. I had this whole account and it had like my like just normal stuff, you know, pictures of me, pictures of the kids, uh, the wife, stuff like that, um. But then I got this account and then, like people are like sometimes you know you'll get a few people that comment stuff like, oh, like you know, or you just started becoming a fan because David Taylor's here and, like I told you before we got on here, like I don't ever say anything negative back to people, I don't ever argue with people. Actually, funny enough, joe is the one that there's one podcast where I kind of address that and Joe told me he's like hey, man, if I can give you one advice, they don't feel the haters, you know, because once you've acknowledged them he's like in their little ego they're like oh, there it is. I really tune that stuff out. I've been an Oklahoma State fan and Oklahoma State wrestling specifically, my whole life.

Speaker 3: 22:21

I met John. The first duel I ever went to was, I think it was 2000. It had to be like 11, 12. I talked about it on the pod a little bit. That was the one I got to meet Jordan Oliver, which is a good friend. Fast forward to now he's a good friend of mine. I really enjoy him. I got to meet him. I got to meet Blake Rusholt, which was the heavyweight at the time, and of course I wrestled heavyweight. So it was like a Christmas gift I had got. I think it was like sophomore year. So I got to go up there and see them and I got to meet John and I was starstruck. He's like how you doing son? I'm like he's like he looks at my mom. He's like he doesn't talk and she's like he talks. He's just he's starstruck. And I was like I'm sorry, sir, he's like he just chuckles. You know, he's like it's all right. You know you need anything else. I'm like no, sir, thank you. He signed my little ticket, I the two tickets signed by him and jordan.

Speaker 2: 23:19

You know, hell yeah, just a blank wall got two tickets up there. You know that's awesome, that's awesome. So. So you've been around it, so it's not like you're, you're a stranger to it. So we answered that question from people. So leave him the fuck alone. He's not not some dude who just jumped on the scene, all right. So, uh, and if you don't worry about if you swear on here, you swear on here, it's okay, we're adults, right, adults right, and that's.

Speaker 2: 23:35

I think that's where Joe hasn't really told me to not fuel the haters, because he knows I'm 45 and like I'm tired of bullshit, so I just don't put up a lot of crap. I just don't, even with something it's weird, especially with the social media stuff Like I'm not triggered until I'm pushed so far, right, like if I see it 30 times and it's the dumbest shit on the planet, I'm probably going to make a comment on it because I'm just tired of seeing it. Like, just shut up, you know, just stop. But that's me, cause I'm old and that's probably why a lot of people don't don't really like me. That's fine.

Speaker 3: 24:08

I keep my circle small for a reason, but uh, I'm so new to the scene, I tried, like you know, like there's so many times I type stuff out and I'm like delete, delete, delete, like no I have same here, same here, dude, it's probably in the thousands already this year and we're just in january that I've done that like type, type, type, type, type.

Speaker 3: 24:26

Delete, yeah, never mind, yeah, no yeah I asked myself I'm like, will I feel better if I say that like no, not really. Like. There's even times like there was early on in the in the search of like the coaching and like different guys hitting the portal I talked about it or I would like try to be the guy like that, Just put a little bit out, not too much, but just a little bit out and then people come to you and you're like you're a liar and I'm like like, like what else can I do? Like show you the conversations between me and this person.

Speaker 3: 24:51

You know gonna do that you know I'm saying yeah, just because you know some guy that's just random, random numbers and no, no post. You know I'm saying just gets on there and argues with people. You know I'm saying like it doesn't. It doesn't mean no service to get in there and argue with those folks.

Speaker 2: 25:05

But it's hard and I've I've said plenty of stuff in the past that I couldn't either back up or or that I, I just blurted it out, I I'll admit to it right now and people can call me for it out on the rug later on. That's fine, but I've done it. You know, I've made the mistakes of like just posting an emotion, like, oh you know, like rage posting, but I've kind of ended that. There's certain things that as I grow up because I mean in my 20s it would have been way worse, but now in my 40s, I'm just bitter, I'm over it I want my kid to be in the next chapter so we can watch the cool college stuff. That's what I want to do. No, for sure, I never really jumped on a college team before.

Speaker 2: 25:45

As far as covering them and things like that, and you and I were kind of talking about numbers before, because I feel like that's part of it. But then kind of listening to other podcasts, kind of like what yours, you know, like what you're doing is. You don't always have to have all the stats, like some people just like to hear about the duel itself, just because either a couldn't watch it or b couldn't be there right. So you're you're basically just kind of doing a kind of doing a play-by-play, because a lot of times either you're there or you watch it right. So it's just kind of a little play-by-play a quick synopsis of the duel and then kind of your thoughts.

Speaker 2: 26:16

Like I said, you and I kind of talk on emotion and how excited we were about someone, or we're kind of down because they didn't get this in a match. You know that kind of thing. So when you're kind of putting yourself in a match or duel, what are specific things that you like to look for when you're watching a duel? Are there? Do you have, like you said, when you do a show? You only have some like quick notes that you just kind of go off of. Are the things you're watching for a duel? You're just taking it all in um.

Speaker 3: 26:47

So this year it's kind of different because, like in the years past, it's not been such like a skeptic like you know, like a skeptical. It's, it's like the fog machine, yeah, it's, it's just so awesome right now. So, like the first couple ones because I have season tickets, which I'm this is my first year being a season ticket holder my, the way I was going into this is I thought this was going to be like, you know, john smith coleman, you know, like the regular cast. You know that was my mindset going into this. And then everything changes and it's like well, I'm still gonna buy season tickets, I still want to be there, like you know, like, yeah, getting david taylor I don't think anybody's mad by that, you know, I'm saying especially with fast forward to now. But yeah, like when I'm there I'm kind of just taking it in, man I'm I'm interacting a lot. I feel like when I'm there is more of my opportunity to uh, like interact with the guys. You know, because, like we're, because I've been getting like some of the 34 club tickets which is like right, where the guys run out, yeah, one of the one of the like people to listen to the pod were like, hey, we can't always make it we'd like for you. You know, if you can't use them, find somebody else that uses them. So I've been able to enjoy that, uh two times now uh, virginia tech duel and then the wyoming duel, so that was really cool.

Speaker 3: 27:51

And yeah, being down there and like seeing the guys do their run-ins and like they're like you're right there, like I'm the first person they see, cause I'm like right in the corner, I'm interacting with David, I'm interacting with Thomas. You know like I'm doing everything I can to just kind of just like hey, and I've been wearing my little single shirt, you know like make sure they know like hey, this is who I am, cause that was a big thing too is like everybody's like oh, people thought I was just different people from all over. Funny story David Taylor's mom thought I was John Smith. She thought John Smith ran the low single page. And David Taylor's dad's like no, there's no way. Like John, don't talk like that. You know what I'm saying. This is obviously before I showed my face and everything like that, but just off the tweets, you know he didn't really think it was me or think it was John.

Speaker 3: 28:36

But yeah, I mean, I'm really just taking everything in, and I mean I still do. There is certain things I do look for, like if I try to get a good picture of, like David one-on-one with one of the guys before they come out. I like to share that kind of stuff because that's the kind of stuff you can't see on TV. If you watch the duel, I can tell you the score. Later I can tell you what I think about it.

Speaker 3: 28:54

I can tell you kind of kind of, when I'm like going through the review in the pod, I'm just kind of like thinking back on the match, like what was that like for me? You know, kind of just put myself back into that where I was and what I was doing during the match, you know. So I'm not so much into my phone, I'm really just taking it all in and enjoying it and just, you know, building those relationships with everybody, the recruits. Sometimes I got to meet all those guys coming in from a court. That was cool. You get to meet a lot of cool people and that's the fun part of this.

Speaker 2: 29:25

It's funny you mention that because last night there was a duel between my son's team and then Nina, which is just down the road from us. It was a high school duel. There's a kid on there that's ranked number eight in the country at 157, I think it is, and then Liam is number 16 at 165, right, and they could have wrestled um, because he'd been this other kid had been wrestling at 175 for duels and then he dropped down to 165 for stuff, right. So there's a guy that ranks and he's like hey, is this gonna go down tonight? I was like I couldn't tell you. I was like I know, liam wrestles 175 regardless, doesn't matter which duel it is, he's not cutting weight, he just wants to relax and kind of, you know, because he wrestled 190 actually that night too is weird. But um, he, he's like, oh, is anybody streaming it? And I said, well, no, unfortunately not this one.

Speaker 2: 30:05

I'm I'm pretty sure our team doesn't necessarily like outside people and it's very penn state-ish when it comes to how open our team is with stuff. Um, it's kind of strange, but I get it. I understand. You know the the concept behind it, so I respect that kind of thing. Um, but um, they. They're asking if someone's streaming it and I said no, not, not this one. They're like, well, that's, that's kind of crazy. He goes I'm surprised someone's not streaming it on their phone.

Speaker 2: 30:31

And I was about to pick my phone up and I was like, ah, dude, like I'm here watching a duel, like I'm not gonna most and that's. And then I'm looking around I'm like that's what everybody else is here doing, like they're here watching, they're, they're taking it. Taking a photo is one thing, but then they sit there and stream like a duel or whatever, or like a match and a duel. So it was just kind of like it's funny that you mentioned that, because taking it in is important, because to me, being at something that's like that is is there's a lot of energy, especially with what you guys have now.

Speaker 2: 30:58

You know the yeah, the, the crowd, the intensity is probably gonna be a little more nowadays than it was back. You know back in the day, in the, you know early 2000s and stuff like that. But what about with? What about when you're? When you're kind of you know in between or whatnot? Are you kind of out in the crowd, kind of talking to people too, like kind of seeing who might be milling around in between a match or something. You know. When you hit 157, you get the break. Are you out kind of talking to people out then too?

Speaker 3: 31:23

yeah, so, uh, we, actually I think we so we take a break, like I think it's after 165, it could be before, I thought it was after, but it's, I don't know. They kind of do a little bit different, uh, but yeah, for sure, I'm, I'm talking, I talking, I'm interacting, I'm like hey, I, you know, I'm Thomas, this is me, you know, let me see, let me see what I can do with you, let me see if we can, cause I have, like some guys that want to do some interviews to some guys on the team, um, but I've told them that I want them to focus on what they're doing, cause I don't know exactly how David feels about all that. Uh, but you know, like I don't want to do something with somebody, and then the next day or that night they get a call from David like hey, you know, and I don't know if he's like that, I honestly don't know. Um, I've had some interactions with him as well. Um, I actually even got him a low single shirt, so that's going to be fun. I can't wait till he pops out with that.

Speaker 3: 32:08

I know people are going to think that's awesome. I can't. I just try to. I try to interact with everybody just put eyes on anybody. You know it was even. The coolest now is that I've, like I said, these guys have only seen my face, you know, consecutively now this whole year, because other than that, I was just sitting up in the crowd. You know when I would come and I just wouldn't interact, I just watch and then leave. Yeah, well, now, like guys will see me and they can spot me in a crowd, you know, and I think that's awesome, you know.

Speaker 3: 32:35

So I do enjoy that, Like if I got any return out of this. It's just you know, just knowing some of the, some more of the athletes, and just you know, having good interactions with them and then friendships with them, is just you know, it's cool, it's definitely.

Speaker 2: 32:48

Yeah, for sure. And you know, and that's been the big thing. I mean, I've interviewed Mark Schultz, I've interviewed gary may have you know all that stuff. And being able to get to know these guys like this is kind of how it started for me. I was at wrestling tournaments with my kid, right, these people would just be there signing stuff, doing whatever you know, things like that, and then you kind of like you and I just having a conversation comedy got me into that I would just start talking to people.

Speaker 2: 33:11

I was talking to dan gable at a tournament one time for like 30 minutes. You know, maybe that's my fault, but he was talking too. He was willing to, willing to go the mile. So I was like, well, this would be interesting, you know, and just kind of talking and getting into it. And then talking to athletes was even more engaging because it was helping me kind of find things out for my kid too. You know, like, how are you doing this, how do you do this? And I get frank jasper, I get shoot on talking to him about nutrition.

Speaker 2: 33:34

So it's really been beneficial, not just for me but also kind of helping, you know, help my kid out, but it's getting more information that I remember as a kid we were not talking about that, we weren't putting in front of parents, you know, and and letting coaches see this kind of stuff.

Speaker 2: 33:48

It's not like I'm teaching coaches anything, but as far as putting something out there that is is, uh, um, well, consumable and and helping people and at the same time, entertaining, right, I mean again the stories and things that you're talking about. I wasn't at an oklahoma state duel, so you're telling me something that I never saw. So that's again, it's. It's really fun to to be able to go down the road and and be able to to follow these through the years and and then go back and be like I wonder what it was like. Because, like I was just talking about 1920 stats from virginia wrestling like holy cow, like I'm gonna, I'm digging in, but with with the oklahoma state gig, when you were you did you live in oklahoma still when, when all this was going down with the coaching change?

Speaker 3: 34:31

no, no, so I've been. Uh, yeah, I've been in kansas the last, like 24, 25 years.

Speaker 2: 34:37

Oh man, that long you didn't say it. I thought it was like somewhere you just moved recently.

Speaker 3: 34:41

No, no, yeah. I went to high school here, everything yeah.

Speaker 2: 34:45

Oh, okay, so where? Where? What town in Kansas?

Speaker 3: 34:49

Uh, in Wichita Okay.

Speaker 2: 34:50

All right, we won't tell your address, that's fine. So you're in wichita. I was actually a funny story for further down the road, but wichita is a nice little town, where. Where did you? Where did you? Did you always watch oklahoma state? Did you take a break? Were you kind of doing other things?

Speaker 3: 35:09

no, always, uh, back then I could only listen to it on the radio, though you know there wasn't all these streaming services and stuff.

Speaker 3: 35:16

Yeah, so I would. You know, I would. Uh, there's a 90, like it's hot, 93.7 or something like that. Rex, he's the Oklahoma state guy, he gets on there and he'll, he would walk, like talk through every dual live and that's how I would listen, like, and I was, um, and obviously like a lot of duels are on Sundays and stuff like that, and I was involved in church and different stuff like that.

Speaker 3: 35:34

Like doing a bus ministry, which is like going to picking up kids and stuff like that, well, I would do that still, I'm still dedicated to my ministry, but I'm like got my headphones in. I'm like in the back of the bus as we're dropping kids off. I'm like, yes, you know, like, cause I've been involved with that since I was young and but yeah, so I always consumed as much as I could A lot of times, especially like NCAAs and stuff like that. Sometimes the finals would air on ESPN or something, but sometimes you'd have to catch them, maybe one in the morning, whenever I could and as much as I could, even if it was the next day. That's how I would consume it as much. But as far as Oklahoma State ones, definitely I would radio. That was my biggest thing just listening to a radio. So I was dedicated, dedicated to listening.

Speaker 2: 36:15

I was dedicating to like, consuming it any way that I could, nice, nice and honestly there's, there's something to be said for that's, I mean, that's loyalty, like I've never been a wisconsin like sports fan, unless it was like my kids are going to school.

Speaker 2: 36:29

I I just never, I've, never. I was never a badger fan. I was never a brewer fan. I was never a packer fan. I was never. I'm a steelers fan. I never a Brewer fan. I was never a Packer fan. I was never. I'm a Steelers fan. I'm a Red Sox fan and I'm a wherever my kids go into college fan.

Speaker 3: 36:42

That's right. I'm a Yankees fan, all right. All right. Thanks. Thanks everybody for coming. That's a wrap.

Speaker 2: 36:51

We'll, we'll, we have to continue that on somewhere. That that'll be fun, because I always, I always like that little rivalry with those guys. But so with what we do we're talking about this, there comes a little bit of a responsibility. Right, we're talking about the whole the osu kind of change, and just real briefly. But you know, david, coming in and in the, in the in the um beginning of all that, there's obviously rumors spreading around, right there's, you know, we know Coleman Scott's get the job. Well, we don't know. Though there's talks about someone else, were you, were you kind of back and forth with people when all that was going on was what, what was their, what was the buzz by you, was it? I mean, obviously you have people that you talk to and we all have our, our, our guys, right. So was there a buzz kind of going around before things started going on the internet about david?

Speaker 3: 37:42

um, no, well, no, it's kind of hard for me to say, because that was kind of me kind of breaking into everything that that's how like quick things have moved. For me is, back then I didn't really have a source or sources. I had like a, I had a couple people, but kind of like they're just kind of feeding me the, the scuttle butt from still water. You know, I'm saying there's okay, this is what we're hearing. This we're hearing. I didn't.

Speaker 3: 38:02

I'm also like on the 34 and counting forum, which is like the oh yeah for message board for oklahoma state and that's kind of where I started hearing and I was like, bro, there's no way like david taylor. I'm like my first question was like david taylor, who You're not talking about? Penn State David Taylor. I'm sitting here questioning myself. I don't remember a David Taylor. It did not even cross my mind that we could really hire somebody outside of the family. It's kind of like a mafia Once you're in, you're in.

Speaker 3: 38:29

You know what I'm saying, like that one meme, it's like you don't ask about family business. So when I first started hearing about that I didn't really know, you know, and like I told you before we started like I was a coleman guy, but that's just because, like not like I dislike david is just all right, we, we keep it in the family. You know, and in my mind you bring a guy over to be the assistant, you just assume, hey, that's. You know, not a lot of head coaches step down without thinking like, oh okay, I okay, I figured in a couple of years and that's another thing I didn't think John was going to retire. That was mind blowing to me. I knew, I knew there might be like. I knew he always wanted to leave the program in a better way.

Speaker 3: 39:09

Like you know, like not 20th at NCAAs or whatever, he wanted to be left in a in a positive way for somebody, so they weren't just taking over just you know what the scraps or whatever. But yeah, I, I totally was a Coleman Scott guy man and I was, I was endorsing that, you know. And then once David became the guy, I just you know, like again, like I said earlier, like it's not like I was like in my room crying. You know, like, oh my gosh, how could, how could we bring in, you know, maybe the possible next best coaching guy. You know, like you're just like okay, like I may not have got the guy that was in the family, but you're not like nobody's going to cry that they got Phil Jackson. You know what I'm saying. Like nobody's mad about that, nobody's mad. So that was a.

Speaker 3: 39:47

It was an interesting time. You know, everybody has their feelings. Um, everybody was like, you know, all of us feel like none of us are Coleman Scott, but we were attached to him. You know, like he was our family. He chose us, we choose you. If you choose us, we're going to always choose you. And that's the, that's the brand, like the loyal and true is not just a saying, you know. That's why, when a guy transfers out not not so much in wrestling, but like a lot of like a football guy transfers out oh man, true, guy transfers to OU we take that to heart, you know it's like your family spitting in your face.

Speaker 3: 40:17

You know that's like. That's like my sister walking in and telling me she wants nothing to do with me. You know I'm like what's going on here? Like no way, you don't do that. But you know that's how it was, like everything was kind of chaos. Everything was kind of at least for me, you know, because I'm like I are like we don't know, you, buddy, we're not telling you nothing. And then you know, but also some people that wouldn't talk to me before now talk to me now because they realize, you know, I can, you know, keep some stuff under wraps or I can, you know, hear something and not not just go out and report it, because that doesn't benefit, you know, that doesn't benefit me in any way yeah, yeah, it's a.

Speaker 2: 40:54

It's funny you mentioned that just because all the stuff, obviously that's kind of swirling around about crookham right now, with um rumors that go, but and here's the thing, though, is that people don't understand that sometimes some people do hear the correct thing, right, like whether you want to believe it or not, whether you like the news or not, is it's irrelevant. It doesn't matter whether you like it or not, if it's something and that's, I think, that's the biggest thing for us is like confirming right, I want to say something, but hold on, I'm gonna ask this guy because I know he'll know and I know this guy will know. Right, I always do that. That's the, that is, first and foremost, the thing that I do, because I'm again, I have a son that's in this, this game, right, I wouldn't want something like that to go down for him, right, but if it was something stupid and he did something wrong, you know, guess what? Then sometimes you pay the price for that shit because it passes around.

Speaker 2: 41:44

That's what happens, yeah, so I was a coleman scott guy as well. I mean, all the way through, even at nc, like I was like he's gonna be, he's gonna be there forever, I was actually kind of telling him. I was like, hey, maybe look North Carolina, you know just kind of see what's going on there, cause we took a visit. Keaton Cleaver was going there and Coleman met Coleman Scott, he got to meet Ramos, stuff like that, and he was probably 14 at the time, I think we were at super 32. And then I was just kind of like, yeah, he's, he should be, he's going to be the next guy, like, but I didn't understand why I left north carolina. That confused me, so I wanted to know a little bit more.

Speaker 2: 42:20

Why wouldn't he be at north carolina, right? So I I got information, but you put information out, and it's not necessarily need to be out there. I think there's guys that could learn lessons from that. You know it, whether it's true or not. Sometimes there's information that shouldn't be out there, but at the same point, though, too, there are guys that are out there that have been putting info out that like that for a long time. They've gotten some stuff right, they've gotten some stuff wrong, and they're not going to stop what they're doing. Like that's just what they do, because we're what we're in a world of clicks and likes, right. We're in a world of getting getting post engagements and things like that, and I think that's why you and I are kind of like we don't want, want, we're not getting paid for this, right. We're doing this because we love doing this kind of thing. We love this, the sport and what it's done for us, and when it's given back to us, just kind of go into a duel and it's exciting, right? It's a different sport. It's not like going to a football game.

Speaker 2: 43:08

So there's a respect factor out there, and I I first and foremost from high school to from youth to high school to college. I respect every athlete that's out there. There's no bout of doubt that I will never, ever, ever, ever take away from any of the athletes that are out there ever. Right, those guys are still figuring life out. While they're athletes, while they're students, they got a lot of shit going on. Some of them are going to make some screw-ups, but they're still kind of, in my eyes, are kids right? They're still figuring it out. For sure, coaches, in my eyes, are a little more open to that kind of scrutinizing stuff, right, because you're an adult. Now, it's a job, it's a business, and business gets in the way sometimes of the reality of what we put out there, right?

Speaker 2: 43:45

So I think sometimes, in with what you're putting out, like again, it's emotion, you went to a duel. You're like man, I really liked this guy. I would have liked to see him, you know when, but he kind of did this him you know when, but he kind of did this. You're basing it off of facts because you saw something. Right now, all this stuff that kind of whirls around when it comes to guys moving and going to different schools. It's not, it's not hard to screw that up, but it's.

Speaker 2: 44:06

Also. I think it's a little bit easier to just be like okay, whatever kind of blow it off, right, because I think a lot of people take to that they're obviously with mr minio. There are a lot of people already commenting being mean to him. You know that kind of thing and I think I fell into that trap too when it was someone that you cared about or like that, you know, like an athlete or coach or something that you kind of cared about like you. It was one of your favorites and I'll see you see him talking shit about him like hey man, how do you know that kind of thing? Yeah, he does.

Speaker 3: 44:33

Maybe he heard something, maybe someone heard something that you didn't hear, you know well, that's the thing everybody like tried to get so mad at him because he was one of the first people to talk about david coming to oklahoma state. Sure, he was one of the first people and flow, flow went on there and cp he's like blown it up I know david, he's not going, as of last night he's not going, and then guess what happens.

Speaker 3: 44:55

so here's my running rule is if Flo goes out of their way to discredit it, there's some truth to it, probably true. That's my personal opinion, because again Christian sat on there like he was all confident and he's like no, David's not going there.

Speaker 3: 45:11

He's not. Ben's like oh, I'm going to. You know, ben Askren tweeted like, oh, I'm going to call out, I'm going to. You know Ben Askren tweeted like, oh, I'm going to call out, I'm going to say that he is going. And you know, cp's like retweeting that, like, no, he's not going to go. He's not going to go. He's like making a singular video, like breaking down everything because he wanted to be the guy like hey, I know more than you. And he's like they met with David. David doesn't want to go this morning. He's like, oh, they must have upped their offer and did this, and I'm not saying that didn't happen, but that that's just one thing I always think of they, they like to they.

Speaker 3: 45:40

They literally told us that david was not coming. He christian said that and they everybody crucified pat for that. But that, that one like I said so.

Speaker 3: 45:51

So when flow goes out of their way to discredit it, I I tend to lean that it's true, hopefully you know, hopefully crookham can come back, but uh, hopefully, from what I yeah, from what it sounds like it may not be so and who knows, maybe they're, maybe they're trying to get you know like how you go see one doctor and you're like okay, well, you seen your doctor, come see our doctor. It may be a situation like that.

Speaker 2: 46:12

I don't really know, but so you know, I'm finding it kind of, though. There's been a couple guys now that they're foregoing the season, so I'm wondering if this has anything to do with this new fifth year that guys are allowed to get. I don't know all NCAA rules, so I'm going to pause and just say, look, I don't know all the rules, but would they be able to redshirt this year and come back and get that extra year because of that new rule?

Speaker 3: 46:38

Well, I don't so, from what I understand. Again, like you, I don't know a hundred percent. That's more like in the weeds type stuff. But from what I understand is that's not a thing yet, because even some of the Juco stuff even though they're like moving forward with that, I don't know if that's like taking place this season actually go in place.

Speaker 2: 46:54

Yeah, I'm talking next season so like if they, if they're putting everything on their season on pause to reinstate for the next year, does that? I mean I'm? That's why I was just looking. I was like why are all these guys like really good guys, yeah, like guys who are potentially going to be all americans maybe when it like are forfeiting they're not forfeiting but they're they're red shirting or whatever going out for the year like what the hell's going on here? Maybe injuries, maybe a little beat up. You know, obviously we don't know the whole story. You know someone might be saying just need to take a break, kind of thing, and that's their story. But just seems weird that this new rule came out.

Speaker 3: 47:25

I was like a minute is there something wrong with this and with the med shirt you can wrestle half the season. And then now, if you don't wrestle into january, even if you do wrestle a little bit into January, it's kind of just so much in the air. So it's like you could wrestle half a season and it technically doesn't count against you, because if you're hurt.

Speaker 3: 47:44

Now obviously I don't think anybody's wrestling half a season and they're like you know what, if you're good like Kirkham, I don't see Kirkham like you know what, because he's pretty much the favorite to win 133.

Speaker 3: 47:54

Correct the favorite to win 133 correct. So I don't see any where where it benefits him to be like. You know what? I think I need another year in my road under my belt, you know so. But it is very interesting, the five years could be a possibility. The ncaa is going to do whatever they can to keep hold of these kids and make the most money they can, because you know like when they, when they made those rules, they weren't thinking about wrestling, they were thinking about football absolutely not.

Speaker 3: 48:13

You know shit about wrestling dude absolutely not if they could have had five playing years of joe burrow, they would have. You know what I mean.

Speaker 2: 48:20

So yeah, there's probably those little hidden schools that are out. There's probably a couple bigger schools too that actually have like an ad. That loves wrestling, that is familiar with wrestling, that knows they want to keep it around. But this whole you know we'll dive into it that whole ncaa thing that's going on, man. Like we're going to be looking at possible cuts. They're looking at trying to make these kids like employees of the school. You know how bad that's going to be. Someone was talking about unions and shit too. Like there's absolutely no freaking way Get out of here.

Speaker 3: 48:49

Well, because right now the universities are at the loss because a kid can literally you could tell a kid, you could punish a kid, like hey, man, you can't be doing that that kid could show up to whoever's door, show up to the school, and they can be enrolled, or you know, like that's the thing. So I think they want to have some kind of the ncaa. For so long had a leverage over kids, especially with, like how it used to be, where if you transferred, you had to sit out a year. Well, nobody wants to do that, nobody wants to do that, you know.

Speaker 3: 49:18

Yeah, but if there's an pop like you can literally like I could wrestle here first semester and then I could just like you know what I'm done with this, and I could just show up in norman and it's like, oh, I paid my own fees and I go here now. It's like, okay, you paid your own fees and you go here now. Okay, you know, but nobody can say anything and nobody can call it out. But now they're wanting to put it back on the kids and yeah, now they want to lock them into contracts and stuff like that yeah, it's crazy, it's not called national letter of intent anymore.

Speaker 2: 49:45

You know they changed the name of it, can't? Everything's changing before my kid gets into college and it's probably still going to change even more before that. Like I, I get that there. There needed to be some stability. We can all think johnny manziel for this, by the way, just so everybody's aware of this.

Speaker 2: 50:01

This whole nil thing is because some dirty football player. So these kids, these kids are kind of getting cornered into a spot. I mean, that's why liam made the decision he made, based off of him liking the school. But we also had some urgency, you know, with the roster cuts and and stuff like that, because you just don't know, you know who's going to be there. Like looking at 165 of virginia, yeah, there's a bunch of kids there, but fingers crossed once those, those cuts come down, that they're still gonna want them there. You know that, that kind of thing.

Speaker 2: 50:30

So it was kind of a scary situation, just kind of knowing that there wasn't really time to like over, evaluate, youvaluate, you know, to kind of figure out where to go. And I can only imagine someone who doesn't know what the hell is going on in the scope of things, because we're we're asking, literally asking these coaches, hey, do you know what's going on with? You know with the school and, and you know, possibly talking just in cause, at that point it was just talks about getting rid of any sports or how wrestling is going to get treated. You guys gonna lose scholarships. They're like, what are you talking about? Like what? Yeah, they don't even know. You guys don't know this shit.

Speaker 2: 51:05

And I was talking to a couple other guys and they're just like, yeah, the athletic directors, like that's the like. Last thing they do is tell those guys stuff, like as it's about to hit the floor, like they don't let them know ahead of time about anything. I'm like you gotta be kidding me. And then I become a soccer coach and I see it all. I'm just like we are told nothing. We're literally the last ones to find out stuff.

Speaker 2: 51:25

So, talking to these coaches and I'm seeing the reactions on their faces and I'm like this is crazy. Like we're making a decision that they don't even know that we have to make, so that, like they're they're planning of how they want to do things is probably thrown off now because of whatever the you know the school needs to do. So it's just a. It's a very precarious time to be able to, as a kid, to be coming into college sports, because I think everybody's going to be expecting a million dollar payoff and I think once the future shows up, it's not going to be happening anymore, you know yeah, I think that's the biggest thing, like you're saying, everybody thinks and that's that's real tough is?

Speaker 3: 51:59

I don't know if you see many uh, like other sports stuff, but there's a the coach, for I believe it's ucla, a basketball coach yeah he's just so fed up with his players that he came out.

Speaker 3: 52:09

He's like, yeah, he goes, these kids, they all think that they're worth all this money he goes and they don't got the talent for all this money.

Speaker 3: 52:15

He was like and that's what's crazy. And that's what's hard is because, like, you have to tell a kid that and it's like you know what, I don't want to kill the kids, the dreams. But at the same time you know you got a kid that maybe placed a couple of times, like maybe maybe you placed all four years in state, not never, never won it, but you placed. And then school really wants you and it's like, okay, well, I want 150 000. They're like, okay, well, hold on. You know. Like, well, hold on. I'm not saying we know. Like we believe in our system, we believe in pushing, we believe that we can get you to where you need to go. But yeah, then the next year you ask for 250 000 and like that's just not realistic. Like some of these guys, not so much in wrestling, but like these football guys some of those guys are like it's more lucrative to stay in college than it is to go and play in the NFL.

Speaker 3: 53:00

Like there's guys making more money Like Shador Sanders don't quote me on it, but I'm confident he makes more money than, like, say, brock Purdy, who was like a fifth, who was like seventh round pick, missed the last pick. You know what I mean and that's crazy. And that's crazy because he's a starting quarterback. Now he may not start for every nfl team, but he's a starting quarterback in the nfl yep, and you got deon sanders, son, who's making a lot of more money than him, and that dude is playing a super bowl. I played in the super bowl, you know that's just crazy.

Speaker 2: 53:28

He broke records like broke records, dude, yeah. So I think, with a lot, of, a lot of what is is in college wrestling and the excitement that's going on now, I feel like we came to a peak. And it almost feels like now, with this NCAA stuff, do we want to keep popping circumstance or do we just want to get back to dirty, gritty wrestling again and not worry about all the fancy shit Because it costs a lot of money? Right, and let's face it, wrestling doesn't bring in money. Wrestling brings in top. I think the top schools are like around a mil or two we don't do any favors no, no, correct, correct.

Speaker 2: 54:08

And we're talking penn state. We're like, we're talking one of the top teams in the country doesn't bring in that much money. That's not their fault. We're just a small sport, right, like we feel, like it's huge because we're surrounded by it like we, we put it around us all the time. But in the grand scheme of things we're very small chasm and we're going to be looked at like an anthill when everything comes down to, down to um, the dollars and cents. And that's why, hopefully, hopefully we do.

Speaker 2: 54:32

And there there are quite a few, a few different athletic directors I've seen making the argument Like we need to look at this because we don't want to, we don't want to be getting rid of these sports, we don't want to have to drop. You know sports, especially the Olympic sports, things like that. So it's not like everybody out there, every AD out there, is like against wrestling, but it's a business. Again, ncaa is a business, college sports is a business. You have to pay bills in college and you have to justify things. Virginia just built a brand new beautiful facility out there. I mean awesome. So I'm assuming that's not going anywhere. You know like they just invested in that much money in it. So I'm really, really positive that they're not going to go anywhere with it.

Speaker 2: 55:11

No, I can't say the same for, like I don't know, like a Purdue or you know things like that. That does it justify a football team paying for that? Because that's what it is. It's these football teams and basketball teams that really pay the bills, because, I mean, let's face it, that's those are the big, the big time sports. So with, with that being said, with Oklahoma being such a wrestling you know, wrestling school, wrestling state, oklahoma state is what do you think? Have you guys heard any kind of grumblings around Oklahoma ever about man? We hope this doesn't come down the pipe because we think wrestling could go away, given your history, right, yeah, have you guys heard anything like that around your area?

Speaker 3: 55:51

Not really as you were. Like explaining it. I was kind of thinking like I never thought about this before. But like I was kind of thinking I never thought about this before, but I'm kind of spoiled being an Oklahoma State fan. You're kind of spoiled because I don't see a world where there's not wrestling at Oklahoma State. Now, obviously things change, but I just think that even if it became because I heard that people fear that one day this all may just be a club thing. Everybody just does clubs. There's no official team. But even if there was, even if that was like what happens to the whole all of college wrestling Oklahoma State would be in a lot better situations than I mean, 95 percent of everybody else, because people love wrestling and we have a good AD too.

Speaker 3: 56:34

Everybody was kind of mad at him. You know I got to see him at the Virginia Tech tech one and I went over and I was like hey, I was like I'm the low single guy he goes oh, I know who you are. And I was like, okay, well, that, thank you, that means a lot. And, uh, I'm like you know, I was like hey, I was like I know you took a lot of flack for bringing in david. I said I know people didn't necessarily like again, it was never. It was never against david, it's just that, yeah, we don't hire outside the family, especially after 33 years of john smith. Yeah, no shit, right, you know, like so especially.

Speaker 3: 57:02

And then, like I said, everybody had the same assumption that I did. Oh, coleman's stepping down from nc and coming here, oh well, he must be getting the job in a couple years or a year or whatever. It may be right, but rad cares about wrestling. Um, he went to oklahoma state, you know. He apparently had a really good relationship with John and that helps, you know, when you have a sure. I think if it wasn't for John Smith, I don't know what wrestling in Oklahoma would look like. He's like an icon man everywhere. I mean obviously everywhere in the United States, even outside the United States he's an icon. But in.

Speaker 3: 57:36

Oklahoma man. He, he's, he's the bee's knees, as I like to say you know what I'm saying Like he, he's the milk and the honey, you know what I mean. And like he has time for everybody. I don't know one person that's ever been like big time by him, like oh, he doesn't have time for you. So many times, Like when I'd see him, he's like how's the family? Like that's crazy. Like you don't even know my family but you're asking like you know it's. You know, like so I think he really set a precedent in all of the state.

Speaker 3: 58:09

But, yeah, we're definitely lucky, because I don't ever see, especially now. I mean, even before I didn't see it ever happening, but now it's like even getting more attention and people are wanting to be in Stillwater. As you see, we're having MMA guys come in here, ufc guys. We got Joey McKenna training this weekend. I don't know how long he's staying, but he's here for a bit. Like that's huge man. And I'm not saying that the old stuff didn't have guys coming in, but you know it wasn't quite like this. You know guys coming in, but it wasn't quite like this. I don't remember us just bringing in a UFC guy that doesn't even have any connections. He's never went to Oklahoma State, that guy's never been.

Speaker 2: 58:45

That's where you have Penn State in your room. Now you guys are Penn Oklahoma State, that's exactly where you guys are.

Speaker 3: 58:52

No, sir, I'll take that Boston Red Sox talk, but I will not take that. Okay, just like David said, we are not trying to be the second Penn State. We are trying to remind people who we are here.

Speaker 2: 59:09

So that's it. Yeah, kaukauna State. But it's funny you mention that, because how do you remove so much of what penn state history david has with himself, like just the, the training, the competition, the, the way things were in the room, like they only play one song, one song in that room, all practice. They don't change the music.

Speaker 3: 59:37

Oh, really, I didn't know that.

Speaker 2: 59:39

Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm curious to see, like if he brought that to that room, you got to pen Oklahoma State room.

Speaker 3: 59:46

No, he's bringing, he's the magic man, right, he's bringing magic From my experience they get to some of it, like when I got to go into one practice and some of the guys got to uh got to pick the music, so maybe that's something I don't know, maybe different, maybe he didn't like the one song theory.

Speaker 2: 1:00:01

I would have been annoyed by it as well.

Speaker 3: 1:00:03

I'm not gonna lie, I'm not a one song guy only one song we allow to be played on repeat is friends in low places. Garth brooks, okay. Another oklahoma state alumni, okay don't.

Speaker 2: 1:00:14

don't make me pull out my country line dance and my texasstep shit, because I did that when I was a kid. I got forced to do that stuff, man, it was scary.

Speaker 3: 1:00:21

Oh yeah, me too.

Speaker 2: 1:00:23

Back in the 1900s, you know, yeah, I can say that now, back in the 1900s. That's crazy. So when you go like now, kind of going forward, what kind of plans do you have to like I mean, obviously you're just kind of getting used to the podcast thing and kind of doing that Do you have plans to expand, to kind of do more Like what are some of your ideas that you have for the future?

Speaker 3: 1:00:49

I'm glad you asked. I really we didn't. We didn't even set this up, but I'm so glad you asked. So I actually have been working on quite a bit now. Obviously, joe did the did the website. Yep.

Speaker 3: 1:01:00

He's so cool, he literally hit me up. It's like hey man. He's like do you have a website? And I was like, no. I was like, and be honest with you, joe, I was like, even if I did, I wouldn't know what to do with it. He's like all right, give me a second. I'm like okay, I'm thinking he's gonna like tell me how to do it, you know yeah okay, send me, send me some.

Speaker 3: 1:01:15

You know, tell me like he's like, if I wasn't a listener, how would you explain the pod to me? You know? So I did, typed it all out in paragraph. He's all right, cool. Literally in 14 minutes he sends me a link. Like here you go, man, and I'm like what is this? I'm like, okay, I click it open, it's a whole thing and I'm like, I'm like literally like flabbergasted, like no way, like and he's like and I'm like dude.

Speaker 3: 1:01:38

Thank you so much. Like I've probably thanked him like a million times just in the few days that it's been live. He's like dude. I literally do that all day. It took me 15 minutes. I'm like okay, but I couldn't do that in 15 days. I am not tech savvy like that. Like I said, my mic didn't work and it's because I didn't press a button on the computer.

Speaker 3: 1:02:01

That shit happens, man, even on the 30, I have an don't. I like things just the way I like them. I don't like to go out of my comfort zone, but as far as like things I have coming, I'm working on doing a few different things. So I'm going to be doing kind of like similar to. I've been talking to a lot of podcast guys Bash, justin Bash. He kind of like gave me some guidance of like different things, like graphics, because I've noticed that, like if I put a tweet out, I could put a tweet out that says date and fix wins via tech fall and that's going to get some good traction. It's going to get 36 likes, something like that. But if I put a graphic with it, even if it's just a simple picture that I just grabbed off the Internet, it gets more traction because it's visually appealing to them. So I've noticed that, so he's given me that, so I actually have that. I actually did that last night. I've we've been real bad snow here, like six to eight inches, so we haven't been, obviously because I do pest control, so I can't really get out and work much this week yeah, pests don't really go around much in the snow either, so you're good yeah, yeah, exactly yeah ain't much spiders and stuff outside, you know the big reset button really

Speaker 3: 1:03:11

so I got the graphics. Um, I got that up and running. I literally just will have to. I got everything ready for that. I'll literally just have to add whatever the writing may be like whoever wins, how they won and then I'll add a picture to it. So I'm really excited for that to be happening. The first time I'll probably get to use that is when Dayton and Zahid go to Croatia at the beginning of February for that ranking tournament.

Speaker 2: 1:03:33

Was that Zagreb or something like that?

Speaker 3: 1:03:35

I think so. Yeah, I think so. Zagreb, yeah, nice. So I'm looking forward to dropping that. And then I've also been working on apparel shirts, sweat shirts. I already shout out to Joe again. I was asking him like, hey man, like what do you think the best way to do this is? And he's like don't go buy shirts in bulk. And I'm like OK, I had a buddy, I had a buddy KP. He told me the same thing. He's like I did it for work. He's like, and it just backfired on me, he's like now you're gonna be doing it, like you know, for people. And he's like you'll get weird sizes and that's what joe told me too, you'll get. You'll get like you'll run out of the what you need and you'll have just a whole bunch of surplus of what you don't need. And I was like okay, that makes sense yeah.

Speaker 3: 1:04:14

So I got that. Um, I actually gonna be ordering one of the shirts because, like, once you set it up, they'll send you sample shirts, because the one place I was doing it here it was going to be hard, especially if you don't go to the actual duels for anybody out of the state. I didn't really know how I was going to continually be able to send it out to them. Obviously, I can go to UPS or whatever every day, but that can be difficult if I get a bigger request form than I anticipate. So I got that going. That should be dropping. I don't know if it's going to be this month or not. I'm kind of like, cause I'm I'm kind of feeling that situation out, but I'm looking forward to doing that. And then the YouTube is still a possibility, like doing this right here.

Speaker 3: 1:04:55

This helps, I'm going to be doing that, that Oklahoma state podcast, this all sports one. I'll be doing that one tomorrow. So these opportunities help me, help me get more comfortable with it, to help me kind of fill the process out. So really it's endless. I mean I want to do interviews. I mean eventually I would like to get David on here. That's a big ask, I know, but you know, I mean I've already started the connection with him. You know what I mean. And going back real quick to what you said about the Penn, like being Penn State in Oklahoma State, if you'd have told me a few years ago, hey, john Smith's going to retire, I probably would have laughed because that's the only coach I've ever known. And then, second, I would have said, okay, well, who's the coach? And you would have said, oh, a Penn State and an Iowa Hawkeye.

Speaker 2: 1:05:34

I would have said, okay, as soon as Gilbert went to Penn State, I wrote him off. I wrote him off, he went to Penn State. I was like you're dead to me, you are dead. That's the fun part.

Speaker 3: 1:05:49

We have fun with that right, the day he got announced, everybody dropped that one video of him. They're like what are you doing? He's like you don't turn your back to these guys.

Speaker 2: 1:05:58

Yeah, yeah yeah, I'll sit sideways. You never know, they might come behind you and try to take out your legs or something you don't know. This dude's crazy. He's right there on live camera.

Speaker 3: 1:06:07

They're going to take your knees out, but he's such a cool guy. That's another one of those guys that I got to see him at the tailgate, but he was holding his baby and I'm super respectful.

Speaker 3: 1:06:19

I have young children my daughters are four and two and so I did not approach him. I did not. Later on, at the tailgate he came by again. I was like hey, I was like I wanted to talk to you earlier. I was like but you had your daughter, you know, I was like I didn't want to, you know, invade your guys' private space. And he's like hey, he's like hey, thank you for that. And I was like not a problem, you know, I just wanted to myself. I'm the low single. Everybody like chin drops, like you're the low single.

Speaker 3: 1:06:43

Because for the longest time I think people thought I was like a burner account. I had somebody message me like I know you're chris perry. I'm like bro, what? Like yeah, no, not chris perry. Like what? Because even sometimes I was like dropping. I was saying things like when christian carroll first hit the portal, I was like oh, sounds like he's gonna go to iowa state. That was the one thing I kind of hinted at earlier, that like I said that that christian carroll was gonna go to like soon as he hit the portal. I said that because that was, that was what I was told. Okay, he's probably gonna go there because they want to have chris perry over there. I dropped that. Bro. So many people like you're a liar. Don't bad mouth.

Speaker 2: 1:07:18

You know like good and that's the other thing too, like when you know that you have correct information, don't let someone else bully you into telling you that it's wrong. Right, yeah, it's, because they either a they didn't come out with it first, or, b they think it's disrespectful that a lot of times there is certain information you shouldn't come out with, but 19 out of 10, when someone's just transferring, unless you're saying they're transferring because there's not enough cocaine at the university, I mean that's, that's an idiotic statement, right. But if you're saying he's transferring, I think he's, I think he's going here. Dude, that's reckless. Shut up. Take your comment somewhere else. I was just saying I was speculating. He's going somewhere.

Speaker 2: 1:07:55

Yeah, so many people, and this is the thing. So I got into it. The little thing that I and this is wasn't about saying someone was something, but like aaron rogers was all over the internet. It was just replays of him throwing bombs right like just throwing hail marys to end zones. Everybody's like, oh, aaron rogers, the greatest quarterback on the planet, and I'm like, hey, what about the receiver catching it in the end zone? What about that dude that just jumped up three feet in the air around another seven other guys?

Speaker 2: 1:08:21

and caught the ball. What are you saying? Aaron's not, not, not a good enough quarterback. I'm like, no, I'm not saying that. Well, because I didn't play in the nfl. Now I can't make a comment about people just dropping their jaw over aaron rogers, get out of here. I played semi-pro soccer, so that to me that's enough. I can, I can piss and moan about all the shit I want, but because you say something that they didn't like or they thought was disrespectful but you know is true, because you confirm, I ignore those people just and just like you've been doing, completely ignore them. Because they're just upset because someone said something that they didn't like or that they wouldn't have said I'm not, you piss off, go over there and do your thing. That's great. And again, it was, it was, it was something like it, like you. Oh, I think he's going here. Harm, where's the harm? Calm?

Speaker 3: 1:09:04

down. Yeah, there was no harm, no folks. He went into the portal like he was allowed to. You know what I'm saying there was nothing sketchy about it.

Speaker 3: 1:09:12

I didn't say, hey, they tampered him. I just said, hey, sounds like he's going there with a former coach. And then even some people jumped on there was like how dare you say he's leaving with coleman? I'm like, well, that's not the coach I'm even talking about. But okay, like again, I'm not arguing with you, I just I put it out there, you consume it, you chew it up, you, you, you know you have it, you, you take it however you want to take it. But there was not, like you said, nothing malicious, just saying, hey, this is what I'm hearing. Like I said this that page is for the people, by the people. I'm not going to post anything that's going to harm anybody, but saying, hey, he sounds like he's going here with this guy, that didn't harm nobody at all Calm down.

Speaker 2: 1:09:47

Calm down, man. So you got some good stuff coming up in the future, man, yeah, I know that there's obviously always going to be a lot of stuff going in, obviously during the season, but do you plan on doing any? Are you going to talk about guys in the offseason too, when they're wrestling that, because you're talking about zag grab things like that? So you're going to continue that coverage kind of in the offseason too?

Speaker 3: 1:10:08

yeah, I actually really hope I can really dive into some more of the stuff that I want to do during the offseason um, like interviews and stuff with some of the guys, because I've had some guys reach out I've reached out to some guys too and, um, they want to do stuff but, like I was telling you before, I kind of want to do stuff but, like I was telling you before, I kind of want to keep the season. One of my favorite sayings is keeping the main thing, the main thing. So, the main thing for them right now is season. I don't want to get them on. I don't want them to say anything that they shouldn't say you know, or this or that. I want to keep it somewhere where they can feel safe. But they can also come on here and just shoot the shit and we're just sitting here talking you know what I'm saying. Like I may have somebody from the team on, but we may sit there and talk for an hour about, you know, a hobby that we both had, that we just, you know, found out during that episode. So I'm definitely looking forward to like branching out and doing some more stuff with the team. Um, hopefully, obviously, this is all just my what I'm aspiring.

Speaker 3: 1:11:00

Uh, like I said, I'd hope to eventually have David on here. I'd like to have all the coaches on here. I mean, I have some pretty good conversations or interactions with some guys, like David's cameraman, cameraman Dan. He's so cool, he's probably one of the coolest dudes. When I first told him, when I met him, and I'm like, hey, I'm the low single, his chin like dropped, he's like no way. And I was like I was like yeah, bro, so he's like one of my favorite guys. I didn't know him before. Obviously he's one of my favorite guys. I'd like to have gilman on. Obviously we share a name. We're both named comments.

Speaker 3: 1:11:31

So that's a we're brothers, brothers from another mother. He don't even know it. Yeah, even though he's a hot guy, we'll take it yeah but, like pierce, all I really enjoy him.

Speaker 3: 1:11:41

He's been been good to me. You know, if he sees me he'll talk to me. He always shake my hand, even some guys in the office. You know, if I could get somebody from the office I got a couple of buddies in the office over there. If I could get them on there, I'd like to have the AD. You know, like I want to do stuff that's like Dynasty Defined.

Speaker 3: 1:12:04

He has his thing. I'd like to. I'd like for us to coexist in the same thing, but we offer completely different, uh, content. So that's what I'm kind of like really working on. Like I was doing like the, the matches and stuff, but like that's really his thing. So I was like, well, I'll just let him keep doing that, let him have that. You know we'll not let him have it, but he's already doing it, he's already been doing it, so just let that continue to be like that. And I'm just trying to find my way through this. So, yeah, the possibilities are kind of endless for me. You know, like, hopefully by the summertime or like by the off season time. I mean I'm doing like YouTubes. I would love to be on YouTube running full time on there, I still want to do podcasts, like obviously I can upload the audio and stuff like that but, I really want to get on YouTube.

Speaker 3: 1:12:41

I really do Cause, like, right now, this is this. I like this man. I really want to get on YouTube. I really do Cause, like, right now, this is this. I like this man, I like plugging in, but I like to like, during the season, I want to like possibly keep it to just me Now, obviously, obviously things can change, but I have like some buddies that want to get on and I'm always down for that. Maybe like for a big episode, for like big 12 or something like that. I can get us all together. But it's really hard to get everybody, like right now, even correlate and, like me and you set in time to do it was a little bit more difficult for me, I mean, it's difficult for everybody. So, like, having four of us was even more difficult.

Speaker 2: 1:13:10

But I'm trying to do referees, referees round table together and that's like four or five different referees. Impossible, dude Impossible.

Speaker 3: 1:13:18

Yeah. So that's one thing is like I've had people suggest that like why don't you have somebody on with you? And I'm like, well, but then I got to work around somebody else's schedule too and sometimes it doesn't all line up. And then sometimes you get somebody who's like, oh yeah, I want to be a part of this. But then they realize hey, either A, they don't have the passion for it to do it week by week's room. Shut the door. Tell my kids like, hey, give me 40 minutes, please Give me 40 minutes. Tell my youngest, please don't bully your older sister, because my kids, bro, they're big into wrestling. Both my kids will say like bottom end set. If I say bottom end set, they'll say top man cover and wrestle. My youngest will wrestle her Ninja Turtles, anything she's got Like my youngest will wrestle her ninja turtles, anything she's got. Like my youngest she's like into like all the boy stuff, dinosaurs, but anything. It doesn't matter if she's got any two anythings, even if it's like two cups, she's wrestling them. So I'm excited for their, for their future, and I and you know like that's another thing too is like I want to have, uh, this is like a little bit, a little bit of breaking, but I'm gonna eventually have, like the women's uh club coach, the head coach, uh Isaac, who obviously wrestled for us last year. I'm going to have him on one of these shows here soon too, because I want him to explain everything that's cowgirl wrestling, because it may be a club, but with the right sponsorship and the right support it can be successful. Or at least you know just like, continue to have support.

Speaker 3: 1:14:46

In 10 years, when it's time for my girls to go, where am I? I'm not sending them to Iowa. I'll tell you that now, mike. Let me tell you right now. My daughters better never tell me like, yeah, I want to wrestle for Iowa. This is not in this house, not in this house. So you can go be a mountain hawk. We can go to Lehigh. We can figure something out like that. We don't speak like that. That is blasphemy. We don't do that in this house.

Speaker 2: 1:15:14

Go with soap right now, wash yourself.

Speaker 3: 1:15:18

Dad, I want to go to Iowa. Honey, get your kid, that is your kid. Get that girl.

Speaker 2: 1:15:25

Wash her mouth out with soap, like we ain't doing that you're walking to school from now on, that's it walking, I get it, I get it. You know, that's funny, you, you mentioned that because I mean I obviously liam was around iowa wrestling like forever, right, forever. I mean that's all my. My podcast logo is black and gold, dirt to dirt, right. Yeah, don't worry, I changed it. I just haven't changed this one yet, but uh, the the the thing was, you know, I, I was like my kid's gonna be a hawkeye, right, I can't wait for my kid to go to college. It's gonna be a hawkeye. Yeah, you can even take a visit. You didn't even go on the visit.

Speaker 2: 1:16:01

He got through. He got through north dakota state, indiana, and we went to virginia. As soon as he left virginia, he's like I'm not even making the iowa trip, I'm going here like dude, you're making the iowa trip. He goes. I don't want to, he's like. He's like this is perfectly, this is like perfect, like it's not. He doesn't want to be in the cold. That's the problem with him.

Speaker 2: 1:16:19

I was like like, okay, cool, I get it. So you find whatever you like I'm going to be a fan of wherever you go, right, I don't care where it is. But then I realized that the Paulson's, the Paulson twins, the Paulson brothers, were there. I was like, whoa, wait a minute, we got Iowa history here, iowa state nonetheless. But Iowa history here, I was like, was like, oh, forget about. It sold as soon as we started talking to trent. It was like game over, game over. The midwest mentality was there? All that stuff? It was just like being, it was.

Speaker 2: 1:16:50

I told liam. I was like if there's anybody that's for you, it's trent paulson. The rest of the guys are great, right, I love ian parker, all those guys. But like I was not expecting to be switching over to blue and orange, that's for sure. At least there's some orange in it where I can get a little bit of kakana left in it. Yeah, yeah, you know. No, no, oklahoma state, none of that. No, it's cavaliers, strictly cavaliers. So I think that would be kind of fun if you and I because it's acc and you and I kind of and you're big 12 we kind of get on once in a while. Can I talk some trash about everybody that's got stuff going on kind of back and forth and have some fun with it, but I think that's the best thing that all this brings right what you're doing. You are obviously we have the brain here. Let me explain to you. If you haven't yet, you can go listen, especially if you want to listen about Kellum Wolbert, your future opening state guy that's my guy.

Speaker 3: 1:17:39

Shout out to him and his pops.

Speaker 2: 1:17:41

That's right. We just saw those guys at the cheese sack Good, good people and um Wisconsin wrestler podcast. Now, those guys are brains. Those guys, they know every sectional, they know everything. There are so many teams in this fucking state, dude. There's certain ones that I'd never even heard of. These guys know all of it. So if you want Wisconsin wrestling like, we got the numbers guys here too.

Speaker 2: 1:18:04

Like these guys are off the charts. Unfortunately, wisconsin grappler only does podcasts with me. He doesn't do his own. He's not tech savvy, right, he's not tech savvy. But we're bringing all this cool shit to the table. We're bringing all this stuff that you can consume. You can listen to it's information, or it's, or it's information or it's or it's just a, a, a synopsis of a duel thing, things like that. So I commend you for jumping on dude. I think it's. I think it's a good time to be in wrestling. We need to enjoy it while we can, and I'll keep saying it until I'm dead Stop subscribing and start showing up. Go to the duels. I don't care if it's down the road. I have been, I I've been, I've lied and I've been bad and I haven't gone to just, you know, like the UW Oshkosh ones, they usually have some pretty good duels. I go, please, please, people If there's any, if any of you Oklahoma state people are listening to go to every duel that you can.

Speaker 3: 1:18:54

For sure.

Speaker 2: 1:18:54

If you can, please go to Oklahoma. Please help everybody. Just help everybody. Show up to a duel, pay the fee to get in, I don't care what it is, stop subscribing and start going. If you can't get there, obviously subscribe and watch, that way you can enjoy it. But get to these places, start showing up like he's doing. Go, go up and watch, be there, be the, be the fan. You don't have to be a fanatic, just go to enjoy it. Take your kids there, cause guess what going to remember that shit? Yeah, they're definitely going to remember that.

Speaker 3: 1:19:21

For sure that's how it was for me, my mom, when my mom made it a way for me to go, like my mom was a single mom just raising me and my sister, you know, and when she made it a way for me to go, when she, when she put, like, without that, without that, who knows if I'm even an Oklahoma state fan, you know, for for life, or if I'm still, you know, I mean Oklahoma State. So it's kind of hard to say that, but you know, like without her making that way for me to go, you know, watching it on TV is one thing, but being there, because that was a bedlam duel, so it was, it was electric, you know, like that place was packed, I mean because we were a pretty good team. Then, you know, because we had, we had quite a few guys. I mean, of course we had Jordan, but we had some other guys. I mean I believe Chris Perry was still there at that time wrestling. So, like you know, we had some guys that were competing, I think.

Speaker 3: 1:20:07

So I can't remember exactly. Jordan was my favorite, obviously, because like I'm mixed, so like he looked like me, you know. So like I see all these guys Like Jared Russell, I mean, I can't remember, but because there's two of the three of the brothers went there, but the one that was the heavyweight, he like he was kind of he's like big country boy and I'm like, ok, yeah, that looks like my uncles. And I'm like, oh, jordan Oliver, ok, he looks like me. You know, that's that's who I connected with. You know what I'm saying. So, yeah, not going to be able to make it out. Like I said, roads are pretty bad here. I go two hours for every duel, so I drive two hours when I go to the home duels. Holy shit, dude. Yeah, I know, I think that's a little bit too why David was like, dude, you make that trip. Every time.

Speaker 3: 1:20:56

I'm like, yeah, of course I'm dedicated, like I do that, like I get off when it's a decent day, like I get off work like three o'clock head out there so I can get there by five. Cause I, if I'm going, I want to tailgate, you know, I want that experience, and then I want to go, you know, then I want to go inside. So if I'm not, like I give my tickets away, I don't charge people for them because I don't want that Like, cause there's some, there's a single mom or a single dad, or a brother that wants to take his sister, or brothers that want to go, but they don't have the means to make it. And even though the dual is 10, 12 bucks to get in per ticket, if I can get you a little bit down into a reserved season ticket seat, I'll do that for you every time and I don't expect anything in return, because that's just not who I am.

Speaker 3: 1:21:40

Like I said, because my mom made that possibility for me, I like to, you know, pay that forward and make a possibility for someone else. So if you're listening to this and you don't got tickets, let me know, cause I'm always getting. I'm always getting like, not free tickets, I'm not getting them from the university, but a lot of other people fans are like that too Like hey, we can't make it, but we just want to give our, give our tickets to whoever can go. So, psa, if you're looking for tickets and you want to go, let me know. I can get you in the building for sure yeah, yeah, definitely hit them up.

Speaker 2: 1:22:08

If you guys are in the oklahoma area, I don't care. I don't care what fan you are go watch wrestling. I don't care. At some point the rivalry is cool, but at some point the sport needs to get a little more recognition, because we don't want it to disappear. So go, go, um, I'm still trying to figure out how to logistically make the drive to virginia every duel yeah, that's gonna be, that's gonna be crazy 16 hours I actually went to virginia for the first time.

Speaker 3: 1:22:34

Um, in june I went out there for work. They flew me out there, they paid for me to be out there for like 10 days and work uh, first time ever being out there, yeah, it was, I was. I stayed like right by old dominion, right by old nice yeah yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:22:47

So we were in charlottesville, obviously for the visit, and I was blown away.

Speaker 3: 1:22:50

I was like man, this is awesome up here yeah the only thing is beautiful country yeah, but when it's like a hot day, that humidity is rough, and I'm a big gross yeah, I was out there sweating 210 right here, man, you ain't joking.

Speaker 2: 1:23:07

This fat and I used to work construction, this fat guy hates heat.

Speaker 3: 1:23:09

I'm telling you that much right now I did concrete five feet of snow I know there's no, yeah, I'd rather be hot than cold. The cold is awful because at least in the hot I it's. It's miserable, but you can move around. You can still my birthday's in the summer too, you can still move around. But yeah, right now the cold, that's what I'm saying. Sunday I'm probably not going to go out there, because it's just. I mean, the roads are already bad. We had rain and sleet and then the snow came over the top, so it's just not really safe. Because when I go.

Speaker 3: 1:23:40

I usually break the whole family out there on weekends, unless it's's if it's like a thursday or friday duel, then I was just going there and coming back. But weekends I like to take the whole family out there. You know, we usually get like an airbnb just enjoy the time, like so when I'm going out there, like I'm putting a lot of money just to go to one duel or whatever it may be, you know so yeah, and you're not even a wrestling parent.

Speaker 2: 1:23:57

That's amazing yeah that is absolutely amazing, dude. If I could, there was. There was something that someone brought up back in the day. They're like, if there's one thing that I could tell you to not do, that I did. They said don't ever sit down and do the math of how much you spent in wrestling for your kid. And we're talking like what we do, going to North Carolina's, going to US Opens, all that stuff Because then she said how much she spent. I know for a fact we go to like 20 times more than what they do and I almost passed out and threw up at the same time. This is ridiculous.

Speaker 2: 1:24:28

So it's it's really cool again that my voice is getting weird, but it's really cool again to see that you're bringing that back to something that you, you know, that you saw, and that's why I think it's important that these people do the same thing. You know the, the fans that are. They're like oh, we love wrestling. Well, now show it. Now is the time where we need to show it. So that's cool that you're paying it forward with the tickets and knowing that someone else would be able to get their kids, or that's. That's really cool. You're better human being than I am, so that's as far as that goes. That's that's the way to go about it.

Speaker 2: 1:24:57

But again, I mean honestly, I think everybody, if, if we're you know whether it's Minio or it's Willie or someone, I think we all should be doing that, if we have the availability to put that out there for someone. I think it's borderline our responsibility to advocate for the sport as much as possible, doing as much as we can. But I commend you. I want to talk to you for a little bit after we're done here. We've been going for about an hour and 24 minutes. I said we've done a. We've been going for about an hour and 24 minutes.

Speaker 3: 1:25:25

I said we've done three hour podcasts but not everybody's got three hours.

Speaker 2: 1:25:27

It's very Joe Rogan and that's kind of how I wanted it to be is. I don't want it to be scripted. I don't want to. There's one guy that tried telling me I should ask certain questions. I was like deleted. I'm going to do my show, bro. That's not how we're doing this. Yeah, people, stay tuned, check them out. You got your own website. What's the website called?

Speaker 3: 1:25:48

Just if you tune into it, I'll share it on my Twitter right now, because I don't know the URL to it right off the top of my head. It's only been up for like.

Speaker 2: 1:26:00

Is it the low singlecom or something like that's tied to like if you type that in or no?

Speaker 3: 1:26:04

no, I think it's like yeah it's like a long URL.

Speaker 3: 1:26:08

It's like the dash, low dash single. If you just go to the low single like on my Twitter page, add a low single. It's right in my bio, you can click it. It leads you right to there. It leads you to the podcast, leads you to the podcast, leads you eventually will have the shirt link there when that drops. Once I, like I said I want to get that sample back first and make sure it's what I want before. I don't want to like set it up and then people start getting shirts and like dude, what the heck is this? And I'm like I don't know, I don't even know, and so I didn't like that's not me. I want to own the shirt too, since it's not gonna be the place I'm going through normally, uh. But yeah, if you just tune into uh to at the low single, um, that'll give you everything. It'll lead you to everything I got will lead you to the website, will lead you to everything yeah, you're on twitter.

Speaker 2: 1:26:51

You're on instagram. Are you on facebook?

Speaker 3: 1:26:53

nope, no facebook. Uh, that's I literally I didn't even have instagram I didn't even have instagram until like a couple months ago and then, like my buddy was like dude, you need to have it like it's. It's good for content. I'm like it is all right, well, yeah, so yeah I'm not really a social media guy well, that's the big thing too, like, especially with us.

Speaker 2: 1:27:12

Like you know, I'm not a, because justin justin bash, he builds websites. I mean, he's on his computer all day so he's able to build graphics whenever he wants to, and I know the one that he uses is like pre-built, so he's just going to stick a new photo in it, add some new letters, all that other stuff. But that's, that's a lot of. What we do is just kind of regurgitate, right, we're we're regurgitating something that we saw and we feel like it was good for you to see and we're just putting it back out there in case you didn't see it. Kind of thing, right, and I do a lot of the graphics myself, like the stuff you know that I put out just announcing the show with you.

Speaker 2: 1:27:42

It's all I. I mean I've been dealing with photoshop and and all that adobe forever, so it just kind of went hand in hand with what I do now. Am I out there streaming content and making videos? Not yet would I like to, yeah, but again, like you said, I don't like going into something half-assed. I want a whole ass, right for sure, so full my whole ass that's right, you're getting right, I'm talking about.

Speaker 3: 1:28:04

I'm talking about Mike Tyson on Netflix.

Speaker 2: 1:28:11

I want to go shit on the planet.

Speaker 3: 1:28:13

What's crazy is that. What's crazy is you could tell the people that weren't fans of Mike Tyson or never really heard of him, cause they're like, oh my God, like that's not even wild, like y'all clearly never seen an interview with him, like where you been, god.

Speaker 3: 1:28:23

Like that's not even wild, Like y'all clearly never seen an interview with him. Like where have you been? Yeah His face. He told a dude he would have sex with him. Like why he's interviewing him. Like I don't think butt cheeks out is like that's mild, he's in his 56. He's like he's chilling now.

Speaker 2: 1:28:37

Yeah, he don't care, zero F's given on that guy, that's for sure. But go check them out. We'll make sure we put the links for everything you got to within the description on YouTube and stuff like that, once we get it out. But we again, we congratulate you and we're going to cut off cause we want to talk to you for a second. But everybody, we're gonna let you go. This has been another vision quest podcast episode and we've been talking with the low man, sir Appreciate you joining us and, uh, tell the folks, um, you know out in Oklahoma state land that, um, virginia is coming for you, you know. So it's going to say that I'm just going to put that out in the open space and I'm sure someone's be like that guy's an idiot. But that's fine, that's fine.

Speaker 3: 1:29:14

I got confidence in my Cavaliers man done.

Speaker 2: 1:29:26

Fight now. All right, all right, man, peace, we are gonna get out of here, roll some music before I get myself fired. See you guys.