Actually I do not know that. How can anyone say it will never change? Never is a long time. I agree with Will that someday Kansas will change this tournament series to be more consistent with the majority of states. I believe this topic has come up about every year. In previous years it has been stated that the majority of states do not include their high school wrestlers in their kids state wrestling tournament series. Several years ago the KWCA approached our Kids executive board with the idea that they would like to see the kids season end before high school state so the kids, kids coaches and families could all go to high school state and so that the high school wrestlers could take a couple of weeks off from their folkstyle season and then participate in freestyle/greco wrestling.

My son started wrestling in the Kansas USAW Kids program about ten years ago as a first grader and I started hearing about this competitive disadvantage that 8th graders had against 9th graders right from the first year from Kids coaches and other experienced adults from the wrestling community. In my opinion it will continued to be discussed because most people recognize that there is an unfair competitive advantage for 9th graders.

I do not think it is doing the 9th graders that much good either. I know last year when this topic came up I asked my son who was a 9th grader a year ago would he rather be wrestling against the top sophomores in a post season tournament or the top 8th graders. He said he would rather be wrestling against the top sophomores for sure. He said high school kids should be wrestling against high school kids and grade school kids should be wrestling against other grade school kids. He wrestled one kids tournament after his high school season and then chose on his own not to wrestle the kids State tournament series as a 9th grader. He has chosen again as a sophomore not to participate in the kids state tournament series. He has been given the right to make this type of decision for himself ever since he started high school.

I don't agree with Coach Tattoo's assessment of Will Cokeley's motives on this topic either. I don't see anything about Will's posts that is trying to not let the kids wrestle or is for his own selfish motives. I don't always agree with Will's positions but I believe his motives are to improve wrestling in Kansas for all the kids. I believe Will has expressed his position on this topic in previous years. I don't see anything about his position on this topic that indicates he is trying to live his life thru his kids. I believe he is very involved with his kids like most of us in the wrestling community are. In general it is a good thing in our society when parents are involved in their kids lives. I applaud him and other parents who are very involved with their kids. From what I know of Will Cokeley though I believe his interest in wrestling extends beyond his own kids.

I believe Will Cokeley is a wrestling person who is thinking outside the box to try to improve Kansas wrestling. He is willing to stick his neck out to express his outside the box thinking. I think wrestling needs people willing to think outside the box and express those opinions. Let's face it is the general sporting public more interested in our NCAA college wrestling finals this weekend or in the basketball rounds of 64 and 32 this weekend? I hear people in the community talking about the basketball tournament frequently. I never hear anyone outside the wrestling community discussing the NCAA wrestling tournament. All I am trying to say here is that maybe some outside the box thinking is good for wrestling and maybe we should be encouraging it instead of attributing selfish motives to it.