My son wrestled 12u-100 all year long, one of the coaches over looked him when entering the the club for subs. I didnt find out until thursday night that he was not entered. I have called everybody just to be told that there was nothing that could be done. I dont think its right that a kid should have to pay such a high price for a mistake. But our coach was told that there were others that this happened too. So i was just wondering if this was true. I also think that some thing needs to be done about this, there has to be some leway when it comes kids and qualifing tournaments. Its just not right he has worked very hard and now its all over.

Yes, This has happened to other clubs. I am the director of a club and I over looked a wrestler. I just realized it when I was printing brackets on track wrestling. I contacted the sub-district director and our district director. I was told that nothing could be done. I could not even pay a different amount to get him in.

I find it hard to beleive that nothing could be done, when I saw at least two changes to wrestlers weight classes after the initial entries were posted.

I am not sure where this happened but in District 1 I sent out multiple emails to the Club Representatives responsible for entering wrestlers. This email listed every wrestler they had entered into the system. It was VERY easy to confirm if wrestlers had been entered or inadvertently left off. There was plenty of time to take care and make sure all of the wrestlers were entered.

effwhyeye

I also saw two changes to a bracket in the last two hours before the bracket posted . These were also weight class changes.

that is what i dont understand they said u could change weight class but could not add a wrestler dosent make sense to me even the tournament diretor said he didnt see the problem to add him. but the rules wouldnt alow it. i thought this was supposed to be about the kids?

There was a big push this year at the State level to standardize the qualifying series of tournaments. In the past these decisions were made at the District level. However, when done with the latitude and common since discussed in this thread the trade off is that each District is operating on its own standard. The thought was that because these tournaments are all part of the same qualifying series they needed to be run in a similar manner. Under the old method kids in District X may have been allowed to sign up late at the seeding meeting while kids in District Y had to have their entrees in 10 days prior to the event. This year the State has mandated that all districts operate under the 10-day rule. All entrees had to be in 10 days prior to the event; this year that was Wednesday-March 5 at midnight. This date and time was distributed through all of the clubs from your State and District administration. Under this plan changes to a wrestler’s age and/or weight could be made up until the seeding meeting started. That is why you saw the movement in weight classes. That is not a new phenomenon. These types of changes have been allowed in the past, but with trackwrestling they were just more transparent this year. I hope this helps to clarify.

Mark,
These type of situations are exactly why I opposed the rule change at the state meeting. I believe there are such things as what I term "correctable errors". These are errors which by being allowed to be corrected cause nobody harm or provide an unfair advantage. They would include but not be limited to, weight changes, age changes, and omissions. An example would be, the qualifier sign-up forms which the parent signs. A few years ago we were told that changes and whited-out forms would no longer be accepted for liability reasons. The first year this was enacted our club like many others showed up at seeding without newly signed blank forms and expected to make any needed corrections to the ones already submitted. This was not accepted and for that reason several of our wrestlers did not get to compete in the sub-district tournament. Since that time our club has at times asked the parents to sign a blank qualifier form so we would have one on hand in case needed at the seeding meeting. Then yesterday we are told with a wink and a nod, that all of this was simply to clean up a problem of illegible forms that had been corrected or changed too many times in the past. All the while, we learn, that some club's forms, with obvious changes, had continued to be accepted! I was dumbfounded to say the least.
All of us as parents or club officers have made the same mistakes as those listed above, among others. I, like everyone, has had to tell a parent I didn't get their kid entered in a tournament. A mistake at an invitational is bad enough but one at a qualifier is the worst. I say, as I said at the meeting, there has to be a way for these "correctable errors" to be corrected prior to seeding.

I agree with SF02. I understand that you can't have 2000 people showing up at the seeding meetings with entry forms, but there should be some way to correct this type of situation. Maybe 50.00 late entry penalty with the absolute deadline being the seeding meeting? I would think that would be enough deterrent that people wouldn't abuse it on purpose, but doable in actual real life emergencies.

We should make every effort to do right by 12 year old kids that want to wrestle and have done nothing wrong.

Mr. Stanley,
You mention being able to change age groups prior to the seeding meeting beginning, I know in one district they were not allowed to change the age group on Sunday. Happens that the two kids left out would have had to wrestle up 1 age bracket to have a weight bracket that would fit them. Now both of those kids are not allowed to wrestle at subs at all, even after their coach had turned everything in.

wrstlmom1970

By RULE you are not allowed to wrestle out of your age group for the qualifying tournaments (rule 4 of Rules Modifications for Qualifying Tournaments). I am not sure when this went in to effect, but as far as I know it has been a rule for at least 10 years now. We had one age group change in D1N and it was due to an administrative error on the clubs part. A wrestler was inadvertently entered into the wrong class.

Mark

Thanks for the explanation. Didn't know exactly how that worked. I was just wondering. I feel a little sorry for the two kids that won't get to participate, but if those are the rules, those are the rules. The two kids were extremely large for their age, so there is no weight bracket for them in the 8 and under group.

Im just glad that im not the only one that thinks its wrong to punish a kid for a mistake that he had no control over. Hopfully there will be somthing done about this for next year, i dont want anybody else to have to go through this it sucks.

So does that mean that 6 and under kids are not supposed to be wrestling up in the 8 and under brackets for state?

if its all about the kids then the kids should not be punished because a coach forgot to get them entered. we are all human and we will make mistakes. its up to us to make it right and give back to the kids and let them wrestle. its not the kids fault the coaches didnt catch it.

Any error that is caught prior to seeding! After that the wrestler may end up paying the price for the adults mistakes. The host club or district should be allowed to collect a hefty penalty for any errors that are correctable though.

Let me start by saying I agree, it should be about the kids and we try and do our best to not make mistakes and get everyone included.

We were allowed to make changes up until the seeding meeting started. Thank God District 1 did a good job of giving us the paperwork to review when we got there. I found a couple of "adult" errors (read me fat fingering the wrong thing) and we were able to get them fixed no problem.

In my opinion, here's the real issue.....the reason the state has to put in rules like this is because the adults sometimes try and "game" the system. People try to see who is in which weight class and then move kids out of weight classes that may be loaded or have a couple of very good kids in them. Not saying this is right or wrong, but is sure makes it hard to identify when a legitimate mistake is made vice someone trying to "game" the system.

If we can figure out how to distinguish between the two then I think everyone would try and do their best to ensure that kids aren't left out due to legitimate adult mistakes. As it stands now, I think the system we use in District 1 is pretty good. It's just that the adults/coaches doing the entries have to be very diligent to find any mistakes and make sure we get them fixed prior to the seeding meeting.

I would like to thank Will Cokeley, Mark Stanley, and whoever else helped with the District 1 entries this year. I think you guys gave us a good system and a fair chance to catch mistakes and rectify them. The Spartans appreciate all the time and effort you guys put into this.

Shawn Budke

SF02,

While I tend to partially agree with you on this issue, I do think it is important to point out the intent behind the rules. When these rules were put into place it was not the intent to harm any individual wrestler. The true intent was to protect the integrity and consistency of our brackets. There are some errors/omissions/changes that are so cut and dried that I do believe exceptions to the rules make since. However, an issue that seems like a no brainer to me may cause issues for another.

I will give you an example of an issue that I am dealing with this year. I have a kid entered at 14-75. Friday night I was doing my homework and looked at the groups of kids across the State. As of Friday night I believe there were three other kids at this age and weight. My 14-75 kid approached me last night at practice and says can I move up. I told him it was too late for that. He breaks down and says but coach I want to wrestle. I said, I don’t understand. He explains that he and his Dad were looking at the brackets published after the seeding meeting and it turns out that he is the only 14-75 left in the State. This kid has competed all year, often times against other kids as much as 25# heavier in combined brackets. I have told him many times after tough losses this year, that if he bides his time he won’t have to wrestler the 95-100# kids in the qualifying tourneys. At 14-80 there was only one kid in our sub-district and he was also from my club. I told both boys that I would request an exception to the rule, which I have done. The ruling was quick; I was denied and a full explanation was given. Moving kids after the seeding meeting is a slippery slope. As soon as you allow an exception then there will be a dozen more requesting a move for other reasons. Am I disappointed by the ruling…yes. Do I understand the ruling…yes.

I believe that many issues should be left up to each District to decide at a local level. There could be an appeal process at the State level to rule on the fairness of decisions made at the District level. But we must all follow the rules in place to the best of our ability.

Mark

This is one discussion that I really wish did not have to happen. The idea that a young boy or girl should spend all year training and competing with a eye towards taking a shot at qualifying for the state tournament, only to have that dream shot down because of errors by the adults that should be looking out for him/her, disappoints me greatly. Unfortunately, all too often I end up being one of the people who are responsible for enforcing the rules saying “no” in these cases, when every fiber of my being wants to say “yes.”

If your son or daughter is not going to be wrestling this weekend because of one of these rules, I know that there is nothing that I can say which would mitigate any of the hurt that your family is currently feeling. However, for those of you who are wondering why a bunch of adults can’t see past a few rules to do the right thing for a young athlete, I would like to try and explain why these rules exist and why they are enforced so stringently.

Perhaps the best place to start is to confess my own sin and the resulting damage. Approximately 15 years ago, when I was the District II director, I received a request the day before the subdistrict tournament that seemed to be an easy call. A wrestler had been entered into a wrong weight class, due to an error by his club director, and wanted to be moved into the correct weight class. There was an outside shot that he could make weight in the bracket he was entered, but he had hit a growth spurt and making the lower weight, if even possible, was going to be extremely difficult. The weight class he wanted to be moved into only had one or two other wrestlers, so it wasn’t going to affect anyone’s ability to advance to the next week’s district tournament. I talked to the club director of one of the other kids in the bracket he wanted to move to and this director had no objection. Therefore, I allowed him to move to the other bracket. It seemed the perfect scenario, with no one being harmed and this young man being allowed to compete.

The next week I was faced with an appeal by a club from the other subdistrict. When they arrived at the district tournament, they found one of their wrestlers was facing this young man who changed weight classes the prior week. Somehow they knew that his weight had been changed, and they challenged my authority to make this change. Clearly they were concerned that this young man was going to affect their chances to qualify for state and they wanted him out of the bracket. Any hurt that I might have felt in denying him the chance to move to his correct weight class the prior week paled in comparison to the sorrow that I felt when I realized that I had no defense for my actions. Because the rules did not allow this change, the only recourse was to scratch this wrestler from the district tournament, ending his season because I decided I knew better than the rules did.

This incident has had a lasting impact on me. My initial reaction was to question whether the rules that we had were necessary and, more importantly, were they fair? The problem that I quickly realized as I considered how these rules should be revised or deleted was that very little happens in a vacuum. Take for instance the impact of a wrestler who is entered in the wrong age group. Our rules state that a wrestler may not wrestle outside of his/her own age group, so if this error is not corrected before the start of the seeding meeting s/he will not be able to wrestle in the subdistrict tournament. It would seem to be easy to just make the right decision and move this wrestler to the correct age group, but where should the wrestler be put on the bracket? The reason for seeding wrestlers is to try and ensure that the top four wrestlers have a fair chance to place at the subdistrict tournament by not making them wrestle each other out of medal contention. Of course they still have to win the matches that the seeds anticipate they will win, and a nonseeded wrestler has every opportunity to defeat a seeded wrestler and earn that qualifying spot, but the goal is still the same. If my wrestler is (on paper) the third best wrestler in this original bracket, and if the new wrestler is the best wrestler in the bracket, it is very possible that drawing the new wrestler in the bracket may force my wrestler to have to defeat two higher seeds just to make it to district while the #4 seed gets to avoid these competitors. Since my wrestler was seeded higher than the #4 seed, why should he be penalized because this other wrestler did not enter the correct age group and subsequently was moved into my wrestler’s bracket?

An option would be to reseed the bracket, but this is also problematic. There is a reason that this is the only Kansas youth tournament where all of the participating clubs come together to argue over seeds. Because of the time and distances involved, and the discussions that are necessary to try and do the job right, this is not a minor task. It would be difficult enough just to get all of the clubs back together that are currently represented in the two modified brackets to do a complete reseeding, but this ignores the “what if” potential. For example, what if I had known that a certain wrestler was not going to be in a certain bracket? Potentially, I might have moved my wrestler into that weight class – why should I be denied this opportunity after the fact if the state is allowing changes? I can come up with several other “what if” scenarios, but you get the idea.

The bottom line is that there are very few actions that we can take that do not impact someone else in a disadvantageous fashion. Since these other individuals followed all of the rules, it seems unfair to put them in the position of trying to obtain their own remedies to any harm resulting from changes.

One rule that I do believe should be reviewed is the ten day rule for accepting subdistrict entries. Initially this was felt to be necessary to provide the subdistrict host a fair opportunity to prepare themselves for the seeding meeting. With the adoption of TrackWrestling and the simplification of putting together the participation reports due to the online entries by member clubs, I think it might be possible to reduce this time period. However, I believe there will still need to be a deadline and there will still be those individuals who are harmed when they miss these deadlines. And I will continue to agonize over those youth who must pay the price.

As a dumb outsider looking in, it would seem to me that if the list of participants had been made available through track wrestling, parents could have checked for themselves that the kids were registered prior to the cutoff. Is there a reason not to?