Five Thoughts on the OSU Wrestling’s Roster

A new wrestling roster was published on okstate.com. A few different things jumped out from it so I thought I’d share my thoughts.

1. Joe Smith at 174 with Travis Wittlake at 165

Most expect some combination of Joe Smith and Travis Wittlake at 165-174 this season, but it was sort of an unknown who would go where. It looks like we now know. Wittlake along with fellow freshmen Jalin Harper, Cade Lindsey, and Manuel Elizondo are listed at 165 and Wittlake would presumably be the starter among that group. It will be kind of interesting to see if Wittlake stays at 165 in future years. With the highly touted 2020 recruiting class that’s coming in that may be the best future scenario for the Cowboys.

2. A Little Thin at Heavyweight

There’s only one. Cornelius Putnam is the only heavyweight listed on the roster. Austin Harris is a big framed kid that could certainly step in if needed, but he’s wrestled at 197 in previous years and is still listed at 197 on the roster. So that will certainly be an interesting weight to follow this season.

3. Three Pretty High Speed 184s

This weight has the opposite problem of 285. Dakota Geer was an All-American as a sophomore last season, Alex Kauffman was a two-time All-American at NEO, and Anthony Montalvo is a very highly touted freshman who is coming off his redshirt season.

Kauffman has a redshirt available, so that is something we might see this year for him, but ultimately we probably see the best pair from this group hold down 184 and 197 with one going up. Is it a situation where all three want the 184 spot and they will wrestle it out to decide the spot resulting in one being forced up? Do they already have a plan and has one already been working to fill out 197? The early season open tournaments will be interesting to watch at these weights and see who beats who and who wrestles where.

4. Balmeceda and Manibog at 141 and 149!

This is sort of shocking, Balmeceda was at 152 in high school, so when projecting and speculating where we would see each of these guys I, and most other prognosticators, had them at 157 or 165, at the lowest 149. I wouldn’t have thought either of them could make 141. This is probably a good thing, OSU has a lot coming in at the upper weights, so more depth and a little size separation between him and Manibog is probably a positive long term.

Believe it or not, Twitter says the roster is current.

We can confirm this photo and roster are current. https://t.co/xFoBfNnOwY

— OSU Cowboy Wrestling (@CowboyWrestling) September 13, 2019

5. A Few Notable Omissions

Naturally a bunch of seniors graduated and are no longer on the roster, but a few underclassmen from last year are also gone. Wes Ahrberg, Colt Denney, Jacob Fontanez, Hanyu Qiu, and most notably Andrew Marsden were all on the roster last year and now no longer listed. As noted above 184 is stacked pretty deep and there is some pretty solid talent listed at 197 with Harris and Hughes, but 285 is thin, so though Marsden’s not a true heavyweight, having him on the roster may have been some added depth there. Colt Denney had a pretty solid redshirt year and won a few tournaments, so he was a bit of a surprise as well.

Overall this sport is an incredible grind, and I think most know that. You talk to just about anyone, even people that don’t know the first thing about wrestling and they’ll say they understand that wrestling is hard. Beyond a bunch of hard workouts, cutting weight, and all the other things wrestling encompasses, you have to look at the broader picture with a kid that either walks on at a wrestling program or only gets a small amount of scholarship money. They’re sacrificing large amounts of time in their life that could be spent studying, working a part-time job, or even just hanging out with friends and enjoying the college life also.

They find motivation from somewhere or something to stay in the sport and continue that grind, but often aren’t likely to start and even if they do stick it out and eventually find a spot in a starting role, they’re probably going to get very little notoriety or anything else for it. So as much as we laud guys like Daton Fix, who definitely deserves all the praise in the world, you should genuinely appreciate that guy whose name you read on a roster, but rarely see anywhere else, because they’re taking on something that few are willing to do.