Wrestling UWW American Olympic Games Qualifier 2020

[MHSN 3,619]

we already know semifinalists

 

60kg:

Orta vs Rodriguez

Hafizov vs Gurria

 

67kg:

Junior vs Horta

Lopez vs Sancho

 

77kg:

Vargas vs Ali

Smith vs Pena

 

87kg:

Gregorich vs Alfonso

Cousin vs Rau

 

97kg:

Hancock vs Mejia

Rosillo vs Perez

 

130kg:

Perez vs Soghomanyan

Santana vs Acosta

 

 

not much surprises except those I mentioned earlier.

Edited March 13, 2020 by MHSN

[JoshMartini007 2,536]

Hoping for a Honduras upset, though it'll be unlikely

[Laraja 1,494]

 A quota! 

[MHSN 3,619]

the center ref almost disqualified Soghomanyan for celebrating too much . this is not MMA. you are not allowed to do such things after the win

[mrv86 3,138]

2 hours ago, MHSN said:

@mrv86 huge win for Mexico at 77kg first round over Venezuela, I think your guy is almost there.

 

And he did it... to bad Lopez and Gurria couldn't make it this time.

[MHSN 3,619]

Cuba will have a full team in Greco-Roman, they qualified 2 in Nur-Sultan and 4 more here. Pena and Orta had hard time in at least one of their matches but it was easy for Gregorich and Rosillo. I think only Egypt is capable of doing that, it will be hard for any other country even Russia to qualify all 6 weights.

 

and Cuba can also do great in Tokyo in Greco-Roman, Borrero and Lopez are big favorites for gold. and winning a medal is not really impossible for Gregorich and Rosillo.

[MHSN 3,619]

Let's take a look at what happened today, I got only 8 out of 12 qualified athletes correctly. not really good considering some of them were easy picks. in those 4 matches I was wrong, only in one of them I was completely off. but other 3 could go either way.

 

59kg: Orta and Hafizov

as expected Orta had hard time against Colombia in first round but narrowly survived, SF was easy for him. on other hand Hafizov beating Montano was huge surprise to me. I think Montano came to the mat with too much confidence. he only found out that when he was down 3-3 with 2 minutes left and he was already out of gas. with a better strategy he could beat Hafizov quite easily. Hafizov is old but coming from Uzbekistan he knows wrestling very well.

 

67kg: Horta and Sancho

Horta had some problems against Ecuador in first round but then to my surprise dominated Brazilian guy Junior in the semifinal. he deserved the quota with no doubt. no much trouble for Sancho, he needed one opportunity in both of his matches to score big points and then he was OK defending his lead.

 

77kg: Vargas and Pena

Vargas won two tough battles to qualify, I think Rivas (VEN) was better than him in the first match but was careless and gave up two takedowns on his own tries. bottom half was more interesting, Pena narrowly beat Cuero (COL) only 2-2 but then SF against Smith was much easier. feel sorry for Cuero he almost beat Pena.

 

87kg: Gregorich and Rau

no trouble for Cuba, the only interesting match in this weight was Rau vs Avendano in QF, Avendano had 4-0 lead and then 4-3 lead in last minute but ran  out of gas and a last minute pushout sent Rau to the Olympics. Avendano had to wrestle Colombia in the first round while Rau had a bye. maybe that was the reason Avendano was tired at the end.

 

97kg: Hancock and Rosillo

no surprise, but Mejia of Honduras had his golden chance in first round, he could beat Rosillo and in that case he could face Venezuela in SF and not Hancock. he also got injured in his first round match which made him even weaker. both semifinals were one sided.

 

130kg: Soghomanyan and Acosta

Acosta and Adam Coon were the only "World Medalists" in the entire Greco-Roman competition and they faced in the first round, I was expecting a convincing win for Acosta but one 2pts caution made it close and Acosta was lucky to survive at the end. on other half Perez from VEN was leading 3-0 and looked in control but then when he went for a takedown he slipped and Soghomanyan scored takedown and back to back gut wrenches.

 

 

I think Venezuela was the biggest loser today, they were close for 2 or even 3 quotas but finished the day empty handed.

unlike previous editions I expect wrestlers to take bronze medal matches more seriously. there is always chance for someone to fail a drug test.

[mrv86 3,138]

19 minutes ago, MHSN said:

unlike previous editions I expect wrestlers to take bronze medal matches more seriously. there is always chance for someone to fail a drug test.

 

Which brings the next question: why have a final match, risking a serious injury? Better to let the semifinal losers to wrestle for the reserve places. In case one of the original qualifiers gets dq or rejects the quota, then the 1st reserve takes that place; and if the other original spot can't be used by any reason, then the 2ns reserve will also get a reallocated spot.

[MHSN 3,619]

1 hour ago, mrv86 said:

 

Which brings the next question: why have a final match, risking a serious injury? Better to let the semifinal losers to wrestle for the reserve places. In case one of the original qualifiers gets dq or rejects the quota, then the 1st reserve takes that place; and if the other original spot can't be used by any reason, then the 2ns reserve will also get a reallocated spot.

 

while I agree with you that finals are unnecessary but UWW is not really open minded about trying new formats. they have a fixed format which they use for every single competition and OQTs are no exceptions. I expect lots of walkovers in the finals. even though for some of these wrestlers this is just another opportunity to wrestle one more and test themselves. kind of a preparation match.

 

[MHSN 3,619]

wow. what a match 97kg final I'm glad they didn't cancel the finals. you rarely see such high scoring match in this level between two World level wrestlers specially at heavyweight. Cuba won 11-8 but Hancock threw him for 4 to win it 12-11 which later annulled because it was a moment after 0:00