Wrestling Community,

Usually a host city of ANY major event, has an ally in their City newspaper in providing extra coverage for "that event"......I don't know what happened with the World Herald, but they had a golden opportunity to cover this year's state tournament like no other, and simply dropped the ball.

Certainly, in the past, the Lincoln J.S. has done a really nice job of covering the state tournament when it has been in their city. What the OWH did this year didn't even come close.

The OWH started with a bang...the four page opener, and then from there.....well, it went straight downhill. If you opened the paper on Sunday morning, you were greated with an old photo of.....basketball? Give me a break! That was the cover story......WOW!

Folks, the OWH has a job to do and we should expect them to do it as the host city paper. They need to cover this event from bottom to top and back. They should be out there making people from out of town want to come back! If I were from ANYWHERE, and I picked up a WH, I should see GREAT coverage of this event.

I feel bad times coming our way AGAIN with World Herald. With Craig Sesker leaving, we are headed straight back to the dark ages. You've seen the cave man FED EX commercial....well those times are coming our way! I think the WH blew the thing off because Craig is a lame duck around there and they are headed in another direction.

Anyway, I would hate to think that we come back to the QWEST next year and get that kind of coverage.....If this is the case, NO THANKS OWH!

TO MY POINT.....wrestling community, you can email the editor of the OWH: larry.king@owh.com with your thoughts and comments about the coverage, or you can call directly to the sports editor Thad Livingston 402-444-1021 with your thoughts. I encourage you to do this!

Journalism is close to my heart. I did THE HEADLOCK for 11 years because I felt strongly about wrestling coverage. I think ALL CLASSES should be covered and I think the state tournament should be OVER COVERED by the host paper. This thing isn't about MS. We have gotten great coverage because of Craig! This is about our greater community. Anyway, we want the coverage we deserve next year. If you want more or better....call or email these guys.

I am really SORRY that Craig is leaving.....we will be back to the times when you couldn't buy an article in the OWH....Ughhhhhh!

Thanks, Craig, for all you have done. You have been a great freind to wrestling!

I could not agree more Grapplinman. The coverage was mediocre at best, it could be worse it could be the GI Independent.

Doug, I am glad I wasn't the only one who thought that.
This is what I sent to the editor.

Mr. Editor
I want to thank you for your coverage of the State WRestling tourney. Your editions on Thursday and Friday were great. Especially the special edition on Thursday.

However, I open the paper Sunday, after two of the greatest teams in the history of our state (two teams from omaha, Millard South and Omaha Skutt)had the greatest tournament of any year,
(They both broke the scoring record. South broke the number of placers record. Skutt broke the number of champions record. They had an amazing tournament.) and what do I see? I see a profile on Dana Altman. Why? Because he is a nice coach. Couldn't this have waited until Monday?

You have two of the greatest teams in history, making history. What's the bias against wrestling. I wasn't going to say anything, but even after Friday at Districts, there was no mention of District wrestling. Not until Sunday. All I read about Saturday morning was Basketball. I would bet that we can read about almost every SUB DISTRICT BBall game, let alone districts.
I hope it doesn't go back to the way it was before Sesker was there.

I subscribe to the OWH over the Lincoln Journal star because of the wrestling coverage. Perhaps I will no longer get either paper.

Shannon Gocke
York High School Head WRestling Coach
402 362 3685
work 402 362 6655
641 W. 5th
York, NE 68467

One thing people shouldn't be confused about is who is at fault here. Its not Sesker's fault-they simply jerk him around, cut his stories and don't let him provide the kind of coverage he'd like to do.

My editorial on NWI this week will focus on this issue. The OWH has consistently dropped the ball on this sport for YEARS and I know in talking with Craig over the years how much he had to scratch and claw just to get what he got for space.

You can bet the OWH's coverage will be falling back to the Stu Pospisil "there's not enough interest in the sport to justify the space" philosophy in the future.

But Mike, your editorial is not the on thing that needs to be done. Check out my other thread...maybe you could participate in a program like that to make Nebraska the center of the wrestling universe!

To be honest the only thing worse then the newspaper is the 10:00 pm news, bad coverage at best. I watch all the Omaha stations hoping to get any district news. The only thing I got was a national basketball tournament at Quest. The biggest news story during the state tournament was that the Blue Jays have a basketball game after the finals.
Omaha's idea of high school sports news cover is squed. The are some great teams in Iowa that get no coverage at all either.

Omaha TV stations are some of the laziest journalists around. KETV and KPTM both do a pretty decent job at covering wrestling, but WOWT is lackluster at best and Travis Justice has got to be the laziest sports journalist in all of Omaha, if not the midwest.

But Travis sounds REALLY cool on the Todd and Tyler show.

Is that the same T&T show that bashed wrestlers and their fans as a bunch of sister-kissing rednecks???

Some show...they used to be funny once.

"Once" is the key word there.

Now they're Howard Stern wannabes...and in all honesty, if you wanna be like Howard Stern, you really aren't aiming very high up the food chain.

It's all about selling papers boys. They are playing to their circulation choir! Do any of us care about Western Iowa Sports? You would if you were trying to sell them some papers!

Well said Doug. I'll miss Craig but good for him that he is leaving that rag sheet OWH. Thanks for the contact info.

P.S. Congrats to you as coach and dad-Watching Morgan reverse to a pin from his back was sweet. If he was built like his dad or me he could'nt have done that!

if i had a sister id probably kiss her...

Thanks for the kind words, Doug. I am very happy for LT to finally taste the gold at State. He has earned it. I was really moved after he won the gold.

I know that Craig is sick about what happened at the OWH. He really wants us to have the coverage we deserve. He wrote a ton of stuff and lobbied hard.....the guys up the food chain simply axed the coverage. What a travesty for people who filled the stands at QWEST. These guys need to answer for their gutless decisions. If this paper sold about 14,000 less papers, they might understand a little more about the power of wrestling.

As is, we need to call and email until these guys are sick of it!

Again, Congrats, Doug to you and LT!

"As is, we need to call and email until these guys are sick of it!"

You are right, DubD. Needs to be a massive, statewide (even worldwide, if we can get Let's Grapple and his boys across the water in on the action) effort to make our voices heard in the ivory tower at the Weird-Harold.

Hey Mikey...are they hearing you? I would think that you could submit your resume to fill Craig's job! We could use your support and voice now at the OWH. Time for you to take the big stage my man!

BWAHAHAHAHA -- the Weird-Harold the BIG stage? Oh, puhhhh-LEEEEZE.

First off, the Weird-Harold is an over-rated, over-priced waste of good newsprint. They practice lazy journalism because they have pushed any and all potential competitors out of the city and have no reason to expand their horizons. I don't work well with regressive-thinking regimes.

Second, the bureaucratic b.s. that takes place within the confines of the daily newspaper community is one that I just don't function well in. I'm the kind of guy that wants a straight answer and a solid decision, and there isn't anybody in the heirarchy of the Weird-Harold who could give a straight answer OR make a solid decision if somebody came up to them with a Smith & Wesson enema and offer a simple directive of "make one, or we blow your colon up through your eustachian tube." Trust me -- you'd run out of buckshot before you'd get somebody to come through with anything beyond, "Maybe we should order in Papa John's before the next staff meeting."

Finally -- I've already worked for an OWH subsidiary and saw enough of the first two topics to have a pretty good read on how it would be if I were to apply for, and get, Craig's gig. The over-under on the number of days that would elapse before one -- or both -- parties went completely "disgruntled postal worker" on the other would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 3.5.

And if you're smart...you'd take the under.

Thanks, but no thanks...

Every year I open the paper and I am disapointed. Thursday and Friday I thought had good coverage, but sunday was horrible. You have Millard South who has taken state 2 years in a row now, and broken records left and right, and there is nothing written about that. They put a little picture of Aaron Denson in their and write a article, that talks mostly about Matt Vacanti and Omaha Skutt. Then 2 pages away they give them their own articles. I will email and tell them my thoughts!