Reasoning for the decision, according to the report, was an analysis of more than three dozen criteria including "popularity, finances, tickets sold and governance. Wrestling is one of the oldest Olympic sports, dating all the way back to the first Games in For U. Even though the sport doesn't have the same cachet in the Olympics that it once did, this is a huge deal. The Olympics are as much about history and tradition as progress, so to drop one of the oldest and most celebrated sports is shocking.
It is still possible that wrestling will get back into the Olympic rotation, though it wouldn't make much sense to have this decision come out and then be overturned when the final decision comes down in September. If not for legitimate wrestling, it's very unlikely that professional wrestling would have ever come into existence. The early days of professional wrestling certainly took a lot from amateur wrestling and some of those concepts are still used today.
Most professional wrestlers during the sport's infancy had mat wrestling backgrounds, and that remains true to this day. The likes of Kurt Angle, Brock Lesnar, Shelton Benjamin, Dolph Ziggler, Jack Swagger and so many others excelled in amateur wrestling at a high level, and it is a big reason why they're so technically sound when it comes to professional wrestling.
The connection between the two sports can't be denied in that regard, but that is pretty much where the comparisons stop. I have no doubt that it is still beneficial for professional wrestlers to have competed in freestyle or Greco-Roman wrestling at some point, but removing the sport from the Olympics won't change anything for the WWE or any other professional wrestling promotion.
If children watched Olympic wrestling and thought to themselves, "I want to do that one day and then become a professional wrestler," I could understand the outrage. That simply isn't the case, however. The fact of the matter is that young people don't compare the two sports, which are different in every way conceivable aside from the fact that it's a one-on-one competition in which the object is to pin your opponent.
Young people aren't captivated by Olympic wrestling like they may have been in the past. The sport has lost any cachet it may have had and it simply can't compete with the likes of basketball, swimming, track and field and other events. Rather than emulating Dan Gable, most kids want to be John Cena, so they probably don't even give amateur wrestling a second thought. Removing amateur wrestling from the Olympics may hurt overall participation in the sport to some degree, but I highly doubt that it will translate to the WWE in any manner.
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Athletes to discuss proposed pentathlon change. Rivas runs th marathon, awaits world record. Korir, Cockram winners in 36th L. Sep 8, Associated Press. They certainly don't have the legacy: Wrestling half the time has "Greco-Roman" in front of it, a reminder of its status as one of the original athletic tests of humankind. Indeed, an Olympics without wrestling is like an Olympics without the discus throw or gymnastics — those sports are part and parcel of what define the Olympics.
The board, for its part, says the Olympics can't live in stasis. The board's decision will come up for a final vote by the IOC's general assembly, but it is not expected to be overturned. Skip to header Skip to main content Skip to footer Feature.
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