I know some of my readers aren't subscribers to The Tribune-Democrat, so you might have missed the resolution of the transfer case involving Taylor and Toby Cahill.
Here's the original story in The Tribune-Democrat as well as the previous blog post on it.
District 5 voted this week to allow the Cahills to wrestle (and play football or any other sports they choose) for Berlin Brothersvalley.
That's good news for the Mountaineers and, many would argue, sports in general. Sitting out an entire school year is a pretty severe penalty.
I talked to a number of different people about the hearings, including some who didn't make it into the newspaper article, and the general consensus was that the Cahills had a very compelling argument for the move and that it wasn't possible to prove that it was for athletic intent.
I also have spoken with a number of people who are worried that the athletic world in general, and wrestling in particular, is changing. It's a smaller world now. When I was in school, Conemaugh Township seemed pretty well removed from Berlin. I wasn't going to Young Guns three nights a week and bumping into the Speranzas and Gavins of the world. I talked to them at wrestling tournaments and got along with them just fine when we weren't on the mat together, but there was no Twitter or Facebook to keep us connected outside of the gym. Now, kids from different schools are talking all of the time. It doesn't mean there's collusion. It just means that the wrestling community has become even closer now.
Even if there's the occasional joke about, "Oh, you should come here and wrestle for us," it's still not collusion in my book. I've heard that dozens of times over the years from parents and fans at schools all over districts 5 and 6. It's always been laughed off as a joke, not a serious attempt to recruit.
People that I've spoken with in the wrestling community are worried that even joking about such a thing is now treading on thin ice.
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