Looking For Food
March 20, 2003 11:41 AM | General
March 20, 2003
KANSAS CITY -- Before starting with today’s journal, I need to recap something that happened after yesterday’s report. I was milling around the lobby at about 10:30 p.m. looking for a vending machine when Brent “Moose” Miller, Tom McMath and Billy Smith flagged me down and asked me to drive them to find something to eat.
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| Brent Miller and his teammates spent a good portion of Monday night looking for a place to eat. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
While driving around, we came up with a great business idea: a gas station in Kansas City. The three of them wanted to get something to eat and were looking for something like a Sheetz or any type of convenience store. We drove around for about 20 minutes and found nothing. While negotiating the streets aimlessly through downtown Kansas City we then determined that there couldn’t be more than about 20 people who live there -- no cars were on the road and no one was walking the streets. It’s the most destitute big city I’ve ever been in. It’s more bare than Morgantown during spring break.
During the mini-tour of downtown K.C., Moose shared some of the more tender moments of his life. He told us how he once traced and cut out a bunch of paper footsteps and put Hershey Kisses on them and placed them up his high school girlfriend’s walkway to her house. He left a note for her that said: “Now that I kissed the ground you walked on, will you go to prom with me?” He also revealed that he likes tender “chick flicks,” as he gave two thumbs-up for “How To Lose A Man In 10 Days” -- all this from the guy they call Moose.
“Simple things amuse simple people Zundell,” he told me.
Truer words were never spoken from the person that teammates continually rag on as being “not the sharpest knife in the drawer.”
We finally asked for directions to a grocery store and a gas station at a Denny’s. We found a BP there was no food. We found a Conoco (a Midwest gas station apparently) and still no food. We found a grocery store, but of course it closed 15 minutes earlier (10:30 p.m.). The guys, in near desperation, found some food at a Walgreen’s. Moose filled up on McDonald’s next door because as a heavyweight he could.
Today the guys got to sleep in and have a lazy morning. We left to go to the arena for a workout just after noon. I’m not sure if it is on purpose or not, but the guys drilled on the light blue mat, the one that is a similar shade to the championship match mat. They are serious when they drill, but not stone-faced. They work and then laugh about something.
Generally the guys drill with someone near their own weight. Matt Lebe won’t drill with anyone other than Tom McMath. Moose and Ryan Wilman partnered today. Billy Smith and assistant coach Whitey Chlebove are going together. Brandon Lauer and Seth Lisa drill together. Greg Jones, though, is drilling with Shane Cunanan who is surrendering about 30 pounds. Greg needs to drill with someone who can come close to matching his quickness. Shane doesn’t particularly like going with Greg because it’s tough to work with someone that much heavier. Still, though, the two work together for most of the session before Shane goes with someone closer to his weight.
People probably wonder what Greg’s mentality is like for this tournament. I can definitively say that he is genuinely excited about the NCAA championships. I read somewhere that he is going to have to adjust from flying under the radar as a freshman to being the focal point this year. I disagree for one reason: perception.
Greg has tremendous ability, part innate and part emphasized from his coaches, to make his perception reality. It’s only pressure if he believes it is. He realizes that the people who wrestle him know he’s the NCAA champion, but he’s done that all year. He sees this tournament the same as he did last year: five wins. What fans or media thinks really doesn’t matter. Greg is able to isolate himself from perceived and external burdens. He’s focused but excited.
At 3 p.m., the guys went to have their skin checks. One by one they come out, comparing body fat percentages with each other. The wrestlers tease Seth about the extensiveness of his skin check. Apparently, and unfortunately for Seth, the check went beyond routine and he is now just short of being able to join the army.
After that at about 4:30-ish, we drove to the grocery store that we found the night before. Wrestlers go to grocery stores so that they can have some small food for the rest of the day and for after weigh-ins. They stock up on Gatorade, bread, bagels, turkey, granola bars, peanut butter and jelly and the like.
The guys have a meeting with coach before heading off to dinner about 6:30 p.m. Of course, not all of them are able to go as some of them will dine on turkey bagels or granola bars.
Between 8-10 p.m., the guys shuffle in and out of rooms mingling. Some of the guys are glued to “Ripley’s Believe It Or Not” to see if the world’s largest rubber band ball will bounce or bust when dropped from a mile above the ground (it busts). Seth talks about being the first man out on the mat tomorrow (he is the very first bout of the entire tournament).
Greg and Billy come in and we talk golf for awhile. Greg and I suggest that Billy take some of the farm land he is going to work on after he is done with school and shape it into a par five. We sit quietly as we listen to the president address the nation. There’s really not much to say.
After the somberness of the impending war, the mood lightens a little with talk of hoops. Lebe and Lauer enter the conversation. Lauer likes Maryland because he’s from there, Lebe, who knows professional football much better, gets St. John’s mixed up with St. Joe’s (“St. Joe’s just beat Duke, right?”).
The guys are relaxed. They are enjoying the trip. They are ready to compete. I don’t get the “happy to just be here” vibe from them. They are eager and prepared to go after their dreams tomorrow. I am eager for them too.
See you tomorrow.
