ABBOTT BLOG: Stand up now and help Jordan and Adeline win prestigious USOC awards by voting online

The wrestling family takes great pride in its sport. Those who go through the experience of training and competing in perhaps the most challenging sport on earth come out of it as changed people. We become a true wrestling family, a close-knit group bonded by mutual respect.


It’s not often that the wrestling family can step up and show that we are strong and we are united. We saw that a few days ago when over 42,000 fans showed up on a Saturday morning to watch the Grapple on the Gridiron in Iowa. This week, we have another chance to stand up and be counted.


2015 World champions Jordan Burroughs and Adeline Gray are finalists for the USOC’s Team USA awards, the Best of the Year. Burroughs is up for Male Olympic Athlete of the Year and Gray is up for Female Olympic Athlete of the Year.


Vote now, vote often. Tell your friends. Share this with others. Don’t wait. Voting ends on Friday, November 20.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR JORDAN BURROUGHS AND ADELINE GRAY


This isn’t going to be a lecture, and I’m not going to beg you to do this. As a wrestling person, you should really want to help here. You know that Jordan Burroughs and Adeline Gray deserve this. Why wouldn’t you do your part to help us get them what they have earned?


Consider Burroughs. Three World titles. The 2012 Olympic title. A 2014 World bronze medal, while hobbled on a bad leg. A 114-2 career record. Add in the amazing style of wrestling, and the wonderful role model that he is for young people, and he truly becomes somebody who stands above others.


Then there’s Gray. Three World titles. Two World crowns in a row. Five World medals. A 25-match winning streak. Dominance in almost every match she wrestled in 2015. She is also a special person, who is great in public settings, a leader in the community, a hero to young girls. She is what the Olympic movement is all about.


The USOC has been giving out these kind of awards for decades. Almost always, the winners come from the chosen sports which hog up the airtime on the Olympic broadcasts, the track and field, swimming, gymnastics, skiing kind of sports which have an advantage in these kind of things.


We have only had two wrestlers win this award, two-time Olympic champion and four-time World champion John Smith back in 1990 and Olympic champion and World champion Rulon Gardner in 2000. Smith had to win four in a row before he got this award. Gardner had to beat an unbeaten three-time Olympic champion Alexander Kareline of Russia in the Olympic finals to get his award.


The format of this award helps us, if we stand up as a family. A full 50% of the vote goes to the fans. It becomes a contest, a competition. Can wrestling get more votes than track-and-field or gymnastics or swimming in this contest? Can we win this time?


We all spend a lot of time on the internet these days. We check our emails. We go to social media. We do research on websites, and often do our shopping there. We are connected. Everybody does this, from young kids to our grandparents. As they said on the Six-Million-Dollar-Man, we have the technology. We can do this.


It’s really up to you. Should the same old sports keep getting these awards, or should the pride of wrestling, who happen to really deserve it, get the recognition and respect this time around? I say we should step up and get this one for our wrestlers.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR JORDAN BURROUGHS AND ADELINE GRAY