Hey, everyone. It's been a crazy week, so I haven't been able to check in, but I did want to give my 2 cents.
I don't see a dual meet championship ever happening after the individual tournament. If you want to see what that tournament does to people, check out this gallery from when it was in Madison Square Garden:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-booth/the-faces-of-college-wrestlers
And that's not even taking weight into consideration. These guys have been sucking weight for so long, extending the season by another week would be torture for some. Like Coach Gavin said about Micky Phillippi, he's been making a lighter weight than he did in high school for the past 7 years. Can't see a guy like him wanting to go another week, even if it is for the team.
The percentage of top guys missing from the team competition would be way higher than football players opting out of bowl games.
I think the biggest thing to understand is this: College wrestling is really, really hard. Mentally and physically. The season is already way too long. There's already a significant movement to switch to a single-semester sport, and I think it has to go that way. That's a big part of why we're seeing top guys skip competitions. Start it in January. Yeah, you'd still have to watch your weight during Christmas, but at least you could enjoy Thanksgiving. Plus, an NCAA tournament in April would get away from trying to compete with March Madness on TV, although baseball season would be starting, so ESPN might be more reluctant to air it.
With all of that being said, I am a big proponent of a duals title. I was fortunate enough to wrestle in the National Duals and it's one of the highlights of my career. I wasn't good enough to make the NCAA tournament, but I loved competing with my teammates on a big stage.
The rumor has always been that Cael didn't like the national duals and that's why it went away. I'm not sure if that's true or not. Having Nick Suriano get hurt in the PSU-Okie State match certainly didn't help its legacy. I think many top coaches would love to see it - or some format, such as the bonus points for the individual tournament - return. That's hard, though, if the biggest name in the sport fights it.
The great thing about duals is they're accessible to the general public. Only hard-core fans are going to an eight-hour tournament but if we truly want to "grow the sport" we need to focus on duals. You can attract a casual or maybe even a new fan with a two-hour dual.