As a sportswriter, I always wanted to write one of those books where you spend a whole season with a team and chronicle their ups and downs. When I left the writing side of the journalism game on a full-time basis in 1998, I had already formulated some ideas for one of these books, but the idea never happened.
The results of these kind of exercises can really vary. The team could not nearly have the kind of interesting story the author hopes or the author could mishandle the material which falls in his lap. I recently read “A Season on the Mat: Dan Gable and the Pursuit of Perfection” by Nolan Zavoral which, unfortunately, falls nearer to the second category. Still, I really recommend this book, especially if you don’t know much abot the sheer awesomeness that is Dan Gable.
My background in wrestling made this a perfect find when I browsed the sale rack at a bookstore late last year. The book chronicles wrestling legend Gable during his final season as Iowa’s head coach in 1996-97. While the team struggles to meet Iowa’s legendary standards, Gable deals with the question of retirement as well as hip replacement surgery necessary.
The team story is fascinating. With not much experience back in the lineup, Gable and his coaching staff have to push and cajole the wrestlers to meet their potential. This includes two-time national champion Lincoln McIlravy, who is dealing with concussions and questioning whether the Iowa philosophy of never stopping is the right mindset. There’s also Lee Fullhart, who ends up winning an NCAA title, but has to decide how to balance the demands of the sport with his academic load as an engineering major.
Gable’s hip surgery plays a key role because he has to cede power to assistants Jim Zalesky and Tom Brands through part of the season as he heals. The myriad injuries Gable deals with on a day-to-day basis form a nice backbone for the story and how he relates to his athletes. Since 1996 represented one of the last seasons in the Wild West of weight cutting for college wrestling, Gable’s ability to help his wrestlers drop insane amounts of weight in a short time demonstrated the amazing influence he had.
However, the result of that influence and the relationship between him and his assistants and Brands and Zalesky themselves brought the book down in my opinion. The Hawkeyes had a ridiculous national tournament in 1997, beating back all the doubt from the previous months. Gable had worked his magic.
The book, however, gives the NCAAs just a chapter or two and really doesn’t go into much depth about the monumental effort. He then fast-forwards immediately to Gables retirement and Zalesky’s ascension a few months later. Earlier chapters had focused a little on the tension between the pensive and stoic Zalesky and the emotional and confrontational Brands, but the ending just skipped over how that affected the future of the Iowa program.
The afterword in the 2007 edition I read highlighted why more was needed at the end. Zalesky did OK, but could never match Gable and left on really bad terms a few years later. Brands returned and hired Gable as an assistant coach. He has excelled, showing that the rift back in 1996 was real and probably deserved more attention. Other matters such as McIlravy passing on coaching opportunities and instead moving into business ventures after a short international wrestling career showed me that the main text needed more depth other than angry quotes from McIlravy’s father about Gable’s style.
I probably have a tough grading scale for a book like this because I enjoy the style so much and this effort takes a look at one of my favorite sports, a sport I think deserves better treatment in the media sometimes. I really did enjoy the book, but just think it could have been better in hindsight.