Ok, so I am having a great year. I started a new wrestling website a couple months ago called The Pin Doctors and it is a full-fledged hit. The Chiefs made me cry from happiness over..and over...and over... Never thought I'd see them win one...honestly. I seriously had no hope of that ever happening.
My brother, Brennan Swafford is a die hard Chiefs fan as well.
That earned him his 2nd OW of the Heart of America Conference award. And he's just a true Sophomore. So he qualified for Nationals as expected. As a Freshman, he placed 7th at nationals.
First match at nationals, he beat a Greco world team member, 20-2... here is his interview after that:
He then won his next 3 matches to make the finals, which were televised on ESPN3 Saturday night and wrestled like the little athletic genius he is:
And then he gave me this awesome interview right after:
My brother is a national champ. My brother, who was snubbed so badly in the recruiting process, proved everyone wrong!!! Brennan was obviously a great wrestler in HS, but was also first team all-state football and placed like 5-6 times in sprinting events in track. He originally signed on to playy football at Graceland, but missed wrestling and wanted to save his body so he can try out for the NFL after he graduates. And I'm dead serious when I say this... it's feasible for him. He is a FREAK athlete. I'm dead serious when I say that he should be looked at. He won the All-Hawkeye Athlete of the year as a Senior in HS which is given to the region's best all-around athlete and for whatever reason, he couldn't get a call or an email back. Not from one D1 school...out of 12. HE SHOWED THEM!!! AND WE ALL KNEW HE WOULD!!!
He was also first in the state for art with a sketch he drew of Bruce Lee in HS. An art nerd and current graphic design major.
I have some people to thank on here who have followed his career over the years on here.
Glorydayz, Lonewolf, Burt, Sorter, Hamas as kept up here and there, Rudy Lost the Toss, Brianfo.... the two main ones though:
Iowanian. He has followed him for years and has offered great praise and insight.
And...
Clay Wendler. He made this awesome highlight reel of him last year despite his fanbase giving him shit for posting non-Chiefs material:
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ENJOYING THIS RIDE WITH ME, GUYS!!! AND HE'S JUST A SOPHOMORE!!!
So, I just want to start by saying that I’m extremely grateful for all of the great things Graceland has done for me. The support from my coaches and professors has been awesome. With that being said I would like to announce that I will be continuing my journey at Iowa. Go Hawks! pic.twitter.com/pyCckVW1dZ
Originally Posted by rico:
I don’t think I’ve mentioned it here other than just a little bit ago, but a couple months ago my brother became an Iowa Hawkeye wrestler! He will be there for his last 2 competitive seasons and will use a redshirt this year! He just finished up his first Hawkeye team camp last week!
So, I just want to start by saying that I’m extremely grateful for all of the great things Graceland has done for me. The support from my coaches and professors has been awesome. With that being said I would like to announce that I will be continuing my journey at Iowa. Go Hawks! pic.twitter.com/pyCckVW1dZ
Well, that’s impressive! After his redshirt season, I might try to make it up there to watch him wrestle. I have an old high school classmate with two kids that attend Iowa University. Would be a good excuse to to visit him. [Reply]
Originally Posted by LoneWolf:
Well, that’s impressive! After his redshirt season, I might try to make it up there to watch him wrestle. I have an old high school classmate with two kids that attend Iowa University. Would be a good excuse to to visit him.
Originally Posted by EPodolak:
That's very cool. Who is his competition..Marinelli?
He’s redshirting this coming year so the next year it’ll likely be a combo of Brennan, Patrick Kennedy, Nelson Brands and Abe Assad filling in to 165-174-184…. assad may be too big tho. [Reply]
For those of you who don’t follow the wrestling thread, but have followed my little brother’s journey:
This Friday, my youngest brother makes his Iowa Hawkeye wrestling varsity debut against Minnesota at Carver Hawkeye Arena!!! His redshirt was recently pulled. He wrestled attached for the first time this past weekend at a big D1 wrestling event called The Southern Scuffle and placed 6th… made the semis and skid... Anyways…Should be on either B10 Network or ESPN or ESPN2 I’m guessing. [Reply]
I've followed Iowa this year....remembered your brother is there. 174? Looks like the Minn match is on the BigTen network. Congrats, I'll look for him. [Reply]
Originally Posted by EPodolak:
I've followed Iowa this year....remembered your brother is there. 174? Looks like the Minn match is on the BigTen network. Congrats, I'll look for him.
Originally Posted by rico:
For those of you who don’t follow the wrestling thread, but have followed my little brother’s journey:
This Friday, my youngest brother makes his Iowa Hawkeye wrestling varsity debut against Minnesota at Carver Hawkeye Arena!!! His redshirt was recently pulled. He wrestled attached for the first time this past weekend at a big D1 wrestling event called The Southern Scuffle and placed 6th… made the semis and skid... Anyways…Should be on either B10 Network or ESPN or ESPN2 I’m guessing.
I tell you what... someday I could write a very interesting book about these past 4 years with my youngest brother, Brennan's wrestling journey that continues to be just crazy as well as my journey of the past 2.5 years of building what is now one of the biggest wrestling media outlets that exists, The Pin Doctors aka PinDox.
So Brennan went from quitting wrestling after HS due to being heartbroken after losing in the state finals for the 2nd time as a Senior and falling just short of becoming a state champ to playing football at Graceland University on a scholarship to all the sudden missing the sport of wrestling halfway through his Freshmen year, so he went out in January and ended up becoming one of the only Freshman All-Americans in all of NAIA that year to winning NAIA Nationals the next 2 seasons (1 season was a free covid year that didn't hurt his eligibility), being named the Outstanding Wrestler Of the Heart Of America Conference both years, to transferring to the Iowa Hawkeyes aka one of the best teams in the country, to putting together a first/redshirt season for the Hawkleyes that had some highs and lows to now.... in which, now, very recently, Brennan has made a transition in his wrestling game to where he is a straight-up D1 hammer... Brennan placed 3rd at the U23 World Team Trials at 79 kgs...a bracket that had 112 collegiate level wrestlers in it, most of them D1. He got beat in the semifinals because of one of the most controversial "slip" calls I've ever seen... to be honest, he got robbed and should have made the finals. But he bounced back for 3rd... and beat Illinois's and Michigan State's starters to do so. He also teched out the 2021 Pan-Am Champ, Sam Wolfe out of Air Force. He also pinned Edmond Ruth, a stud out of Illinois and brother to 3x national Champion from Penn State, Edward Ruth... some say he has just as much potential as his older brother. And Brennan pinned him with what Head Coach Tom Brands described as "the best headlock he has seen in D1 in 20 years." I mean, he placed 3rd at this huge tourney that many believe he should have won and beat a bunch of really great wrestlers in doing so... it's not like he wasn't battle-tested. He is a legit D1 hammer now and it is a lot of fun being his brother right now. It's crazy to think that he started out his collegiate career as a guy on a football scholarship who never wanted to wrestle again...Never would have guessed that he would work his way to becoming a Hawkeye hammer....
Here is his highlight reel I made for him a couple weeks ago. These highlights are all from the World Team Trials... let me know what you think!!!
Here's his headlock match vs. Ed Ruth:
Here is the semifinal match that he lost and most believe shouldn't have, vs Mickey O'Malley of Drexel:
This is his conolation semis win over 2X NCAA Qualifier, Dan Braunagel of Illinois:
Awesome story about your bro OP. It's nice to read something positive during the dog days of summer. I think I will throw Vision Quest in the DVD player tonight as a tribute. [Reply]
