Why Jordan Burroughs Is The Most Important Wrestler Of His Generation
Why Jordan Burroughs Is The Most Important Wrestler Of His Generation
Jordan Burroughs has cemented his legacy as being the most transformative wrestler in America.
There have been many legends in the long and storied history of American wrestling. Jordan Burroughs stands out among wrestlers of his generation for both his accolades on the mat and his leadership off the mat. The United States of America is now in one of their most successful periods of freestyle wrestling of all-time and it all started with Jordan Burroughs.
Growing Up In South Jersey
Burroughs was first introduced to the sport of wrestling as a youth in South Jersey in the town of Sicklerville where he grew up. Though a state champion in talent-rich New Jersey, Burroughs was not one of the more heavily recruited wrestlers of the high school class of 2006.
Nevertheless, Burroughs accepted a scholarship to Nebraska which he attended from 2006 to 2011.
King Of College Wrestling
It took a year for Burroughs to find his groove in Lincoln, Nebraska but by his sophomore season he had established himself as one of the top middleweights in the country, earning third place at the 2008 NCAA Championships.
Burroughs ascended to the top of the podium the next year, winning his first NCAA title in 2009 at 157-pounds. An injury kept JB off the mat for the 2009-10 season, though Burroughs was able to return in 2010-11.
Watch this blast from Jordan's past as he wins a match in December of 2008 at the CKLV over NCAA champ Jordan Leen of Cornell:
In his final year at Nebraska, the Husker senior tore through his collegiate competition, going undefeated on his way to a second NCAA title, which he won at 165-pounds. Burroughs was also awarded the Hodge Trophy, wrestling's equivalent to the Heisman.
The 'All I See Is Gold' Era
Burroughs began his international freestyle wrestling career Immediately after his college wrestling career ended. He also changed his social media handles to "alliseeisgold" in reference to his pursuit of global dominance.
Jordan lived up to the hype, making three straight senior teams and winning gold medals at three consecutive competitions, the 2011 World Championships in Istanbul, the 2012 London Olympic Games, and the 2013 World Championships in Budapest, putting Burroughs at the absolute pinnacle of the sport, all at 74 kilograms.
Watch Jordan announce his presence on the international scene with a win over defending world champ Denis Tsargush of Russia at the 2011 World Championships:
Extended Excellence
JB would settle for a bronze medal at the 2014 World Championships before getting back to the top in 2015 with another gold medal at the World Championships held in Las Vegas.
Burroughs would miss the podium at the Rio Olympic Games in 2016 but would bounce back and make the senior world team in 2017, 2018, and 2019, a dominant streak of nine years as the best 74 kilogram wrestlers in America. Burroughs would win a gold (2017) and two bronzes (2018 & 2019) over those three years.
Watch Jordan defeat Italian superstar Frank Chamizo at the 2018 Beat the Streets charity event:
Burroughs would finally be dethroned domestically when Kyle Dake beat him at the Olympic Team Trials for the Tokyo Games. But again, Jordan would demonstrate his resiliency by moving up to 79 kilograms and winning two more gold medals at the 2021 and 2022 World Championships.
Team USA Before Burroughs
The United States of America has been a contender at the team level since wrestling was first included in the 1904 Olympics. Team USA could count on multiple medals at nearly every World Championship and Olympics held since then, reaching a high water mark in the mid-1990s when they took home team titles in men's freestyle at the 1993 and 1995 World Championships and won the unofficial team title at the 1996 Atlanta Games (they don't keep official team scores at the Olympics).
The Americans hit a rough patch in the late aughts, however, as the Americans only averaged a single medal a year from 2007 to 2010. The 2010 World Championships in Moscow was a low point for the Red White & Blue as Team USA was shut out of the medal stand and finished as a team in a dismal 22nd place.
That was also the year before Jordan Burroughs made his first World team.
Team USA After Burroughs
The American Wrestling Renaissance began the moment Burroughs made his first senior level team, as Team USA finished third with two medals (Burrough's gold and Jake Varner's bronze at 97kg) plus three fifth-place finishes.
Team USA stayed competitive with the best in the world for the rest of Burroughs' stint on the team, culminating in 2017 when America won a men's freestyle team title for the first time since 1995.
And though Burroughs was not on the Tokyo Olympic squad, the momentum built during the previous nine years continued through the pandemic and Team USA brought home five medals from Japan, the most since 1996, when there were ten weight classes as opposed to six at the most recent Olympics.
Burroughs returned to the lineup for the next two World Championships, where he won again won gold in both tournaments, and Team USA returned to the top of the team race in 2022, when the Americans once again brought home a team title.
Watch Burroughs win his history-making seventh World or Olympic gold medal:
The American men's freestyle team has never been stronger or deeper and it all started when Jordan Ernest Burroughs started competing on the senior circuit.
The Burroughs Legacy
Jordan Burroughs has seven world or Olympic men's freestyle gold medals, the most in American history. He's got three more bronze medals on top of that to bring his total medal count to 10, good for the second most in history.
For a good portion of Jordan Burroughs' run, he was beating wrestlers like Kyle Dake and David Taylor, keeping them from making world and Olympic teams at 74 kilograms. Dake has four gold World or Olympic medals to his name while Taylor has three. Only Burroughs, John Smith and Bruce Baumgartner have more golds than Dake and only those three plus Leroy Kemp have more than Taylor.
While Burroughs was fending off some of the best American wrestlers in history he was also defeating the best Russian and Iranian wrestlers, as well as wrestlers from ex-Soviet Republics that did not field their own teams full of contenders prior to 1993.
All taken into account, it's clear that America's recent golden age of men's freestyle wrestling can be traced back to the generational talents of Jordan "All I See Is Gold" Burroughs.