WESTFIELD, Ind. -- Rock Ya-Sin wasn’t trying to hear Keith Johnson, his wrestling coach at Southwest DeKalb High School in Decatur, Georgia. Johnson told Ya-Sin, a junior in high school at the time, that he should go out for the football team even though Ya-Sin had never played the sport before.
Ya-Sin respected his coach but wanted nothing to do football. He wanted to be a college wrestler, just like Johnson had been.
“I flat out told him that wrestling would only take him so far,” Johnson said. “It would only get the discipline in him. The thing is, Rock didn’t need the discipline part.