All-Area wrestling: Hunter Mullins is the most dominant wrestler Orting’s ever had, coach says

Orting High School wrestling coach Jody Coleman will wrestle anybody except for his senior heavyweight Hunter Mullins.

Why?

“I think I was little mean,” Mullins said. “He has to go to school and work the next day, and he has kids.”

Mullins was a sophomore the last time they rumbled, and Coleman said that Mullins picked him up by his armpits from the seated position and “flat-backed” him.

“It’s physics,” Coleman said. “I could not have grabbed the mat harder with my hands. So I just said, ‘We’re done. I got a wife and kids, man.’  ”

Coleman said Mullins is the most dominant wrestler he’s ever coached. Mullins is 40-1 (his lone loss coming in the semifinals of the Walsh Ironman in Ohio), and already has a school-record 36 pins this season.

This is the same wrestling program that is the only one in the state to have produced two four-time state champions (Drew Templeman and Fred Green).

“At least in a single year, Hunter is the most dominant I’ve ever coached,” Coleman said.

Mullins, who has been named to The News Tribune’s All-Area wrestling team for the second consecutive year, is the same wrestler who jumped into the considerably lighter Coleman’s arms and engulfed him in a hug after winning his first state title last year.

The senior, who is ranked at the No. 14 heavyweight high school wrestler in the nation, is almost constantly smiling. He’s also Orting’s ASB President.

Where some wrestlers are getting in their zone before matches, not to be approached, Mullins is chatting and smiling up until the match begins.

It’s a stark contrast to the Mullins you see on the mat.

“I just flip a switch,” Mullins said. “I’m here, let’s wrestle. I’m the best. I’m going to smash your head in. That’s it — I’m the best, I’m here to beat you into the ground and if you keep getting back up, I’m going to keep beating you down.”

That came from working with his club team’s assistant coach Brandon Cruz, whose son, Alex Cruz, is a sophomore on the Orting wrestling team and a defending state champion.

Mullins said their club practices against each other resembled something more from “Fight Club” than a wrestling match.

He learned to flip that switch — to become the meanest person in the world on a wrestling mat.

“You should be getting warned for being too mean,” Mullins said. “(Brandon Cruz) was the meanest guy you’d ever wrestle. There was one day he was like, ‘I’m going to break you today.’ I was like, ‘What does that mean?’ He’s like ‘I’m going to make you cry.’ It got to the point where we were in all-out fist fights on the mat and we don’t even care.

“But when we get off the mat we don’t hate each other. We’re like, ‘Hey, that’s a good workout, man. Nice job.’  ”

It’s almost like he has two separate personalities, Orting senior Erik Jacobson said.

“It’s really drastic,” said Jacobson, who won a regional title in the 220-pound weight class this past weekend. “I’ve never seen anything like it — someone who can just turn it on and off like that.”

Coleman had to move chairs out of the way outside the wrestling mat to keep Mullins from throwing his opponent into them.

He remembers Mullins matched against a Kentwood wrestler, just after Mullins had broke his nose.

“He’s just like, ‘I’m going to get this over with. My nose hurts. I’m just going to go pin him,’ ” Coleman said. “When he’s wrestling and he gets the angle he’s looking for — it’s just 0-60 (claps) that fast.”

Mullins said one of the first experiences to get him excited about wrestling was when his uncle took him to his first Mat Classic in 2007. He’d take Mullins out of school early on the Friday of Mat Classic every year from then on until he died in 2011.

“And I thought Mat Classic was the coolest thing ever,” Mullins said. “He was like a second dad to me. He took me to my first one. I wish he could watch me in my last one.”

On every class assignment he writes his name as Hunter “2X” Mullins for the second state title he’s seeking this weekend.

Orting appears to be the favorite to win the 2A team title this year, which would be its first since winning four consecutive team titles as a 1A school from 2009-2012.

“Every day I sit in class and think about it,” Mullins said. “I can have all these wins, but if I don’t get that championship on Saturday, what was the whole point?”

This story was originally published February 17, 2016 at 9:38 PM with the headline "All-Area wrestling: Hunter Mullins is the most dominant wrestler Orting’s ever had, coach says."