Rodriguez-Veras excels in two unique ways: wrestling ... and music
Groton Picture it: A school bus full of high school wrestlers. Maybe a black eye here, fat lip there. Long day at an interminable tournament. Rolling down the highway ... and they all start singing ... Adele?
"By the time we got to 'we could have had it all,'" New London High School senior wrestler Luis Rodriguez-Veras was saying Saturday, alluding to Adele's hit "Rolling In The Deep," "we're all banging on seats and signing at the top of our lungs. Team bonding." In a very New London way. This is what happens when Rodriguez-Veras wrestles on your team. Not only do you practice pinning, throwing and other vagaries of the sport, but you sing, too.
Effortlessly cool kid, this Rodriguez-Veras. And a personification of the marriage between sports and the arts. Not only is he an accomplished wrester in Whalerville, but he performed last year (and hopes to this year) at the New London Youth Talent Show, the city's annual tribute to peace, acceptance, diversity and community, played before a full house at the Garde.
"You should hear him," New London coach Mike Gorton said Saturday's Eastern Connecticut Conference tournament at Fitch, where the Whalers finished fifth overall and unseated Ledyard as the Division I champion. "The kids would make him sing every bus ride home. 'Shut up! Shut up! Everybody quiet down! Luis is going to sing!' I didn't even know. He's this little sophomore on
years ago). Then he's doing 'All of Me' by John Legend and stuff by Adele. I have it on video. Hilarious. And he plays guitar. He can sing and play at the same time, which is very hard to do."
It's the image here that's so charming: tough, focused, bruised wrestlers finding their theatrical vent. But maybe then not so strange. In wrestling and performing you are all you've got. It requires self-confidence, self-reliance and enviable courage.
"It's got to be the same part of the brain," Gorton said. "That's why he quickly became a good wrestler. Because he's a good performer. He's used to having the pressure on him. Maybe a football or soccer player might not be used to having all that attention. Or having to wear (the wrestling) outfit."
Rodriguez-Veras blossomed last year, his junior year, on stage and on the mat. How? He made a decision.
"Last year was my first year for the talent show. Goosebumps. I just sang. It was trying something new," he said. "But basically my junior year, I decided I'm going all out. Nothing to lose. I'm almost done with high school, I thought. It's time. I went to Opens in wrestling.
"Singing and wrestling are both commitments. You've got to practice to be good. I'd go home after wrestling and sing and play my guitar. Junior year was the light of my life, a real checkpoint for me."
Rodriguez-Veras, who placed third at 170 pounds Saturday, hasn't let the individuality of his vocations create any self-indulgence. Whatsoever. Compliment him? He deflects everything to mom and dad, former New London High music teacher Christina Nadeau, Gorton, his coach, and the whole gang at the talent show.
"I've been singing since I was little. My mom used to tell me when I was two years old when I was singing 'A, B, C, D, E, F, G' that I'd be a singer," Rodriguez-Veras said. "I didn't think I was all that. My dad got me a guitar my freshman year. So grateful. Now I can play 50 songs by memory. It's part of my soul now.
"Ms. Nadeau encouraged me. We would always sing. She really built my confidence. So did coach Gorton on the mat. I'm pinning kids I thought I couldn't pin and throwing kids I thought I couldn't throw."
New London, a city versed in sports tradition, has a burgeoning institution in the Talent Show, too. Both uniquely illustrate the spirit of the city. Here is one kid who builds the bridge between the two.
"He's a very interesting human being," Gorton said of Rodriguez-Veras. "Multi-talented, always thinking, always kind and respectful, but also very competitive." This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro