Compare And Contrast Yerk Giants And Boston Red Sox
Mitchell Breuer
1. SPORTS Wednesday
February 6, 2013
Red Wing
Republican Eagle
WRESTLING WITH A
HEAVY HEART
Joe Brown/Republican Eagle
Goodhue senior wrestler Mitchell Breuer with a photo of his brother Bryce and his father Tim. In the span of 17 months, Bryce, 8, died of
leukemia, while Tim, 37, died of a brain aneurysm.
In 17 months, Mitchell Breuer’s life changed with the death of his brother and father.
Through it all, the Goodhue senior has persevered in his home life and on the wrestling mat
By Joe Brown
jbrown@republican-eagle.com
itchell Breuer wres-
tles two different
types of matches.
On the mat, he is
a standout mid-
dleweight for the Goodhue
wrestling team, working his way
up to a 114-59 record and a state
berth last season as a junior in a
varsity career that started in sev-
enth grade.
Internally, Breuer wrestles
with grief, sorrow and the memo-
ries of a brother and father who
were gone much too soon. On Feb.
22, 2007, Bryce Breuer, 8, died of
leukemia. Then nearly 18 months
later, on July 19, 2008, Tim
Breuer, 37, died suddenly from a
brain aneurysm.
“I know the two forces driving
him apart,” said Goodhue
wrestling coach Josh Grant. “On
one hand, he’s tried to funnel a
lot of his grief into wrestling for
his father. And then the other
time, wrestling brings back so
many memories, positive good
memories, that it becomes a
struggle.”
Through the pain of loss,
Mitchell had to grow up fast and
become the strong presence that
his mother and four younger
brothers need.
“(The two deaths) shaped a
bunch of my personality and
what I am now,” Mitchell said.
“I’m more relaxed now, just
calmed down, trying to keep
everyone from fighting. Maybe
that’s how I’ve always been.”
Said Logan Breuer, Mitchell’s
younger brother and a sophomore
on the Goodhue wrestling team,
“Mitch just seems like he’s a lot
more mature, but he also knows
when he can let loose and have
fun. He can recognize situations
better and knows how to react.
“You see a lot of kids his age
and they’re into bad stuff, and
Mitch is really good about it. He
doesn’t get as overwhelmed as
other people.”
M
Turn to BREUER, page 3B
Wingers shake off poor start in big win
1B
Chris Harrell/Republican Eagle
Red Wing's Ben Miller goes up for a layup Monday night against Kasson-Mantorville
at Red Wing High School. The Wingers won easily, 63-41.
By Chris Harrell
charrell@republican-eagle.com
It took Red Wing 4 min-
utes, 25 seconds to wake
up Monday night against
Kasson-Mantorville.
The KoMets controlled
the opening minutes,
beating the Wingers to
every loose ball and estab-
lishing a 10-2 lead. With
13:35 left in the first half,
Red Wing head coach
Doug Toivonen took a
much-needed timeout. He
didn’t tell the team any-
thing new but the mes-
sage came through clear.
“I told them we’d dug
ourselves a hole,” Toivo-
nen said. “It was time to
dig deep. We just needed
to pick it up and the kids
knew that.”
“We just came out flat,”
Red Wing senior Ryan
Boldt added.
After the timeout, the
Wingers went on a 24-2
run to close out of the first
half leading 26-12, and
they led K-M by as many
as 30 points in the second
half en route to a 63-41
victory at home.
“We made a small ad-
justment trying to take
dribble penetration away,”
Toivonen said. “We got
some transition baskets
and it took some pressure
off. The kids kind of re-
laxed and we were able to
flush the first five minutes
because that wasn’t very
good.”
Boldt was the only
player to score in double
figures for either team
Friday night, finishing
with 11 points. Boldt did
the majority of his damage
during the first three min-
utes of the second half,
scoring seven points as
the Wingers extended
their lead to 35-14.
Ty Buck and Jon Sevlie
each finished with nine
points for Red Wing (10-8)
while Jack Leurquin had
eight points and three as-
sists. The Wingers had a
27-17 rebounding edge
and garnered 13 steals in
the victory.
Red Wing’s balanced
scoring and unselfish play
was a continuation of Fri-
day’s win against Chaska.
The Wingers had 13 as-
sists and nine players
score in Monday’s game.
Red Wing improves to 5-2 in section play
with victory over Kasson-Mantorville
Boldt tabs
Legacy as
adviser
group
Turn to SECTION WIN, page 2B
By Chris Harrell
charrell@republican-eagle.com
Another step on Ryan
Boldt’s road to the 2013
Major League Baseball
First-Year Amateur Draft
is complete.
The Red Wing High
School senior recently
chose his adviser group,
the Legacy Agency, headed
by Executive Director and
President Greg Genske.
Because of NCAA rules,
Boldt and his family cannot
sign a contract with the
Legacy Agency and can
only receive advice leading
up to the draft. An adviser’s
job is to prepare a player for
the draft without impacting
his college eligibility.
“Our personalities just
fit,” Boldt said of Genske
and his associates. “They
get you the right informa-
tion. They tell you what
you need to hear, not what
you want to hear.”
For a fam-
ily new to
the process,
Boldt said
he didn’t
even know
about advis-
ers until
last sum-
mer, The
L e g a c y
Agency will help prepare
Boldt for college or the
minor leagues.
“It’s just that, it’s pro-
viding advice,” Genske
said, “making sure he has
all the information at his
disposal so that he may
conduct himself appropri-
ately and make the best
decisions for himself when
the time comes.”
Ryan, a 4.0 student at
Red Wing High School,
signed a national letter of
intent to play baseball for
the University of Ne-
braska, Lincoln, and the
scholarship includes an
opportunity to play for
Cornhuskers head coach
Darin Erstad.
“We’ve received nothing
but outstanding reports
about what an excellent
player he is,” Genske said.
“I’ve heard from a lot of
scouts comparing him to
Darin Erstad, who was my
client during his playing
career. ... Once we had a
chance to meet with Ryan
and his family, we thought
we’d be a good fit.”
Boldt’s academic
prowess creates obvious
leverage come June, but
Ryan said he is excited to
attend Nebraska and look-
ing forward to the draft.
The Legacy Agency, con-
sidered one of the top
sports agencies, has a
clientele of more than 130
Major and Minor Lea-
guers, including Jose
Reyes, Johan Santana
and CC Sabathia.
While the Legacy
Agency consists of many
clients, those clients are at
different stages of their
careers, allowing different
timing for the work each
player needs, Genske said.
Boldt said Genske con-
tacts him about once a
week to build the relation-
ship. As the draft nears,
Ryan said he looks for-
ward to the advice Genske
can provide.
“It’s still just kind of
small talk because we’re
trying to get to know each
other,” Boldt said. “Going
into the high school sea-
son, it’ll probably amp up
a little bit and we’ll talk
about more specifics. …
They’re going to have to
help me out with a lot of
stuff, getting me ready for
the mental side of how
everything’s going to go
with college or the pro
level.”
Boldt
2. Red Wing
Republican Eagle 3BWednesday
February 6, 2013
Setting an example
On May 19, 2003, the
Breuer family received the
news: Bryce, the family’s
third child, had acute lym-
phoblastic leukemia. The
diagnosis came the day
after Bryce’s fifth birth-
day.
Mitchell and Logan re-
call an eager child who fol-
lowed in his brothers’
footsteps.
“He, for sure, would
have been another
wrestler,” Mitchell said.
“He liked to tag along with
us; stuff like that.”
As the Breuer family
was getting blood tests to
see if there were any
matches for Bryce,
Mitchell — at 11 years old
— already had it in his
mind that he would be the
one to help.
“He actually said, when
they all had their blood
drawn, ‘I hope I’m the one
who’s the exact match be-
cause it should be me
going through it instead of
the other brothers,’” said
Susie Matthees, Mitchell’s
mother. “Then, when we
found out a week later
that he was the match, he
got a big smile. It was like
he knew that it was going
to be him.”
Bryce and Mitchell had
two operations: a bone
marrow transplant and a
donor lymphocyte infu-
sion, which involves sepa-
rating healthy T-cells from
a donor’s blood. As his
younger brother was suf-
fering, Mitchell made the
effort to see Bryce at the
hospital as much as he
could.
“Mitchell would always
try and get to the hospital
the most,” Susie said. “A
lot of times, Logan came
along, too.”
Mitchell added, “For a
while, I tried to get out
every Tuesday to go and
see him.”
But Bryce was not
showing progress in his
recovery and was fading
away. In the last week of
his life, Bryce stayed at
the family’s home outside
of Goodhue.
“Family was over a lot,
just hanging out with our
family, trying to distract
you from what’s really
going on, which didn’t
work,” Mitchell said. “The
last thing I remember is
sitting down in the living
room, then Dad came run-
ning down the stairs and
grabbed all of us boys and
brought us upstairs, after
(Bryce) had taken his last
breath.”
Mitchell said he found a
strong figure to emulate in
his little brother.
“I’d say Bryce was
stronger than a lot of
adults, just because he
had gone through so much
and kept a good attitude
the whole way through,”
Mitchell said. “He just
was the unlucky one. Dad
always said that there are
people that can drink and
smoke all the time and
they’re fine, but why does
this have to happen to
him? He’s just a nice little
kid.”
After Bryce’s passing,
then-Wildcats head
wrestling coach Bill Sut-
ter renamed the home
youth wrestling tourna-
ment the Bryce Breuer
Memorial Tournament.
Over a year later, the
tournament was renamed
again to the Tim and
Bryce Breuer Memorial
Tournament.
Flashing lights
Still reeling from
Bryce’s death, the Breuer
family came home on a
July night after picking
up Susie from the airport
following a work confer-
ence in Dallas.
Five minutes after they
got home, as the boys were
outside prepping a bon-
fire, the scene became
frantic inside the house as
Tim collapsed inexplica-
bly.
As Susie performed
CPR on her husband, the
boys were unaware until
Mitchell saw the lights of
the ambulance off the win-
dows of the family’s
camper outside.
“I kept telling all the
adults, the first respon-
ders, to go check on the
boys,” Susie said.
Mitchell, age 13, re-
membered having to han-
dle his brothers as chaos
ensued.
“I was trying to keep
Ethan (the youngest
Breuer boy) under control.
I wasn’t crying at that
point,” Mitchell said. “Our
neighbor came out and
called me and my brothers
to come over. That’s when
I started crying.”
Then Susie had to break
the tragic news: Tim had
died.
“At that point, they
thought it was a heart at-
tack,” Mitchell said.
“They all screamed,
‘No!’” Susie said. “The dif-
ference with Bryce is we
all got to have time with
him, and we hoped and
prayed that he’d beat the
leukemia, but he just kept
getting worse. With Tim,
we were home 20 minutes
and he collapsed and was
gone instantly.”
Though grief-stricken,
Susie gave her oldest son
some advice.
“I remember saying to
him the night that Tim
died, ‘I know you’re going
to want to step up to the
plate and try to be the
man of the house. But I
know your dad would say
to be who you are and be
13. Help your mom out,
but don’t try to grow up
too fast,’” Susie said.
“Tim was such a wise,
wise man, and a commit-
ted and devoted father.
These boys had already
experienced so much with
17 months between
deaths.”
Mitchell matures
Mitchell picked up the
slack wherever he could
around the house.
“He tried to do the
things that Tim did,” Susie
said. “As I learned how to
start doing those things,
we kind of became a team.
But then, he’s also teach-
ing his brothers, too.”
On the family’s farm-
land, Mitchell became the
right-hand man for his
grandpa, helping grow cash
crops during the spring and
fall. Mitchell already had
learned some things from
his dad, like how to drive a
tractor.
“Every weekend I was
out there, because if you’re
down a guy, you can’t oper-
ate,” Mitchell said.
Logan chimed in, “Inef-
ficiencies kill a small busi-
ness.”
Looking to continue
helping the family after
high school, Mitchell has
been accepted at the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin-River
Falls, where he plans on
majoring in ag engineer-
ing or ag management.
Father-and-son sport
Wrestling was always a
uniting factor in the
Breuer household. The
garage was filled with
wrestling mats, and Tim
had hoped to become an
assistant coach at Good-
hue, his alma mater.
“One of the things about
Tim is that he loved hav-
ing five boys,” Susie said.
“And with the ages they
were at, he always said,
‘We’re going to have four
boys on varsity, since
Mitch will be a senior and
Joel will be a seventh-
grader.’ That was his goal,
to get all four of them on
varsity.”
But without his dad, the
sport became a burden
during the early part of
every season for Mitchell.
He struggled to find the
drive to cut weight and to
practice.
“There have been plenty
of times that since you
don’t have Dad around
that you think, ‘I could
just quit. That’s fine. No
one will say I should stay
with it,’” Mitchell said.
“But really, there are
countless, countless peo-
ple around that want you
to stick with it.”
Every match, Mitchell
wrestles for his brother
and especially his dad. His
younger brothers are
wired the same way, but
they say the tragedies af-
fected Mitchell the most.
“It’s different for me, be-
cause Mitch had that (sev-
enth-grade) year with
Dad,” Logan said. “I was
just in fifth grade, but I
still try and do it for them
and make Dad proud.”
In five years of coaching
Mitchell, Grant recalls sev-
eral times where he was
struggling. But with a de-
voted family behind him,
Mitchell was always able
to pull out of his funks.
“I don’t think I could
have done it without his
mother and the family
that’s behind Mitchell,”
Grant said. “There’s been
plenty of conversations
where I could see Mitchell
spiraling emotionally in
practice, almost to the
point of shutting down,
losing his passion for the
sport, because of those
emotions coming back. …
In the end, he’s the one
that keeps sticking it out.”
Family matters
Since October 2011, the
Breuer boys have had a
new face in the house:
their stepfather Ross
Matthees. He and Susie
are expecting their first
child together in May.
Once he met the family,
Ross said he saw a group
of boys who were mature
beyond their years.
What also helped them
bond was wrestling. Ross
was a grappler at Zum-
brota-Mazeppa High
School. After helping out
with the elementary
school team, Ross is now
an assistant coach for the
Goodhue varsity and jun-
ior varsity, where he
works with Mitchell,
Logan and Joel.
“It’s really good just to
get that pat on the back by
him after every match,”
Mitchell said.
Logan added, “You can
always have somebody to
talk to. If you lose a close
match or you go through
something tough with
wrestling, I can come
home and talk to him.”
Having that support –
from home, from Goodhue,
from the wrestling com-
munity – has continued to
be a motivator for the
Breuers through the
tough times.
“There are a lot of differ-
ent roads (Mitchell) could
have gone down,” Grant
said. “I’m way prouder of
that than anything he’s
done on the mat. I’m just
glad wrestling has been a
vehicle to do this stuff and
he still has positive people
around him to carry that
load.”
Success, whether on the
mat, on the farm or with
the family continues to be
a driving force for
Mitchell, just like the fa-
ther he learned from and
the brother he was willing
to give anything for.
“I know if (Dad) was
still here today, and he
saw how Mitch and me
were doing, he’d think
that was pretty awesome,”
Logan said.
Mitchell added, “I think
he’d be very proud of us
and proud for us. Go to
state, don’t go to state,
but for sure, you finish a
season. You start some-
thing, you finish it. That’s
what he would want the
most.”
BREUER Continued from page 1B
Top: Joe Brown/Republican Eagle. Bottom: Submitted photo
Top: Joining the Goodhue varsity wrestling team as a seventh-grader, senior Mitchell
Breuer has a record of 114-59 and reached state for the first time as a junior.
Bottom: On Dec. 14, 2012 at the Chisago Lakes Invitational, Breuer picked up his
100th career win.
Boys basketball standings
Missota Conference
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Holy Angels 6-1 14-5 70.2 64.1
Shakopee 6-1 10-8 58.2 58.9
New Prague 4-3 11-6 62.7 59.4
Farmington 4-3 11-8 69.7 62.9
Chaska 3-4 9-10 64.8 64.7
Red Wing 2-5 10-8 64.1 56.7
Chanhassen 2-5 8-10 59.7 61.3
Northfield 1-6 6-11 58.2 63.8
Hiawatha Valley League - Blue
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Lake City 8-1 15-3 60.9 49.9
Cannon Falls 7-2 11-8 57.7 52.7
Zumbrota-Mazeppa 5-2 9-8 53.8 49.2
Kenyon-Wanamingo 4-5 7-11 51.9 56.2
Pine Island 3-5 4-12 48.5 58.4
Goodhue 3-6 8-10 51.9 50.7
Triton 0-9 2-16 49.4 65.1
Hiawatha Valley League - Gold
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Byron 9-0 17-1 55.9 37.8
Hayfield 6-3 13-5 59.2 51.6
La Crescent 4-3 8-9 53.7 56.7
Rochester Lourdes 5-4 13-5 62.6 53.2
Stewartville 5-5 8-9 52.9 53.3
Winona Cotter 2-6 9-8 58.1 56.0
Kasson-Mantorville 0-10 2-17 46.9 61.5
Middle Border Conference
Team Conf Overall
Durand 7-1 13-1
Somerset 6-1 9-3
Prescott 5-3 8-3
New Richmond 4-4 7-6
Baldwin-Woodville 4-4 10-4
Amery 3-5 5-9
Osceola 1-6 4-9
Ellsworth 1-7 4-10
Girls basketball standings
Missota Conference
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Chanhassen 7-1 14-6 62.8 51.4
Chaska 6-2 15-5 59.1 50.1
Shakopee 6-2 13-7 53.0 50.5
Red Wing 6-3 14-5 61.5 52.3
New Prague 5-3 14-5 57.6 48.7
Holy Angels 2-6 9-11 57.3 56.5
Northfield 1-7 6-13 47.8 53.7
Farmington 0-9 2-18 43.6 55.2
Hiawatha Valley League - Blue
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Pine Island 8-0 17-3 56.6 41.6
Goodhue 7-2 17-4 62.6 48.0
Kenyon-Wanamingo 6-3 14-8 56.3 49.6
Lake City 4-5 11-8 57.9 47.6
Zumbrota-Mazeppa 3-4 7-11 48.0 49.8
Triton 2-7 4-16 42.5 61.0
Cannon Falls 0-9 1-19 32.2 62.7
Hiawatha Valley League - Gold
Team Conf Overall PF PA
Kasson-Mantorville 8-2 15-6 63.1 50.4
Hayfield 7-2 14-7 54.8 46.2
Byron 5-4 12-6 55.2 51.2
Rochester Lourdes 4-5 8-13 43.1 47.0
Winona Cotter 3-5 8-12 52.2 51.0
Stewartville 4-7 8-15 45.9 51.3
La Crescent 1-7 5-15 54.1 60.8
Middle Border Conference
Team Conf Overall
Baldwin-Woodville 6-1 11-2
New Richmond 6-1 8-5
Durand 5-3 10-4
Prescott 5-3 8-4
Amery 4-5 7-7
Osceola 3-4 5-8
Somerset 1-6 1-12
Ellsworth 0-7 1-11
Boys hockey standings
Missota Conference
Team Conf Overall GF GA
Holy Angels 9-1-1 11-8-1 5.3 4.1
New Prague 8-1-1 11-7-2 2.9 2.5
Northfield 7-3-0 13-7-0 3-5 2-7
Farmington 4-5-1 10-9-1 3.4 2.7
Chanhassen 3-5-1 6-13-1 2.0 3.3
Chaska 3-6-1 10-8-3 3.4 3.7
Red Wing 2-6-2 2-16-2 2.1 4.5
Shakopee 0-9-1 4-16-1 1.7 3.7
Girls hockey standings
Missota Conference
Team Conf Overall GF GA
Red Wing 7-1-0 23-2-0 5.8 1.8
Shakopee 5-2-1 12-11-2 3.9 3.1
New Prague 4-3-1 18-6-1 4.9 2.0
Northfield 3-5-0 15-9-0 4.0 2.9
Farmington 0-8-0 5-18-2 1.7 3.7