Early Life and Amateur Wrestling
Hager has been wrestling since the age of five, and wrestled in high school with Danny Hodge's grandson. He is good friends with Hodge, and grew up living two blocks away from him in Perry, Oklahoma.
Hager was a two-sport athlete in high school, in addition to being class president as a sophomore and junior. Hager was the No. 5-ranked 215-pounder by Wrestling USA. He won the 215-pound division of the state wrestling championship as a junior after being a runner-up as a sophomore. Hager then joined the Junior National USA wrestling team as a heavyweight during the summer of 2000. A two-time All-American Scholar, he also had 45 tackles and six sacks in three games before breaking his ankle as a junior. He recorded 75 tackles and three fumble recoveries as a senior, helping Perry post a 10-3 mark.
The University of Oklahoma recruited Hager as a two-sport athlete. He played football and was the second-string defensive tackle behind National Football League players Tommie Harris and Dusty Dvoracek. Due to his high-school wrestling background, he was asked to join the wrestling team as a heavyweight in his sophomore year, and switched over full-time. During his junior year, he was introduced to Jim Ross, who was then World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE)'s Head of Talent Relations, through former OU defensive tackle Dusty Dvoracek, Hager’s close friend and college roommate. Ross encouraged Hager to contact him after graduating. At the 2005 NCAA Division I championships, he lost to University of Pennsylvania's Matt Feast in the second round, and did not place. As a senior in 2006, Hager had a seventh-place finish in the NCAA championships and also defeated the eventual heavyweight national champion, Dustin Fox from Northwestern. He was named an All-American, while also setting the record of 30 pins for most pins in a single season.
In 2006, Hager graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a Bachelor's degree in finance. Following his graduation, he had a job with a firm in Dallas, but was offered a contract with WWE the day he was scheduled to start.
Read more about this topic: Jack Swagger
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