Jesse Mendez on wrestling transfer portal: 'You'll never see me not in an Ohio State singlet'

Jesse Mendez is as loyal as they come and the Ohio State wrestling national champion isn’t going anywhere.

With two years of eligibility left, Mendez has his sights squarely on winning two more NCAA titles for the Buckeyes. In the age of the transfer portal, big named wrestlers could surely enter the portal, change schools, “chase the bag” or represent another school.

Mendez made it known that he’ll never be that type of athlete.

“It’s just loyalty, I’m not gonna bite the hand that feeds me,” Mendez said on The Athletor Podcast. “I mean, the people at Ohio State (are supportive) so it’s like, why would I bite the hand that feeds me? They put a lot of trust in recruiting me, giving me whatever scholarship, they had a lot of trust recruiting me, bringing me on campus expecting me to be the guy. Why would I be the guy to transfer to another school just because they’re offering me a bag? 

“You’ll never see me not in an Ohio State singlet. It’s just not gonna happen. I’m not in it for the money. And, you know, they put a lot of trust in me to be a leader and to be that guy, and I’m going to be that guy.”

Mendez went 29-2 last year, winning the national title over Penn State’s Beau Bartlett, whom he won two of three matchups last season.

Jesse Mendez all in on Ohio State wrestling

Ohio State had numerous injuries during the 2023-24 campaign, thrusting in some young guys into the lineup. It didn’t matter as Ohio State was one of the better teams all season long anyway.

That included Mendez being joined by freshman Rocco Welsh in the NCAA finals. Welsh lost the 174 pound final to now-four-time champion Carter Starocci (Penn State).

But Mendez firmly believes next year’s Ohio State team can get it done and climb the mountaintop.

“Yeah, I mean, this was a weird season,” Mendez said on Baschamania. “We had I think it was four All-Americans get hurt mid-season. And we had a lot of young guys step up. And I’m just super excited for this young team. We got a lot of hammers and they’re as tough as nails. So I’m excited. They’ve been working all summer. You know, we’ve had 98% of our team in the room all summer. So now these guys are tough, they’re young. They’re they’re hungry and they want to win national titles. So when you get a team like that, it’s exciting. 

“It gets me excited and you know, I want to help do whatever I can, I want to lead them. And, you know, we want a team title. We don’t want just individual titles. We want to be that team that’s holding the trophy up at the end of the year.”