What does it mean to be a man?

It is a late-spring night in 1997 on frat row in Bloomington, Ind., and the blood is starting to thump in Mike Powell's temples. Behind him, the wiry dude with the wild eyes is yelling on the steps of the frat house. "Stay the f--- off my porch!" he roars. "Come back here, and I'll kill you." The guy's friends are right there with him, taunting along.

Powell grimaces. No one talks to him this way. He's 205 pounds of pure fury—an All-America wrestler in Indiana's highly rated program, a sophomore on track to compete in the Olympics. Charismatic, darkly handsome and fueled by a confidence that borders on arrogance, he's the kind of guy who wears ripped tank tops to parties, who wedges a Junior Mint in the crevice of his cauliflowered left ear and dares girls to eat it, knowing they will. Those close to Powell see his gentler side—how he's the only male in a women's studies class, how if you asked his three roommates to name their best friend, they'd all say Mike Powell. But to the lugs at Bloomington bars and parties he is only the most alpha of males, someone to test themselves against, and he is happy to oblige. In his senior year at Oak Park and River Forest High near Chicago, he went 42--0 on the mat and won the state title. Since then he's also undefeated in bar fights.

Tonight Powell has left a frat party with five other wrestlers, and now he hears them yell back and senses the brawl taking shape. He turns, and the night becomes electric. It's six versus 30, but that doesn't matter. Powell puts one guy in a choke hold, flips another over his back. A burly young man comes flying in; Powell catches him and bangs his skull on a car, cracking it like a coconut. He looks up, the rage in his eyes. Who else wants some?

The angry, drunk kids continue to rush at him, and Powell dispatches them with frightening efficiency. They don't know who they are up against, how much power lies in Powell's 5'10" frame. In a few days he...