Pros vs. Joes on US Olympic Swim Team

On Monday evening, I did a podcast with Coach Mike Thompson of the CoachMike Canadian swimming blog, discussing the youth in swimming and how, even as federations push for ways to keep athletes in the sport longer, the competition seems to still be dominated by youth.

This comparison holds true in the present American Team that will be sent to the Summer Olympics in London this year, on the women’s side at least. For the men, however, it’s the opposite of true. It wasn’t until the last day, and the last finals event, that we signed up our first two amateur swimmers for the men’s roster in Connor Jaeger and Andrew Gemmell in the men’s 1500 free. Even if you extend it to swimmers who just finished college careers in March and haven’t had much time as a true professional, that bumps the list up by only one – Jimmy Feigen.

For all of the potential youth that we’ve talked about making this team in the last year (Tom Shields, David Nolan, Arthur Frayler, Clay Youngquist, Dax Hill) the racing was still dominated by professional, post-graduate athletes. But that’s not necessarily a huge shift, either. In 2008, there were very few amateur swimmers on the roster – Ricky Berens, Dave Walters, and Nathan Adrian were then relay-only swimmers. Scott Spann was a surprise to make the team, and final’ed in the 200 breaststroke. And that appears to be all.

The bigger shift appears to be on the women’s side of the pool – and it’s not in the direction one would expect. By my counts (and there’s no guarantees that they’re precisely accurate), there were only 7 amateurs on the 2008 Olympic Team – Elizabeth Beisel, Elaine Breeden, Kathleen Hersey, Rebecca Soni, Julia Smit, Allison Schmitt, and Christine Marshall. This year, there are a 14.

Part of that is caused by the vacancy left from 6 events that Katie Hoff swam in 2008; part of the explanation could also be that after a rush to turn professional in 2008, we’ve gone back to our youngest swimmers remaining amateurs. The number would’ve been beefed up by three with the addition of Katie Hoff, Kate Ziegler, and Chloe Sutton to the amateur ranks back then. This year, we’ve got only 1 swimmer who are both pros and would still be in college had they not gone pro (Sutton).

But among those 7 amateurs on the women’s team in 2008, only 4 returned to make another Olympic squad, which is a lower percentage than of those who turned pro early (Ziegler and Sutton both made a second-straight team). The numbers aren’t big enough to draw a statistically-significant conclusion, but it seems as though turning pro before college isn’t necessarily as automatic of an end-of-the-road as some might like to make it seem.

The longer-term trends seem to indicate that men’s swimming is still moving toward a more “professional” team; though I haven’t done the math on it, thinking back to the early 2000’s, where the American squads were dominated by collegiate swimmers like Aaron Peirsol and Brendan Hansen. The women’s program, on the other hand, seems fairly stagnant in their pre-graduate ways.

So why the difference in trends between men and women? The first may be that women develop so much earlier, so it’s more natural for high school and college swimmers to contend with their money-earning counterparts. Women also seem to be a bit more hesitant to delve fully into the pro lifestyle after college still, even with increased opportunities. Swimmers like Julia Smit, who retired before this year’s Olympic Trials, are a great example.

So the bigger question here is “why do we care?” We’d all love for our athletes to make money, but just because more pros are making the team, doesn’t mean that they’re making more money doing it, so these numbers don’t necessarily bare out that more swimmers should stick with swimming after they finish college. Financially, with these guys graduating from great universities, it’s a loss on opportunity costs probably half of the time.

The benefit has to do with the long-term successes of the sport. For starters, the more professionals that make the National Team, the more power they have. Professionals are more likely to shift the sport toward collective bargaining for athletes – if over half of our Olympians are amateurs, it will be harder for the few professionals to be taken seriously when they ask for a bigger piece of the pie.

The other side of it is the non-monetary aspects of being a professional. Professional athletes are (usually) more accessible to the media; they’re more visible in their communities; they have more freedom to compete and grow fan-bases. Swimming, as it currently sits, has only two ways to grow: into minority communities, and with an increase of the pure “fanhood” class of the sport. There are a ton of kids in this country who swim competitively, but still only a small portion of those are “fans” of the elite levels of the sport, who might buy a shirt honoring their favorite swimmer rather than their hometown basketball team; or who might buy a ticket to a Grand Prix instead of a Dodgers game.

The qualification numbers don’t show a whole lot of progress in the professional arena, but these numbers aren’t the be-all end-all in the story. Look at attendances (the last three nights of the Olympic Trials topped 12,000 fans). Look at the amount of coverage the sport receives on ESPN – it was a headline story on every episode of SportsCenter over the last week, as well as a topic of discussion on every talking-heads show.

The challenge now becomes how to best parlay the potential benefits into realities. Many of these Olympians are still struggling to pay their bills and feed themselves. That gap is the one that needs to be cleared. At the point to which the sport has now developed, simply putting more or less professionals on an Olympic Team doesn’t even begin to tell the story of what’s going on in professional swimming.

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JackedAndTan
11 years ago

Thank you, CupofJoe! It’s beyond funny reading these comment threads with pseudo-experts spreading their wild theories. I’m gonna point out Bobo Gigi, just because his are the easiest to argue against.

There is no such thing as cycles or “an eternity since last victory”. Dominance is not something you choose for to happen. Becoming Olympic/World champion takes a combination of many factors, not just talent, not just looking to and imitating what (insert whatever country is dominating that particular event right now) are doing. America may right now be filled with freak athletic talents who could all go 46 in the 100 free, they just happened to pick up football, judo, crime or basket weaving. Or perhaps they just stayed… Read more »

WHOKNOWS
11 years ago

There were many “pro” female athletes that ventured to FAST starting at the end of 2009. It seemed as the athletes were doing well…. then turmoil happened! These girls were left out in the cold and they searched all over the USA for a training program jthe year ust before the OlympicTeam Trials. I say that if this program had continued it pattern of success, many of these “LOST” females would have made the Olympic team.

don
Reply to  WHOKNOWS
11 years ago

I agree, most of those girls went to swim with Hutchison and when he split, some stayed with Urbanchek who has a different style and methods.So many of those girls were in limbo, not sure what to do or where to go. It is really a shame that program succumbed to the drama of Hutchison and Jewell, .Good thing Urbanchek was there to pick up the pieces and provide stability,couldn’t have been easy for him.

cupofjoe
11 years ago

I find it amusing that whenever the U.S. comes up with a week event in an Olympic year everyone starts looking for reasons. I will tell you why Australia has better sprinters than us right now: James Magnuson. Just like in the late 90’s and early 2000’s we were saying the same thing about Australian distance swimming. The truth was Thorpe and Hackett were just BETTER than anyone we had. Look at them now. No great male distance swimmers in the past three years. And during that period of Australian dominace we had Janet Evans, Brooke Bennett and later Ziegler on the women’s side. So what is it–we knew how to coach women and not men? Come on. And to… Read more »

Kori
Reply to  cupofjoe
11 years ago

Co-signed

aswimfan
Reply to  cupofjoe
11 years ago

I agree with this.

Swimming goes in cycle, although the cycle in US swimming is much shorter than any other country due to large swimming population base, great facilities and coaching, etc, and thus new talent is always coming up whenever an older champion retires.

It just so happens that new sprint great talent is coming up a bit late than in any other events (but then again, the men middle/distance actually fares a lot worse).

bobo gigi
Reply to  aswimfan
11 years ago

Yes but I talked about the 100 free. It’s curious. 2001 on the men’s side and 1998 on the women’s side. It looks an eternity for USA. And I don’t see the streak with an end in the next years with the australian rockets on the men’s side. For me the only american swimmer who can break this streak before 2016 is Missy Franklin if she specializes in this race.

Rafael
Reply to  bobo gigi
11 years ago

and if Tang Yi and Kukla/McKeon does not show they can become much better also.. even with the youngsters on 100 free Missy is not “alone” as a future star.

Who is younger? missy or kukla?

bobo gigi
Reply to  Rafael
11 years ago

Yolane Kukla is a little younger but excuse me in terms of pure talent Missy is by far ahead of the other swimmers. Now if she wants to dominate this race she will have to train only on sprint. And I don’t think it will be the case. She’s an all-around swimmer and I believe she wants to stay an all-around swimmer.

aswimfan
Reply to  Rafael
11 years ago

Missy has much more upside than Kukla.

Kukla is much shorter than Missy, and cannot get much faster.

Among australian young talents, I think Emma mckeon, Bronte Campbell and Brittany Elmslie have greater potential than Kukla.

And don’t forget that Sjoestrom is still 18 yo!

junker23
Reply to  cupofjoe
11 years ago

This is a thing I was going to say.

The US’ll be OK. Could be better, could be worse, but we’ll be OK.

bobo gigi
11 years ago

And yes 48.42 in 1988 looks absolutely amazing if we compare with overall times today.

bobo gigi
11 years ago

Ok thank you for the correction about the last american woman. You are an encyclopedia! But admit even 1998 it seems such a long time ago. 2001 on the men’s side and 1998 on the women’s side, it’s incredible for the biggest team in the world.

bobo gigi
11 years ago

About the bad results of american sprinters for many years now in the 100 free I see the facts. I’ve made some research and correct me if I’m wrong but it’s impressive. The last time an american sprinter has won a big international competition like world championships or olympic games in the 100 free on the men’s side was Anthony Ervin in 2001. And on the women’s side it was Nicole Haislet in 1991. It’s incredible when we know all the historic american champions who have won this race before. And this losing streak will not stop this year.

bobo gigi
Reply to  bobo gigi
11 years ago

Ok it’s Nicole Haislett.

aswimfan
Reply to  bobo gigi
11 years ago

Bobo,

You are incorrect.

The last american woman to have won worlds/olympics 100 free was the legendary Jenny Thompson in 1998 Worlds in Perth.

The last american woman to have won 100 free olympics were Nancy Hogshead and Carry Steinseifer in the boycotted 1984 LA Olympics in a not so impressive 55.92 when the WR from 1980 was 54.79

The last American man to have won 100 free Olympics was the legendary Matt Biondi in 1988 Seoul, after clocking an amazing 48.42 WR in US trials in Austin.

Here’s some of legendary American 100 free gold medalists:
Duke Kahanamoku, Johnny Weissmuller, Don Schollander, Jim Montgomery, Rowdy Gaines, Matt Biondi.

Nathan Adrian needs to step up.

don
11 years ago

You are simplifying things and it is not that simple. You need to take into account freshman year, training and the individual. I saw an interview with Nolan before he went to Stanford and frankly, he looked burned out. For a kid that loaded with talent, he was flat when it came to swimming. I was hoping the atmosphere might be what he needed.
Everyone thinks it is just talent and potential but its not. It is heart too and if that is missing and you don’t have that extra X factor,you will be a really ,really good swimmer but not a great swimmer.
Look at Erik Vendt. not the most talented but incredible, work ethic, heart, determination… Read more »

aswimfan
11 years ago

I’m curious about David Nolan.

What happened to him?
Is his LCM THAT bad compared to his SCY?
Or did Stanford have THAT bad of an effect to him?

newswim
Reply to  aswimfan
11 years ago

Look at his previous LC bests….compare them to his most recent swims. Look at the trend beginning with last summer, before he joined Stanford . You should find your answer in those data points.

About Braden Keith

Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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