You work hard, Walt will do anything for you.
If you're a lazy, excuse-making egomaniac, Walt will tear you down. As he should.
It looks like he's done more than tear a few athletes down. I'd say he's torn an entire program down. Wether you like him or not, the facts remain that the men are seriously bad and the women have slipped. So personality aside, why can't he get it done?
Walt is finding out that kids from the better programs HS programs in Michigan are more interested in partying than running.
lol this guy is a joke, People have no idea what they are talking about when it comes to Walt Drenth. The MSU team may be down and not running well, however Drenth has done amazing things with some not so amazing teams. I remember when he took a team from Central with mediocre guys and won a regional championship. If you look at the programs he has coached at they've all been successful. I'm sure MSU will be on the rise.
If you look at any of the programs in Michigan right now, they all seem to be struggling. Michigan was 5th in the big ten with a very down year.
Eastern is not a good team at all compared to what they used to be. If you talk about partiers on a team, look at Eastern. 2nd place in the MAC. I was at the MAC meet and CMU supposably beat them right after the race, however it took a recount to state EMU barely edged Central by 4 points, talk about a down year.
All programs are struggling right now, and I would reconsider blaming the coaches. The coaches don't run the races
Walt has had success with teams in the past but was in a different role. Walt seems to be good as an assistant and not so good at being in charge. Everyone knows he applied for every head job in the country during his time at AZ State and never got the nod for the job. Michigan State is the only school that gave him a chance and he has squandered it.
Regardless of what Walt did at CMU, W&M or ASU, the FACTS are that the track & field and now cross country teams at MSU are terrible and he has had ample time to "get it going". How long should it take? I think 5 years is pretty generous.
I ran for Walt for 3 and a half years before leaving the team. The man is one of the most passionate people i have met, you get out of him exactly what you put in. I think he was dealt a bad hand of runners when he arrived here, not talentless runners, but he had a team with awful chemistry. Anyone thats been in a competitive program understands that to have a successful cross country team you must have solid chemistry. Drenth has the same basic training principles as most collegiate coaches, and a ton of drive and passion to back it up. If every guy on that team had his mentality they would be a top ten team year in, and year out. Thats something i'm not sure you can teach someone though, something you must really learn on your own, and must be shared by the whole group of them before things start to click. As a previous poster said, drenth will do anything for you, if your willing to put in the work. I think thats completely appropriate. I mean why devote any time to people who make excuses and complain. If i was him i would find people who do that and aren't willing to make a few sacrifices incredible disprectful, those people rightfully should fear Coach D. No, doubt in my mind that they will be on the rise soon enough. The young guns they got now have good leadership in pat grosskopf and spencer beaty, it just took the team a little while to get some solid leaders again. The last time they had good chemistry with some solid team leaders, drenth took them to 17th place showing at xc nats... the middle distance crew has found that chemistry and drenth has had HUGE success with them; Shane knoll - 3:57 indoor mile, ian boyle 1:48 and 3:45, and numerous other sub 150 guys. The women have figured it out, the men will too. Best of luck to them all! If anyone thinks that Coach D is not a good coach you must be crazy and i would be willing to meet with you and punch you. Great guy, great coach.
Nice post Nick. However, I do think that part of a coaches job is to help the kids mature and grow, so part of it comes back to him. There are kids who will reject working the right way and eventually you let them go and learn what to look for in kids you recruit. You also establish a reputation for what you allow. When you have leagues with some good player and a really top team (in this case UW, in other leagues there are others), it makes it tough to push through into the top tier where success helps bring more success. I was quite impressed with some of the women coming through, especially Bush (too bad the water jump killed her!).
Nick Kats wrote:
I ran for Walt for 3 and a half years before leaving the team. The man is one of the most passionate people i have met, you get out of him exactly what you put in. I think he was dealt a bad hand of runners when he arrived here, not talentless runners, but he had a team with awful chemistry. Anyone thats been in a competitive program understands that to have a successful cross country team you must have solid chemistry. Drenth has the same basic training principles as most collegiate coaches, and a ton of drive and passion to back it up. If every guy on that team had his mentality they would be a top ten team year in, and year out. Thats something i'm not sure you can teach someone though, something you must really learn on your own, and must be shared by the whole group of them before things start to click. As a previous poster said, drenth will do anything for you, if your willing to put in the work. I think thats completely appropriate. I mean why devote any time to people who make excuses and complain. If i was him i would find people who do that and aren't willing to make a few sacrifices incredible disprectful, those people rightfully should fear Coach D. No, doubt in my mind that they will be on the rise soon enough. The young guns they got now have good leadership in pat grosskopf and spencer beaty, it just took the team a little while to get some solid leaders again. The last time they had good chemistry with some solid team leaders, drenth took them to 17th place showing at xc nats... the middle distance crew has found that chemistry and drenth has had HUGE success with them; Shane knoll - 3:57 indoor mile, ian boyle 1:48 and 3:45, and numerous other sub 150 guys. The women have figured it out, the men will too. Best of luck to them all! If anyone thinks that Coach D is not a good coach you must be crazy and i would be willing to meet with you and punch you. Great guy, great coach.
great post. hey... has Walt fired up any "Waltcakes" for you yet? dude can cook a mean ass pancake. big as a f'in dinner plate. no joke.
i'll join you in the punching. drenth is boss.
don't care about "chemistry"
don't care about pancakes
don't care about one guy running 3:57
DO care to know WHY they haven't been higher than 7th in the Big 10 since he got there. 17th his first year is your argument? Pretty safe to say that was still Stinzi's team...it's been FIVE years!!!!!!!
facts remain wrote:
don't care about "chemistry"
don't care about pancakes
don't care about one guy running 3:57
DO care to know WHY they haven't been higher than 7th in the Big 10 since he got there. 17th his first year is your argument? Pretty safe to say that was still Stinzi's team...it's been FIVE years!!!!!!!
Are you saying you want Captain Mustache back? C'mon...
Also, you can't discount losing a guy like Nathan Shay, and that horrible accident with the top recruit from Milford (I think?) a few years ago. Kinda hard losing two top guys...
The facts actually are that they were 4th in the Big Ten in his 3rd year, and the 2nd Big Ten team at Nationals in 2006. Granted, it's been rough this year for them, but he'll get the program going in the right direction.
And anyone who suggests that he hasn't done a great job with the women's program immediately loses credibility. They're as down as they've been since he took over this year (and who wouldn't be losing all of that firepower), and they'll still make nationals and maybe make the top 20.
They were 6th place, 5 points away from being 4th last year
Your talking, and trying really hard to tear him down, but your sounding like an ignorant moron.
People said all kinds of bad things about Stintzi when he was here also. He laid it out for you, "I am not here to be your friend, I am not here to babysit you, I am not here to be your parents. This is DI cross country and it is a different level than where you came from. I am here to be your coach. Some of you will make it and some will not..." That kind of thing.
He developed about 5-6 guys who ran 28:45 or so either during school or just after. Schell, Jurcevich, Kyle Baker, there was an Australian ... Even though he had concrete, demonstrable success with several males and females people would complain about him. Mostly people that didn't see the way to 14:00 and 29:00 was probably going to involve more work than high school.
Everyone I have talked to about Drenth has had good things to say about him, those of who who are complaining I think are putting too much importance on the role of the coach. As a few have alluded to, unless the coach is as bad as Gibbard, it usually lies with the athlete more than the coach.
Wisco, PSU, Illinois, Indiana, MSU, OSU, Michigan, and Minnesota cannot ALL be top-three in the Conference and qualify for Nationals every year. There isn't enough talent to go around for everyone to have a solid year and even if there was people peter-out sometimes no matter how good or bad the coach is.
newname wrote:
Wisco, PSU, Illinois, Indiana, MSU, OSU, Michigan, and Minnesota cannot ALL be top-three in the Conference and qualify for Nationals every year. There isn't enough talent to go around for everyone to have a solid year and even if there was people peter-out sometimes no matter how good or bad the coach is.
That's an outstanding point. Just look at the women's race the last couple years. The top six or seven teams have had a chance at nationals, so its unfair to judge a season based on conference finishes. In the end, if you don't win conference then the only thing that really matters is running well in the national meet.
Not true at all on men's side. You have Wisconsin who has absolutely dominated and then Minnesota and Michigan (Ohio State maybe every other year). I will even give Penn State a pass because at least they're solid in track. After that you have schools like Iowa, Illinois, and MSU that never seem to break the top half of this conference. You may like Walt all you want and he was a great distance coach, but once you're named Director of a program, there aren't many who can pull it off. FACT is that MSU hasn't cracked the top 7 in 5 years; that is ridiculous and they're even worse in track. Walt doesn't have the personality or patience to be in charge of that much.
Don't even get me started on Purdue CC!
I think we give Wendell at Illinois a pass too easily by blaming Coach Angel. They too have been dismal and he has has 5 years as well. Seems to have some talent in recruits, but they seem to stink come Big Tens as bad as anyone. At least Drenth has a couple distance guys running some decent track stuff; Wendell and his distance runners are missing at Big Ten Track Championships!
[quote]sparty real wrote:
FACT is that MSU hasn't cracked the top 7 in 5 years; that is ridiculous and they're even worse in track. Walt doesn't have the personality or patience to be in charge of that much.
quote]
This is a great observation. Walt accepted "director" position and anyone who knows him knows it's NOT the role he should be in. Great hands-on coach, terrible manager of people/details.
Except for the fact that it's not a great observation at all. Once again, they were 6th last year and only a couple of points out of 4th. A couple of years before that, they were 4th and the 2nd Big Ten team after Wisconsin at nationals. Now, I'm sure Walt would tell you that the program isn't where he wants it to be, and he'd definitely concede that they've been disappointing this year, but they're on par with Ohio State and Iowa over the last five years or so.
I admit that I don't care for Ohio State (especially football), but OSU was 3rd, 8th, and 2nd in last 3 years at Big Ten Cross Country. They were 9th, 3rd, and 2nd in track. Thats called improvement and showing some signs of life.
Your best MSU is 6th in cross country? Even last year, when MSU actually looked to be good in track, they fell apart at the conference meet.
I agree Walt is a great coach with a group of 8 committed runners, but he can't manage a whole track team
The hot distance coach left; they've struggled since.