Pierce Murphy NOT a Blue Collar/Walk-on Type Guy

There is a big difference between a 9:14 from Hawaii or Alaska than a guy who runs 9:14 from Cali, NY, Illinois etc. I ran 9:14 in HS and that's what it took to run well at the section/state level. He ran 9:14 and probably dominated Hawaii 5 years ago.

If you're a college coach and a kid from a HS that NEVER produces good runners pops a 9:10, you may be more inclined to recruit him than you would a guy from the woodlands running 9:06.

Wetmore has a history of taking 9:10-9:30 altitude guys and making them AA. Oregon and Stanford have a history of taking the 8:50 guys and making them AA. There are obvious exceptions (wheating, etc) but Oregon in the last couple years has gotten Haney, Maton, Hunter and Chez. Stanford got McGorty, Fisher, Ostberg, etc.

Big difference. To a program like CU, 9:14 probably is blue collar.

So 9:14 is a dime a dozen now, I won't disagree. What coaches look at, and the smartest ones do, is how the kids got there. That's the most important factor. Low to mid mileage (45 mpw) kids running 9:30 or better indicates potential, especially if they've little to no injury history.

What about Gabe Gonzalez? Was solid as a senior but only ran 9:40 3200 indoor and 4:16/8:38 1600/3000 outdoor. I'd say that Murphy's 9:14 trumps both of those for sure.

AND Gonzalez beat Murphy in that 10K. Pretty huge for the Hogs!

ttc wrote:

wise man wrote:

Best post on this thread. No BS. Truly shows us where he was in high school.

The subjective part is how "good" is # 141 in the nation. Is it elite? No, I'd say that's top 25 probably. Sub-elite is maybe top 100. I'd say very good is top 250, so I'll classify him there.

"The Arcadia Invitational (that PIERCE ran in) attracts the **TOP PREP ATHLETES** in the United States and internationally (Canada, Mexico, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand)... produced 152 U.S. Olympians (in 48 years)."

"For each of the last 16 years, the Arcadia Invitational has ranked first in the nation in the number of EPI ELITE marks achieved among high school meets."

Pierce was invited to Arcadia- but he "wasn't very good"- yea, right.

You guys don't appreciate how good #3 in the NCAA XC is then. 9:14 is good but there were at least 140 high schoolers in the US with a better time. He beat all of them except one (Cheserek). Even going from #141 to All-American (top 35) would be substantial improvement.

Not countries wrote:

Funny that you think wetmore looks for undertrained athletes, when ALL of his hs coached athletes were over trained and did nothing in college

What? Maybe you could try that again in english this time. Trying to figure out your point here. If it's that all or most of the kids he recruits were over trained in HS and failed to improve in college, I think most here are going to conclude you're posting under the influence.

The CU blue collar, Wetmore factor myth needs to stop. He's a great coach, but one guy in the top five in the 10k for a distance $ heavy school at altitude is nothing to go crazy about. What happened to the blue chip CU guys? A 9:24 HS guy from U Portland (Buchanan) was 5th.

I don't think Wetmore would argue these points.

Well done by all athletes and coaches, but thread me when we see domination like Standord (sweeping top 3 places, two years in a row) or Arkansas having 2-3 guys in the top 8 year after year.

If you run 9:14 at Great Oak or American Fork or the Woodlands and programs of similar quality, that is expected. To run 9:14 out of a small unknown school in Hawaii shows a lot of talent and probably an 8:50 or better if trained by one of the first three schools and competing frequently against top competition in good weather. Going to Colorado and training with that coach at altitude with that competition will also make anyone a lot better.

I find it amazing that 9:14 would get you #162 among seniors in the country now. Back when I was in high school, no one in my league ran sub 9:37 (and the one guy who ran 9:37 at the Meet of Champions and I think made it to state with that had run only in the 9:50s prior to that). In the entire country in at least one year in the early '90s, there was no one under 9.

HardLoper wrote:

ttc wrote:

"The Arcadia Invitational (that PIERCE ran in) attracts the **TOP PREP ATHLETES** in the United States and internationally (Canada, Mexico, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand)... produced 152 U.S. Olympians (in 48 years)."

"For each of the last 16 years, the Arcadia Invitational has ranked first in the nation in the number of EPI ELITE marks achieved among high school meets."

Pierce was invited to Arcadia- but he "wasn't very good"- yea, right.

You guys don't appreciate how good #3 in the NCAA XC is then. 9:14 is good but there were at least 140 high schoolers in the US with a better time. He beat all of them except one (Cheserek). Even going from #141 to All-American (top 35) would be substantial improvement.

Exceeding trajectory is one thing & he did. But the "blue collar" part, or no D1 schools wanting a 9:14, 2-event state champ Arcadia guy is absurd. Arcadia saw him as a top prep.

He is Blue Collar by UC/OR/Stanford standards. If he was an incoming freshman right now with a 1628 XC PR and a 9:14 3200, he would look very blue collar compared to Rocha, Herrerra, and Dunne. Combined with Dressel and Klecker from this years class, Murphy would be a blue collar guy that no one at CU was talking about.

I'm not sure most people here know what blue collar means. Blue collar has nothing to do with times. Pre was a blue collar guy. And Murphy was a walk-on, so I don't see how the OP can say he's not a blue collar/walk-on type.

Eh I don't know wrote:

9:14 really doesn't mean much now. Very far from a blue chipper. I was a 9:10 guy 6ish years ago and I was a walk on at a program that never made XC nats-got close, but never made it.

what type of program has 910 guys as walk ons but has never made xc nats?

Talent doesn't go away unless you are Alan Webb. Murphy was never a true blue collar / workhorse type, he just wasn't a serious runner in HS. It's remarkable he managed to run 9:14 on light training as a high schooler, and he certainly could have run 8:45-8:50 if he had a knowledgable coach, competition, and serious work ethic.

What Wetmore does is make guys like that smart racers, so they finish ahead of some of the uber talented that don't race as intelligently. No doubt he is he best distance coach in the country.

gnome de plume wrote:

Not countries wrote:

Funny that you think wetmore looks for undertrained athletes, when ALL of his hs coached athletes were over trained and did nothing in college

What? Maybe you could try that again in english this time. Trying to figure out your point here. If it's that all or most of the kids he recruits were over trained in HS and failed to improve in college, I think most here are going to conclude you're posting under the influence.

What I meant is that wetmore over trained all of his hs athletes and that non of them did anything in college. You do know that he was a hs coach before Colorado?

V6 wrote:

Talent doesn't go away unless you are Alan Webb. Murphy was never a true blue collar / workhorse type, he just wasn't a serious runner in HS. It's remarkable he managed to run 9:14 on light training as a high schooler, and he certainly could have run 8:45-8:50 if he had a knowledgable coach, competition, and serious work ethic.

What Wetmore does is make guys like that smart racers, so they finish ahead of some of the uber talented that don't race as intelligently. No doubt he is he best distance coach in the country.

Is Wetmore still the best distance coach in the country?

This thread is ridiculous.

First of all, what some of you don't realize is that an 8:50-8:59 runner is the same kid, and a 9:00-9:10-12ish runner is the same kid, and all the rest 9:12ish to below 9:20 are the same kid, and really if you want to be accurate about the highest levels of talent, you start to talk about REAL HS elite when you bust that 8:45 barrier. Everything else is just shades of the same thing, talented runners that show the promise of making it to the next level in college. It's silly that there is so much bickering about things like "blue collar" or elite, or walk-on type guys.

My point is that when a college coach looks at kid, boy or girl, they are, at the end of the day, prognosticating what that runner will do for them. College is the great equalizer. It takes the same talent and work to get the HS boy you signed at 8:57 as it does for the 9:12 kid to be able to slam 23:30 8k's and 30:00 10k's on cross country courses. Sure, one has the tiniest of head starts, but almost without fail, if you bring in a group of 8:55-9:15 kids, they all equalize within about 3 months at the college level, which is my point, they are the same. Hell, many times the "faster kids break before the "slower" kids. My issue is that some on here make such a HUGE deal out of that 15 seconds that separates them when they leave high school, when in reality at the next level they sit and start at the same relative point.

End of Rant.

He does more "coaching" than the guys that bring in a bunch of old foreigners.