If track had a draft like the NBA...

Donavan Brazier would have been drafted very high, maybe #1. He had run a 1:43.55 NCAA record to win NCAAs by a second that spring, at 19.

Considering Murphy was not just NCAA 1500 champ but the recent Olympic Trials 800 champ on his way to the Olympics (age 21), I think “scouts” would have preferred him to gambling on the high schoolers. I think 1. Brazier, 2. Murphy.

Among women, Raevyn Rogers would have been a high pick if she’d entered the draft, as would Courtney Frerichs.

Good call, totally missed Brazier. Still, I think consensus would have probably leaned Murphy. I feel like Brazier was perceived as inconsistent at the time. I'm sure "scouts" would have mostly overlooked the '16 trials as a tactical blip, but I think Murphy's trials win + his 1500m would have had him above Brazier.

I still think Hunter would have had a good shot at #1. The hype was huge, and his real-life HS to pro contract shows how much belief there was in him at the time.

Slagowski is a reach, but his situation was so compelling. I don't think he would have been anywhere near consensus #1, but there is a precedent in other pro sports for teams taking big swings on raw talent guys like that. It would have taken someone having a lot of faith in him (which a decent amount on these boards did.) I could see him going higher than Fisher/McGorty.

I wasn't around at the time but brazier seems like a pretty clear #1 pick. 1:43.55 as a 19 year old, smashing some of the oldest records in the books, with massive upside... I absolutely would see him as the #1 pick.

Yeah when I was originally thinking about this I was just going to make it 1500m+. But I realized that was kind of an arbitrary place to draw the line, and it limits the value of Murphy and Engels. So I when I was typing out the post I changed it to 800 without even considering the 800m guys that year. Hence forgetting Brazier.

I still think Murphy is #1 here though. Brazier's run at NCAA's was great, but I remember him losing a lot that outdoor season. The NCAA win/record was kind of surprising. Murphy just seemed like a surefire, consistent winner and I think the USA 800m win would have swung it in his favor.

This was such a loaded year. 2016 was a fun time to be a fan.

That's almost a decade ago—seems strange to make such a long post about that specific year. What about now?

Creating a professional track and field league is not as much of a pipe dream as some might think. I think with this format

6 teams 30 athlete rosters (15 of each gender)

co-ed competition scored like a regular track dual meet with 10 total events per meet (perfect for a 90 minute tv window plus 15 minute intro and 15 minute conclusion show)

each meet has 10 total events (5each gender)

1 relay (4x1 or 4x4)

1 throw

1 jump

1 sprint/hurdle

1 distance race

mens and women’s events alternate. If women do high jump men do pole bailout for example.

it would be fun to see guys like Ryan Crouser throw the discus to help his team score points. That is fun about high school track. People doing events other than their best events to help a team win.

or to see mondo duplantis run in the 4x1 relay to Help his team.

Because when I was thinking over the past decade, 2016 stood out as the most confusing year to me.

For men, this year would be a total toss-up. So many good runners. Assuming we’re sticking to Americans, I think Bosley would be the slight favorite at the moment.

That could all change after NCAAs. I think Nico, Jacobs, Waksom, Green, Maier and Hamilton (for the steeple) could all challenge for the #1 spot. And that’s not even considering either Sahlman brother, Lex and Leo, Simeon and Burns, etc…

For women I think it’s pretty clearly Touhy

Looking at the women's side again assuming 800 and up:

First overall - Raevyn Rogers. Really doesn't need much elaboration. 2nd straight NCAA outdoor title, 5th at trials in a deep field. Huge upside and an obvious star. While Frerichs was more competitive on the world stage the fact Rogers was looking already competitive in an event as deep as the 800 plus her versatility in the 400 gives her the edge over Frerichs.

2nd - Courtney Frerichs. NCAA champ and collegiate record holder in the steeple at the time 4 of the top 10 NCAA marks in the steeplechase. 11th in the final at Rio.

3rd - is it cheating to go north of the border and steal Gabriela Stafford from the Canadian university league? She beat a an embarrasing number of US pros en route to going to the Rio Olympics and was a fraction of a second from a world indoor final. PRs of 2:02/4:06/8:54i at just 20 definitely forecast the 1:58 to14:31 range she showed later.

4th - you probably take Dom Scott who was fresh off of completing the 5000/10000 double at NCAA outdoors, an okay showing in Rio, and had shown with an 8:46 3k she had some speed upside as well as strength.

5th - obviously coloured by hindsight but I'd like to think I'd take a punt on Karissa Schweizer. 4 years younger than Scott but still already had an NCAA XC title that year plus a bronze in outdoors. The hype was already real.

Molly Seidel would have looked a good prospect though already running into injury problems. Some great high school performances but if I were a GM of a track team I would generally steer well clear of drafting women out of high school. Wouldn't want them to burn out/often they already are burnt out.

Might be missing some obvious ones on the distance end but I think that's what I'd have gone with.

I actually think this is interesting. Obviously it's super difficult because the Olympics/WCs are more important (also why no one gives a crap about World Team Tennis or Davis Cup in tennis) and athletes are going to interrupt their training to go do this unless the money really is good.

So how much would you need per team to get people to show up and take it seriously?

Let's say, just as a round number, you paid athletes $5k/appearance. And let's say there's six meets around the US across the season, held every Saturday for a six week span across the summer: Eugene (Hayward Field/Oregon), NYC (Icahn), Philadelphia (Franklin Field/Penn), Des Moines (Drake Stadium/Drake), Los Angeles (Hilmer Lodge/Mt. SAC), and Austin (Myers Stadium/Texas).

I'd propose nine events per meet:

Sprint: alternate between 100m (3) and 200m (3)

Long sprint/mid-distance: alternate between 400m (3) and 800m (3)

Distance: alternate between 1500m (2), 3000m SC (2), and 5000m (2)

Hurdles: alternate between 110mh (3) and 400mh (3)

Horizontal jumps: alternate between LJ (3) and TJ (3)

Vertical jumps: alternate between HJ (3) and PV (3)

Throw #1: alternate between SP (3) and DT (3)

Throw #2: alternate between JT (3) and HT (3)

I don't have a great solution to televise field events better -- maybe a concurrent Internet stream where hardcore types can watch the field series in action. 10k is too long to televise.

I think your hunch with six teams is right; you don't want four teams with two entries per event, and you don't want eight just because the talent pool is going to drop off so sharply. I do think you're going to need more than 15 athletes per team per gender though, as you might be able to double some athletes across 100m and 200m for example, but you wouldn't be able to across soe of the jumps and throws. Let's say 20 per team.

So now it's 6x40, or 240 athletes. Is $30k enough to get Noah Lyles or Athing Mu to do it? Probably not. But that's way more than you'd need to get some lower-tier athletes there, so maybe you figure out a way during the draft/dispersal process to get more money to your stars. So yeah, let's say it averages out at $5k/appearance. So that's $1.2mm per meet, or $7.2mm in total.

I have no idea how much it costs to actually put on a meet, to rent out a stadium, or any of that. I do think however that you could get ESPN interested, since summer programing is beyond dire. I do also think -- and this part is critical -- that you'd also have to get a DraftKings or FanDuel interested, as they've got super deep pockets and they'd want to use this analogue of human horse racing to get people onto their app. Otherwise I really don't know how you'd be able to get the dough to start it off, and I don't think you'd be able to make it up in gate receipts.

Looks like you're restricting yourself to (North) America.

I think there would have been a few 19-year-olds in East Africa who might have gone pretty early in a draft like that...

Erin Finn and Anna Rohrer were probably more highly regarded than Schweitzer at the time

Track had a draft in 2016. Who was the #1 pick? How did it turn out?

Am I really the only one who remembers the TrackTown Summer Series?!?!?

https://www.si.com/olympics/20...

I’d say the Schweizer pick is definitely colored by hindsight. The obvious issue with the reasoning is that this hypothetical draft was taking place in July, and Schweizer didn’t win an XC title until that November; her best XC result in 2015 may have been 30th at Pre-Nats…

We also have to settle on terms for American vs. international athletes, like in the case of Dom Scott. Limiting it to athletes representing the U.S. certainly simplifies things, but I don’t see why athletes like Kerr/Hoare/McDonald etc. who ran in the NCAA and have been based here since would be excluded, not to mention a guy like Cheserek who’s been here since he was a younger kid.

To another point, it’s probably best we don’t get too hung up on the financial realities, or we’ll inevitably run into the reasons why this league doesn’t exist.

Funny looking back Dom Scott (I know, international) was the dominate runner at outdoor track NCAAs that year. Schweizer was 3rd, Sharron Lokedi was 6th - she would go on to arguably be the most accomplished of the group. Vanessa Fraser finished 13th, who would have also been a excellent American pick that year.

I was talking to a couple people from the shoe industry during a cross country meet last Fall and phrased this question a little differently...

"If you were going to start a pro team and you got three American athletes and three International athletes, who do you take?"

They had some great "Well, obviously I am taking..." type names. Who would you guys take right now (not in 2016)?

Are there specific parameters? Do they have to be from the American school system? Or can I take Jakob, Katir, etc?

You have to take three Americans and three International athletes for your team. You can pick anyone you want: HS kids, college kids, pros. Your choice.

p.s. Obviously you get a men's team and a women's team.

I put this thread on the HP a few days ago but hadn't even read it. Amazing thread. I've been thinking recently each year I shoud publish an article, "These are the only athletes that should go pro (or that I"d sign if I was a shoe company)." But that article is basically this.

I feel like shoe companies often do a HORRIBLE job of IDing talent. Maybe they'll hire me as a consultant and I'll just off shorte it to the messageboard. When I was coaching at Cornell, I said, "I don't recruit times. I recruit talent." Shoe companies should realize they are doing the same - accomplishments and times are fine but ultimately you want talent.

More or less agreed. I get that there's not as much money in track, but the lengths that other sports go to identify talent is crazy.

To be fair, I don't know exactly what goes on behind the scenes before athletes are signed. Maybe it's more involved than it seems. Do they test things like speed, strength, mechanics, or mobility? Do shoe companies do V02, economy, or threshold tests? Do they know their 400m PRs?

It seems to me like they just sign based off of PRs or NCAA championship placement. That would be like an NBA team drafting off of their collegiate counting stats. It gives you a decent enough idea but doesn't tell the full story.

Say what you will about Bowerman, but they've done a great job with finding relatively underrated guys. Just on the guys side alone, Woody, Tuntivate, Josh Thompson, and Ahmed have all massively over-performed relative to where they would have ranked on a pre-draft "big board." Maybe they're doing behind the scenes things to pick the right athletes.

If you want a head start on this year's article, here's my current 2023 prospect big board for American men.

1. Drew Bosley
2. Nico Young
3. Dylan Jacobs
4. Joe Waskom
5. Nathan Green
6. Alex Maier
7. Colin Sahlman
8. Duncan Hamilton
9. Ryan Schoppe
10. Graham Blanks

I think big outdoor seasons from any of those HS sub 4 milers from last year or Lex, Leo, and Aaron Sahlman could vault any of those younger guys into the mix.

Haven't made a women's list yet, I'll probably wait for indoors to be over for that.