My 5 biggest overachievers and underachievers in athletics at the Paris Olympics

Also we have a piece up on an analysis of the Repchage Rounds:

Did you like them?

Ban this ding dong, Rojo!

No Hasan? I don’t think anyone thought the US women were sending their best 800m team.

Mods please delete this post.

Low class picking O'Keefe. She had an injury. You can debate for days whether she should have started or not. But she is not an "unerachiever" just because she was injured.

After his performance at the US trials, I thought it was pretty clear that Hocker was going to contend for a medal. Rooks wasn't even on my radar.

Unfortunately, Sha'Carri was an underachiever. She may have been hinder by feminine issues. But missing the 200 final and giving away the gold in the 100 by being an iceberg in the blocks was not the Olympic debut she should have had. She did have some redemption with an amazing anchor on the 100 relay with an amazing look of "b#tch please" to the side as she cruised past the competition.

Chari Hawkins was an underachiever, but a heartbreaking one. The no-height was shocking and tragic. She has a great social media presence that is almost an encyclopedia for sprint training. She could have just posted a bunch of hot girl/athlete thirst trap stuff and had plenty of followers. But she really puts out very well thought out content on training, running form and drills, etc.

I would say Mondo and Sydney overachieved. They are at the point where they just shouldn't be breaking their own WRs but they keep doing it. Sydney also blew apart the 400 relay with an insane third lap.

I think your repechage piece confirms what we already knew, that the athletes in the repechage rounds will have no impact on the final. If I remember correctly from discussions about the time qualifiers when they were removed, athletes who made it in on time likewise had very little impact on finals. I would be interested to see the analysis taken a step forward comparing how the would-be time qualifiers' (wbtq) semi-final performance to that of historical time qualifiers. Essentially if you made the semis as a little q (or last Q for the 1500) in the past what were the chances that you make the final anyway. Clearly with the Kerr and Murphy examples it matters, just curious.

However, I think JG's conclusion (in the quote below) is at odds with your reporting during the Olympics.

In the daily recaps you guys raved about how the repechage produced high quality racing with tons of drama and energy, especially when French athletes were in the mix. Making an Olympic semi-final certainly is a high-water mark for most athletes so it certainly matters to the athletes (and probably to their sponsors, governing bodies, countries etc.)

Ultimately, my impression is that the Olympics and World Championships have slightly different goals/purposes. So while I would agree that the repechage has no point in WCs, at the Olympics giving fans another chance to see their country represented seems fitting (or at least acceptable). And if you can get 70k people to show up and watch why not give them a few more races.

All that being said, I probably only watched the highlights of the 1500 repechage as I only watched the evening sessions. There's only so match track I can watch at work after all, haha.

Over is Hassan. Who does that?

Under is O'Keefe. Yes, she had an injury. What the heck was she doing on the starting line, Des?

Well as Wayonyi was boasting he was going to break the WR, and he didn't, then I guess he might have been one of the top underachievers.

The point of my piece was mainly to serve as a followup to my piece from before the Olympics when I rated the US medal hopefuls, but it was hard not to share some thoughts on Ethiopia.

As for O'Keefe, yes she was injured and Jonathan Gault asked if I wanted to include her. Most definitely yes. I was really looking forward to what seeing what she could do on that course. Her future was bright but her performance was real let-down.

Seriously, I'd heard rumours she was the one injured but it was shocking to see her off the back 19 seconds into the race.

If Hassan isn't on the list, it isn't a serious list.

The biggest underachievers should be Chase Jackson and Molly Caudrey.

I thought you were crazy to pick Akins as your #1 medal pick pre-Olympics. I think you may be the only one who picks her as one of the top 5 underachievers. The women's 800m is stacked this year, even with Mu at home, and the likelihood of Akins even making the final was very slight. Honestly, I think this is another runner you have a 'block' with. Congrats to her for winning US nationals, but that wasn't enough to put her on any 'favorites list...'

I agree that Hassan's efforts and results were heroic... but were we really surprised? Yes, she's had a sub-par year (for her), but she always pulls it out of the bag when it counts - like Degrasse, only with superior results. So while the results were amazing, I wouldn't say they were that much of an overachievement.

This quote from you is wishful thinking:

“Noah Lyles wants so desperately to carry the sport like Bolt or Michael Johnson did, but the new sprint superstar appears to be named Letsile Tebogo.”

Let’s be real: Lyles is the only male sprinter who won two individual medals in Paris, and Lyles won the marquee event in track. He was the sprint superstar in Paris, not Tebogo. More people talked about Lyles losing the 200 than Tebogo winning it. And Tebogo himself admitted that Lyles is the face of the sport.