Well, that didn’t take long. It’s been less than a year since London. A year of luxurious victory lapping on golf courses and at poker tables across the world… One could get used to that life of competitive leisure. Or maybe not. Maybe it doesn’t take all that long to get bored of such diversions. Because here’s the word:

Michael Phelps is about to launch a comeback. He’ll soon be returning to training; in fact, he’s rumored to be arriving in Colorado Springs, at the Olympic Training Center, in the next few days. Maybe he won’t show. Perhaps he’ll read these publicized rumors and get spooked and insist that he’s still happily retired on the links. The man has nothing to prove to anyone. He’s the greatest Olympian of all time, regardless of whether or not he ever touches chlorinated water again.

However, these rumors didn’t just come out of thin air. The upper reaches of the swimming world are swirling with the chatter. It’s like the CIA intercepting red flag chatter across Islamic websites. It might be nothing, it might be just talk, but when there’s enough of it, you have to take it seriously. That’s what’s going right now in swimming’s version of the CIA. The folks in-the-know, the top coaches and swimmers, the ones just a degree or two removed from Phelps himself, they’re all talking about it.

If I hadn’t confirmed the likelihood of these reports, I wouldn’t be writing about it. This isn’t April Fool’s Day again. It’s May 17, 2013, just ten months removed from Phelps’s final race in London.

After that race, Phelps did indeed file his official retirement papers. Many don’t. Aaron Peirsol didn’t, back when he hung up his goggles. Plenty of “retired” former greats leave the door open that way. It means they can return to competition anytime they damn well please. Phelps wasn’t like that. Last summer it seems he really did truly believe he was done. Or maybe he knew no one would believe him until he made it official with FINA. In any case, because he filed those retirement papers, he won’t be competing anytime this summer. He’ll need nine months to give birth to this comeback. That’s how long it takes to come out of retirement, before you’re allowed to compete in any USA Swimming or FINA sanctioned competition. Plenty of time for those comeback notions to gestate.

It’s easy to forget how hard it is to live and train like an Olympic champion. Who knows, Phelps may indeed come back next week. He may try to be quiet about it, and slip back into competitive waters to see how it feels. And he may scratch that itch for a month or two before he realizes how satisfied he was in repose, on the links and at the poker table. Then it will be back to caring about making par and hitting the flush on 5th Street.

These are nice pastimes. Sometimes, with just the right shot or luck of the draw, there will be moments when that spike of competitive adrenaline feels almost as good as the real thing.

But can anything ever really compare to gold around your neck and a national anthem played in your honor?

Blame it on the big city. The buried journalist inside of me knew that Jason Collins’s coming out party was big news. The first out gay athlete in a major professional sport… a guy still immersed in a proud 12-year NBA career. That’s pretty major. Big enough for Sports Illustrated to stop the presses and splash Collins on its cover. So then why did it feel like it shouldn’t have been any news at all?

Maybe because living in a place like New York, and having plenty of gay friends and colleagues, makes this “announcement” sound like a quaint little Victorian era scandal. If you have a problem with an athlete’s sexuality, or anyone’s sexuality for that matter, I feel sorry for you. No, really.

I don’t care who Jason Collins goes to bed with any more than who Kobe Bryant cheats with. Or Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods or any of the other fine moral-free manly role models we know and love. Those three heterosexual gentlemen above are, by virtually every account I’ve heard, horrible human beings. Spiteful egomaniacs incapable of fidelity or humility. Yet, when any one of them is on the court or the links, I can’t take my eyes off of them. They’re geniuses at what they do, and it’s a beautiful thing to behold. Jason Collins, on the other hand, sounds like a damn good guy, but I can’t say I’ve ever watched a single minute of him playing basketball.

Why can’t we separate the two? Well, because this is sex we’re talking about, and there’s nothing simple about that. Especially not when God gets involved…

But enough about God. I’m pretty sure he’s cool with Jason Collins. No, that’s not true. I’m quite positive He couldn’t give two shits about Jason Collins and his attraction to men. In that, at least, the Big Man and I are on the same page. I don’t care either.

It would just be nice if athletes in our sport could be carelessly open about their preferences too. After all, this is a sport with more than its share of past gay champions. Canada’s Mark Tewksbury and Australia’s Daniel Kowalski, to name two terrific role models. And of course, Bruce Hayes, of ’84 Olympic fame. All due respect to Jason Lezak, but Hayes still might have you beat for the greatest relay leg ever swum. If it’s before your era, take a look.

Unfortunately, all those guys came out a few years after they hung up their goggles. That’s the way it usually goes. Just stay back in that closet until the cameras go away, then it will be a little safer. Problem is, that’s when no one’s paying attention. No one, like say, a teenage kid struggling with suicidal thoughts, adrift and depressed in some small God-fearing close-minded town.

I wish I could send my younger self this message of tolerance. That 16-year-old self trapped in an all-boys Catholic school, longing to get out of there, hormones raging, wanting to hook up with girls more than anything else on earth – and being fearful and distrustful of any guy who didn’t feel the same way. That’s called homophobia. Fearing what you can’t understand. Treating someone as different, as lesser, because they don’t have the same “natural” urges as you do.

It’s easy to act tolerant and holier-than-thou when you’re fully formed and comfortable in your own skin, but it’s easy to forget how hard it was as a kid. When everyone’s just trying to figure their shit out… I can only imagine how hard it is for the guys and girls who, through no fault of their own, want something different with their sex lives.

With swimmers, it might be even more difficult. This is a sport where every athlete is mostly naked, invariably ripped, wet, and usually panting. The sexuality of it is impossible to ignore. That can be troublesome. Especially for those struggling with attractions that aren’t exactly embraced inside every locker room.

Maybe Jason Collins has opened the door for countless other closeted pro athletes to come forward now without fear. It would be nice if some brave Olympic swimmers decide to join him in proud solidarity.

But it will be really nice when no one cares at all.

Did you watch the premier? If so, I’m betting you tuned in with a similar mix of dread and curious amusement and perhaps some smug schadenfreude. That seemed to be the general consensus going in. With that cringe-worthy promo and the viral video of those Fox news anchors cracking up at Lochte’s expense post-interview… Which isn’t to say that interview wasn’t funny, in a sweet-Jesus-where-is-his-media-coach? sort of way. But by the time the show actually aired last night, it seems safe to say the swimming world was ready for an uncomfortable train wreck.

But was it? I can’t name a single reality show I’ve ever watched with any interest or regularity, so I’m the wrong person to rate it. Maybe it will catch with an inexplicable Kardashian-ness, or maybe it will produce a collective yawn from viewers needing more than Lochte’s frequently shirtless torso and ever twinkling eyes. All I can say is that I watched a show starring a sweet and simple man who will always do right by his friends and family. I don’t find that particularly compelling, but then watching that entire reality genre has always felt like leeches were attached to my scalp, sucking away brain cells in soulless swallows.

Yet, from a swimmer’s perspective, there was something very interesting about the show: who was missing. In a show reputedly about Lochte’s orbit of play hard, train hard priorities, there are some glaring discrepancies. Maybe all of Lochte’s play pals signed up to star alongside their famous friend, but the inner circle behind his training – the ones really responsible for making him successful enough for his own show, they’re nowhere to be seen.

You won’t find Coach Gregg Troy anywhere on this show. Despite the fact that, outside of Locthe’s parents, he’s been the most influential reality in Ryan’s life for the last decade. You won’t find Coach Troy’s wise lieutenants, Martyn Wilby and Anthony Nesty, on any episode either. Two coaches who’ve been on hand every step of the way in Lochte’s rise. The “coach” you will find on this show is identified only as “Mike” – a young not exactly authoritative looking coach on deck. Who the hell was that? According to a Gators source, that was a (soon-to-be ex) volunteer assistant with Florida.

So, yeah, the actual swimming side of  ”What Would Ryan Lochte Do?” could not be less real – or apparently, less of a priority. Fair enough, I guess; who wants to watch a swimmer, any swimmer, slog through the monotony of training that is every elite athlete’s actual life?

Here’s someone else who was missing from the premier: Ryan’s father, Steve Lochte, the man who also coached his son through high school in Daytona. No telling if he will appear in future episodes, or if the Lochte family story line will be limited just to his mom and two sisters, but for swimmers, cutting out his coach dad feels like another glaring omission. One of my principle memories of the 2008 Games in Beijing was that moment after Lochte’s national anthem, after winning his first individual Olympic gold, in the 200 back. As he stepped from the podium and began his victory march around the deck, he spotted his family in the stands and climbed up to embrace them. He reached his dad first. Caught live on NBC cameras for the world to see was a teary eyed father hugging his boy. Clear as can be, he said, “I’m so proud of you son.”

Now that’s reality.

He stands six-eight in bare bronzed feet the size of small boats. His hands are larger than Lebron’s and rumored to be webbed between each finger. His flexibility could make a yogi blush. He has spent most of his waking life immersed in salt water. His name is Siddhartha Belau. He is 20-years-old and he is a better swimmer than Michael Phelps. Unless you’re from a slim string of pearls called the Palau islands, in the South Pacific, you’ve likely never heard of him.

I didn’t believe it either. When stories of this young man first reached me, I discounted them as colorful fantasy. Things like this sometimes reach your Inbox when you write a blog like this one. Consider it the swimmer’s version of fish tales. Fabulist folks come lurking out of the depths with absurd stories of impossible speed and grace in the water. I heard one about a 15-year-old boy from Perth who was said to have clocked 45 seconds in the 100 meter free. Turned out the pool was 45 meters long. Heard another about a 12-year-old Amazonian girl from Argentina who was rumored to go 8:08 in the 800. Typo; it was 9:08. The stories about Belau were equally dubious at first blush, but there was something more there. The reports started to add up, from various verified sources. His legend is just reaching these shores. Soon the world will know him.

I believe Siddhartha Belau is real. And that he has broken 20 seconds in the 50 meter freestyle. Long course. He first learned butterfly at the advanced age of 14, but it’s reported that he’s already been 51.3 in the 100 / 1:52.6 in the 200. One of his coaches insists that he would beat Lochte in the 200 IM at Worlds this summer, if only he could make it there.

“The boy has never left the islands of Palau,” says the coach, who wishes to remain anonymous. “He is deathly afraid of airplanes, he will never agree to fly. You must understand – he lives in paradise and has no wish to leave.”

Another source wrote that: “Sid is a very simple boy, very pure of heart. He spends his days in the water, only emerging to eat the fish that he has speared. I do not think he has ever spent less than eight hours in the water, any day of his life. He is dry only when he sleeps.”

Indeed, it appears that getting Belau to race at all was something of a challenge. Fellow Palauans have spread tales of their Aquaman since he was a child. There are stories of little Siddhartha swimming ten meters deep and catching lobster with his bare hands when he was three years old. Other islanders speak of young Sid body-surfacing alongside dolphin in the island’s high clean surf. But when it came to racing up and down the pool, Belau was uninterested.

“I literally had to beg him to try swimming in the pool,” says the coach. “Sid couldn’t see the point. Palau has just one 50-meter pool and it is not well used. Why bother with a pool when you have the beautiful Pacific all around you? But there was a group of us, we knew what we were seeing. We knew that the only way the rest of the world would believe us is if we put the boy in the pool, and timed him at the distances you folks care about.”

Belau may have expressed reluctance at first, but it appears he soon found an affinity for the still waveless waters of the pool. “Sid says he likes the meditative aspect of pool swimming,” reports a friend named Ohana. “He loves to race against the clock, and hear what kinds of records he would have set, but he finds things like the Olympics funny. He feels no need to prove himself in those arenas.”

Why not? I wrote that back to all of them, the kind Palauans who’ve taken to emailing me over these last few months. How could Siddhartha Belau not care about showing the rest of the world what he can do? His friend Ohana may have summed up the Palauan sentiment best: “Because you care, does not mean he must.”

I’ve considered getting on a plane and finding out for myself. The invitation is there. I’ve asked them to send videos, something that can prove these outrageous claims. They’re working on it, but this is one corner of the world where lives do not revolve around iPhones or YouTube. They say they’ll have something for me soon, but on Palau-time, soon is a relative concept.

So, in the absence of evidence, I went looking for something else to back up my growing irrational faith in this elusive swim god. It turns out there might be some theories to support the likelihood of such a man. We all know the stories of Kenyan runners. The Olympic world has long pondered the question – what makes Kenyans such brilliant distance runners? Turns out there are some very good scientific reasons for their running supremacy. It’s a potent mixture of genes and culture. Here’s a great piece in the Atlantic that breaks down the Kenyan’s special sauce.

By that rationale Kenyan runners have an awful lot in common with swimmers in the South Pacific. Just as Kenyans perfected the art of running through genetic evolution and a culture of running long ways on the open African plains, these South Pacific swimmers may have developed as the most water-evolved people on the planet. It’s not so far fetched. Much has been made about Michael Phelps’s upbringing, where he watched his older sisters training when he was just a boy, absorbing the sport through chlorinated osmosis on the pool deck. Well, what about upbringings like Siddhartha Belau’s? A boy who was raised not on a pool deck in Baltimore, but in the clear cool waters of the South Pacific? A kid who was catching his lunch with his bare hands in 40-foot waters when he was barely out of diapers… A kid who learned his feel for the water by body-surfing with dolphin…

“He’s the greatest swimmer you’ve never seen,” says his coach.

But do you really need to see to believe?

He gets you to believe. In yourself, in your talent, in your training, and importantly, in him. That’s no small task, and it doesn’t have much to do with what goes on in the water everyday.

18 to 22 year old boys can be a delicate lot. They won’t admit to this, but it’s true. Their egos are fragile and their freakishly fit bodies are hyper sensitive to the slightest turbulence in their training. Often times what they need is not a coach but a psychologist. Enter Mike Bottom, the ultimate mind coach.

Two days ago, Bottom guided Michigan back to the top, as the men raced to their first title in 18 years. Bottom’s incredible accomplishments with a who’s who of champion sprinters long ago established him as one of the world’s great coaches, but this title does something else. It validates his Hall of Fame bona fides and transcends that old Sprint Coach label that he wore for so long. This Michigan team won it the Michigan way and the Bottom way. Which is to say they won it by dominating the distance events and swimming blazingly fast on the sprint relays. That’s a dangerous combo.

They also won it with virtually no stars. With all due respect to Connor Jaeger, who posted a pair of terrific winning times in the 500 and 1650, this Michigan team was a group that won with depth and consistency, not with a few eye-popping record-shattering swims. They did post one NCAA record – a stunning 1:22.27 in the 200 medley relay that no one saw coming. But aside from Jaeger’s wins and that one relay, you didn’t see Michigan standing on top of the podium in any other events.

Consider the races that will be remembered at this meet. There were quite a few. USC’s Vlad Morozov’s staggering sprints. 17.8 on that relay, 40.7 flat start in his 100. Cal’s Tom Shields, who ended his collegiate career in high style, tying Phelps’s small pool record in the 200 fly with that 1:39.6. And of course, Arizona’s monster sophomore, Kevin Cordes, who can now officially be proclaimed America’s Next Great Breaststroker. A few days ago, I posted a claim that his 49.5 100 breast split on Arizona’s medley relay may have been the best college swim ever. Turns out we spoke too soon. His 1:48.6 in the 200 breast is the best college swim ever. Tell me another that compares.

All of the above guys are Pac-12 swimmers. That’s where the best swimmers are. It’s hard to argue with the evidence. However, Michigan had the best team. By a lot. For all the drama at the meet this year, the team race was never really close. As the pre-meet projections established, Michigan was on another level, points-wise. They won by a comfortable 73.5 points ahead of Cal. (Talk about poetic justice. Beating your old team, after losing the top job there and watching them instantly ascend to the top in your absence…) The fact is, Michigan left plenty of points on the table. That first morning, they really should have had three or four guys in the final of the 500. Instead, they put four in the B-final, with each one missing the top 8 by less than half a second. There are plenty of other examples where they could have racked up plenty more points, but no matter. They did what they had to do.

They did it because Bottom made them believers. The man grasps the science of fast swimming as much as anyone, but it’s always been about more than that with Bottom’s swimmers. He simply convinces his swimmers that they’re the special ones. Simply – talk about the wrong adverb… There is nothing simple about it. This is high stakes coaching. Because all you need is one swimmer to call bullshit, and start spreading seeds of doubt among his teammates, and all those inspiring whispers cease to matter. It’s easier for coaches to place all their faith in a system. That gives everyone deniability. You present a program that’s worked before – with the right amount of yardage and speed work, the right arc to a season, the right carefully plotted taper, and you let the end take care of itself. That makes sense, and it does work, but Bottom has always played for higher stakes.

He’s the coach who creates unshakeable confidence in his swimmers, convincing them of their specialness, of their destiny. It doesn’t always turn out that way. But when that promised specialness all works out in the end, that’s when legends are made. Both in the water and on deck.

You love this stuff, you know you do. I do. It’s shamelessly swim geek, but whatever. If you’ve been in it, you know how exciting it is. These are numbers that make your pulse race. The crazy ass relay splits that bend time and make you text your friends frantically… Here’s tonight’s first edition:

4.) 40.45 – Vlad Morozov, USC, 100 free split on 4×100 medley relay, prelims. 18.9 to the feet… Yeah, Jesus.

3.) 43.48 – Tom Shields, Cal, 100 fly on medley relay, finals. The. Best. Swimmer. In. College.

2.) 17.86 – Vlad Morozov, USC, 50 free split on 200 free relay, finals. What the fuck?

1.) 49.56 – Kevin Cordes, Arizona, 100 breast on medley relay. No, seriously, what the fuck? When I texted this to my friend, Adam, he wrote back: “The greatest yards swim ever.” It might be.

So, there you have it… Sick Splits, Vol. 1.

The times are in from the all-important first session of NCAAs – and it turns out the psyche sheets don’t lie. Much. Take a look at the reality after morning one:

If the meet had been decided on paper, here’s how it would have looked:

So, flip Indiana and Texas in 4th and 9th positions, and the top nine teams are more or less exactly as predicted. USC and Auburn reverse orders in 5th and 6th, but that was a toss up to begin with. As noted previously, Indiana was probably the one team most likely to drop in the projections, while everyone seemed to know Texas was completely undervalued based on its seed times.

As for the top teams, it’s clear that Cal was also undervalued points-wise. Just look at its seeds for its relays. But that likely won’t be enough to catch Michigan. If they continue to swim to their seeds, as they did this morning, they’ll win. It’s just one session of six, but as anyone who’s ever been to the Meet knows, that first session counts for more than any other. It sets the tone and dictates all that’s about to come next.

Like a political pundit desperate to believe his party actually stands a chance, plenty of folks will continue to deny the obvious in these statistical projections. That’s all lovely, it’s nice to support your school. Just remember to bet with the stats, not with your heart.

This doesn’t mean anything. Let’s get that out of the way right up front. The meet isn’t swum on paper. Titles are won in the water. Yes, yes, tell us something we don’t know…

Ok, how about this? Michigan is about to run away with the men’s NCAA swimming championships. They could DQ a bunch of relays and swim like crap, and still win it. At least that’s what the numbers are saying. According to a detailed analysis of the Psych Sheet, top relay times from College Swimming.com, and a hand entering of all diving data, based on Diving Zone scores, here is what the scoring looks like on paper heading into the meet:

The above projections were compiled by a smart New York financier and close friend by the name of Steve Williams. It might be of note that Steve was a member of Michigan’s 1995 winning NCAA team – the last time Go Blue won it all in the water. No bias or anything! But as a man who makes his living making well-researched statistical financial projections, the hard data happens to support his rooting interest. In this case, the math is pretty straightforward. Swimming is a sport of numbers, and a Psych Sheet is as objective a document as any financial forecast. He notes that the diving is a little subjective, since, well, diving is a subjective sport. But in Steve’s words: “I entered all the diving data by hand from the divers who made the meet.  I used their absolute Zone performance scores to rank them per event.  This was a pain in the ass, but I used Zone scores, as a diver is only as good as their last performance.”

Nonetheless, these projections do not reflect the relative preparedness of when these qualifying times were posted. Some swimmers, like say Cal and Stanford, were merely in tune-up mode at their conference championships. They were far from peak performances, so big improvements can be expected. Meanwhile, teams like Indiana may have been flat-out rested at their conference meets, so perhaps a bounce could be in the cards. (The Hoosiers jump out on those rankings. Knew they’ve made big strides as a program, but to see them projected ahead of so many longtime powers is a bit of a shock…)

All conference tapering aside, it seems like an extremely good bet that Michigan will race to its first title in 18 years. Not to jink them or anything, but huge congrats to Coach Mike Bottom and Co for returning a proud program to the top of the heap… However, the rest of those projections reveal that the remaining Top 10 will be a tightly contested battle. Cal and Florida appear to match up with identical numbers, in the relays and individual events, and Indiana is just 15 points back in the 4th spot. USC and Auburn are placed in a virtual pre-meet tie in 5th and 6th, separated by just nine points. And Arizona and Stanford are just two points apart in 7th and 8th. One false start on a relay; one bad prelim session; one sick superstar – that’s all it will take to turn all these projections upside down.

So, in the spirit of March Madness, after analyzing the data, and knowing a bit about the swimmers and the coaches in play, here are my picks for the final Top 10 this Saturday night:

1.) Michigan 2.) Florida 3.) Cal 4.) USC 5.) Stanford 6.) Arizona 7.) Indiana 8.) Auburn 9.) Texas 10.) FSU

How about you?

The man knows a few things about fast age groupers. After all, he’s the coach of the greatest college recruit ever. That would be Missy Franklin. And the man in question, of course, would be Todd Schmitz. Earlier this week, Coach Schmitz made this observation on Twitter: I bet last week was the fastest week in age group swimming ever in the USA. Look how many NAGs went down. 

Well, the astute folks over at Swim Swam jumped on that particular tweet and they followed up on it. Turns out, Schmitz was dead on – and even underestimated the excellence. After reading that fine bit of reporting, I was inspired to do a bit more. There have been some truly crazy swims this month, and this season. So far, there’s been 27 NAG records set in March 2013 – 23 in a crazy seven day stretch from March 12 – 19. This season, 78 NAG records have gone done – out of a total of 196. That’s around 40%. Not since that artificial year of 2009 and the era of the super suits have so many records been left in shreds.

So, what’s going on? We know it’s not the suits. There’s nothing artificial about this onslaught. We also know it’s not limited to a certain region of the U.S. Back in the day, elite swimming was more or less the domain of California and Florida, with a large percentage of the U.S. National Team coming from those two states. No longer. These age group records have been falling everywhere from Maryland to Minnesota to Washington to Texas, and of course, plenty in Florida. Swim Swam also notes that California hasn’t even held its high school championships yet, meaning we can expect quite a few more before the short course season concludes.

Check out a few of the highlights, thus far: A 10-year-girl named Regan Smith became the youngest ever to break a minute in both the 100 fly and 100 back for two of her four NAG records. A 12-year-old boy named Reece Whitley became the youngest guy ever to break a minute in the 100 breast. 14-year-old Becca Mann crushed the NAG record in the mile, going 15:54.46 – a time that would seed her 4th at the women’s NCAAs this weekend. Then there’s the crew of 14-year-old boys. In this particular age group, a whole slew of records has been slashed, led by young Ryan Hoffer who went 20.0 and 44.8 in the 50 and the 100. The 13-14 backstroke records now stand at 48.7 and 1:45.7 (Thomas Anderson and Benjamin Ho, respectively.) And my personal favorite – the 1000 free. Last weekend, a kid named Matthew Hirschberger clocked a 9:02.3. Yes, you read that correctly. These are 14-year-olds.

In the upper age groups, the names are more familiar. It comes as no surprise that Katie Ledecky annihilated the 15-16 NAG records in the distance frees. (4:31 / 9:22 / 15:28) It’s also not much of a surprise to see other bold-faced names like Missy Franklin, Ryan Murphy, and Jack Conger appear among the 18-year-old record setters. Those three make up what is quite possibly the best recruiting class of all time this year. However, the crop of recruits in the years ahead appear to be no less astounding, when guys like Caleb Dressel, Andrew Selisker, and Dylan Carter start considering their college choices. Check out some of the times from that trio of 16-year-olds: Dressel – 19.8 / 43.2 in the 50 / 100 free; Selisker – 53.2 / 1:54.8 in the 100 / 200 breast, plus an eye-popping 1:44.0 in the 200 IM; and Carter – 1:35.2 in the 200 free.

How is this happening? Well, great coaching for one. 14-year-old distance phenoms Becca Mann and Matthew Hirschberger are teammates at Clearwater Aquatics, coached by Randy Reese. Caleb Dressel and Ryan Murphy are both products of the Bolles machine. Out of Minnesota, Coach Kate Lundsten must now be considered among the top rank of club coaches in the world. A year after graduating Olympian Rachel Bootsma, Lundsten coached three 15-year-olds and one 14-year-old girl to an insane 1:40.6 in the 200 medley relay. And of course, you have Todd Schmitz and his Franklin-led Colorado Stars.

However, let’s give the lion’s share of credit where it’s due – to this incredible crop of young swimmers moving through the club ranks. USA Swimming has always done an almost eerie and disheartening (to the rest of the world) job at replenishing its talent coffers through each Olympiad. Yet, it’s fair to say there was just a bit of apprehension out in Colorado Springs when Elvis left the building. Regardless of the talent in the wings, the retirement of Phelps left the single biggest hole ever, on any national team. Sure, Lochte capably fills a large piece of that, but he’s still Steve Young to Phelps’s Joe Montana.

But today’s NAG record setter is tomorrow’s Olympian. Based on this barrage of records this season, Team USA’s roster in Rio could be packed with plenty of new faces with the talent to climb plenty of podiums.

Dave Durden was not impressed. And why should he be? His team had just snapped the Streak. Three cruel decades of Stanford’s smug dominance at the top of the Pac-10 / 12 men’s conference swimming championships. 31 years. Since the early 80s, no Pac school was able to chop down the Cardinal. It’s about damn time. So, shouldn’t the Bears (and the Trojans and the Wildcats and the rest) be rejoicing?

Not really. See, Stanford all but conceded the title. And for that, they must be praised.

You won’t find much Stanford love in the pages of this blog. It’s the product of being a former USC Trojan. It’s not personal. Well, actually, it is. It’s completely personal. I’ve always hated the fuckers. Some of the reasons are even slightly valid. But in this case, Stanford must be honored in defeat. Not because they lost with humble grace (that would be very un-Cardinal), but because, for once, they kept their eyes on the real prize.

In year one of the Ted Knapp era, this is a new and prioritized Stanford. They are plotting to win the war, the NCAA team title two weeks from now. They might. In victory, the two-time defending Cal Bears looked beatable. More than that, they looked entitled. A quality that has always been more Palo Alto than Berkeley. Maybe that’s what repeated winning does to you.

So, no, Coach Durden was not impressed with his Bears. They’re loaded again, with a squad packed with underclassmen studs, and leading the way, the best swimmer in the NCAA, Tom Shields. At Pac 12’s, Shields won five races: the 100 and 200 fly and the 100 back, plus two relays. He was the swimmer of the meet. He’ll probably be the swimmer of the Meet two weeks from now. But the rest of them?

The New York Times ran a story about Cal’s victory / Stanford’s defeat today. The focus of the article was about the general buzz kill surrounding the end of the Streak. Neither winner nor loser seemed to care. The winners were pissed at their performance; the losers shrugged it off and said (rightly) that they had more important things to think about.

One has to wonder how Coach Knapp felt about the Streak. Over the last decade, it seemed to take on a life of its own. For most of those 31 years, Stanford was simply the class of the Pac 10 / 12. They were better than everyone else, plain and simple, as much as it pains me to write. Say, for two of those three decades, they won the conference meet without breaking much of a sweat. Hell, in seven of those 31 years, they went on to win the whole damn thing. But the last time they did it was 1998. For the next 14 years, it started to feel like the Streak, the battle, mattered more than the war.

It became a defining piece of Skip Kenney’s legacy. His Cardinal couldn’t lose the conference meet. That’s just not who he was. And if Ted Knapp wanted that top job when Skippy moved on, well then, as the loyal Number Two, he had to suck up some dubious tapering decisions come conference time. No longer. This year, Knapp saw the writing on the wall. It wasn’t so hard to see. After Cal won back-to-back NCAA titles, after losing two weeks prior at conference, it may as well have been spray-painted in neon on Stanford’s Clock Tower.

To win the big one, you don’t want to be at your best fourteen days too soon. Tapering isn’t rocket science, after all.

But then, you also don’t want to cruise through the conference meet like you’re a Golden (Bear) god, believing you’re predestined for yet another team title at NCAAs.

When Dave Durden took at look at his crew, that’s what he saw. Not impressed. Durden is too smart and too classy to come out and say it plain and mean in the New York Times. Instead, he referenced a “distorted self-awareness” among his talented crew of underclassmen.

Distorted self-awareness – that’s good. Allow me to translate: That heralded crew of Cal freshman last year, the ones who helped lead the Bears to another title? As sophomores, Durden is saying they’ve gotten cocky. They’re acting entitled, thinking winning is just that easy, something that they deserve every year. Maybe this year’s crop of equally talented Cal freshman have followed their example and started swaggering around before they’ve won anything. Whatever it is, Durden has called it out. And he’s done it in a brilliant and not-so-subtle way in the pages of the New York Times.

Across the Bay, Ted Knapp is guiding his crew with his own bit of inspired psychology. The man has clearly read his Sun Tzu:

If your enemy is superior, evade him. If angry, irritate them. If equally matched, fight, and if not, split and reevaluate. – The Art of War

(Or maybe he’s just a big fan of that scene from Wall Street…)

In defeat, Knapp seems to have followed master Sun Tzu’s wisdom. He evaded a superior opponent in a battle that was acceptable to lose. He likely irritated the victors by shrugged it off and claiming his team never even talked about the Streak. And now they’ll regroup and take aim at the war ahead…

Both Durden and Knapp replaced legends at their respective schools. It’s clear neither is shy about stepping from any shadows.