Who Deserves to Win Each of the Golden Goggle Awards

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Photo Courtesy: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports

By David Rieder.

The 13th annual Golden Goggle awards in New York City bring three guarantees: well-dressed swimmers who have left the suits, caps and goggles at home (or perhaps in their hotel rooms); a flurry of swimming-related humor; and outrage because someone deserving was robbed of a particular award.

But remember: everyone that got nominated is extremely deserving of being honored, especially this year after American swimmers won 16 gold medals and 33 medals overall in Rio. Voters had some seriously tough calls to make in quite a few of the categories.

Which categories were the toughest? Who do I think deserves the big hardware Monday night? Keep reading to find out.

Breakout Performer of the Year

Four really good options in this category. Few can forget the moment when Cody Miller won bronze in the 100 breast in Rio and appeared even more excited than gold medalist Adam Peaty, and both Josh Prenot and Leah Smith took major steps forward in their respective careers at Olympic Trials before each winning individual medals in Rio.

All three deserve major props, but this is Lilly King’s award to lose. After a stunning freshman season at Indiana when she won NCAA titles the 100 and 200-yard breast—both in American record-time—King turned her sights to long course and won Olympic gold in the 100 breast. She posted an Olympic record-time of 1:04.93, a year after finishing second at U.S. Nationals in 1:06.69. Even with three other candidates who would be deserving almost any other year, this one looks clear cut.

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Photo Courtesy: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports

Perseverance Award

Safe to say that this award will be a bit harder to handicap than the breakout award. After all, what is perseverance anyway? All four of the candidates have overcome significant struggles on their way major success in 2016, but who best fits the criteria?

Dana Vollmer has actually won this award before, in 2009. After missing the 2008 Olympic team, she won NCAA Swimmer of the Year her senior season at Cal before earning her way back to the World Championships. Emerging from a major disappointment to have the best season of her career? That’s perseverance. While her comeback to the sport the past year after giving birth has been remarkable, I rank her fourth-most deserving among the nominees.

Anthony Ervin bounced back from a dreadful World Championships in 2015, where he took much of the blame for the American failure to make the final in the men’s 400 free relay. He made it to Rio in both the 400 free relay and 50 free, winning gold medals in both.

Kathleen Baker has dealt with plenty of adversity over the past few years. Baker returned home to North Carolina this spring after missing out on the championship finals in both backstroke events at the NCAA championships, and she later revealed details of her struggle with Crohn’s Disease. To swim as well as she did to make the Olympic team in the 100 back and then to cut a further half second from her best time to win a silver medal in Rio deserves major props.

David Plummer swam the race of his life in the 100 back final at the 2012 Olympic Trials, swimming under 53 seconds for the first time. But he got third, less than a tenth behind Nick Thoman—and then he had to watch as Matt Grevers and Thoman made it a 1-2 finish for the U.S. in the event in London. And somehow, Plummer found the resolve to come back, and he succeeded, finally making an Olympic team and winning a bronze in the 100 back and later a relay gold medal.

So yeah, it’s a tough call, but only one of these four suffered the biggest heartbreak imaginable and then put his life on hold for four years to try it again—and succeeded. Plummer gets my vote.

Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

Coach of the Year

Six nominees here, all members of the U.S. Olympic coaching staff: Bob Bowman, Dave Durden, Bruce Gemmell, Ray Looze, David Marsh and Greg Meehan. Let’s just say that all were on the Olympic staff for good reason.

Gemmell has actually won this award each of the past three years as Katie Ledecky has broken record after record, and it’s not like Ledecky had a poor year in 2016. (She won a few races, as I remember.)

Meehan undoubtedly did amazing work this year, going back to the NCAA season, when he very nearly led Stanford to an NCAA championship after Ledecky deferred and Simone Manuel redshirted. And then he led both Manuel and Maya DiRado to stunning Olympic gold medals and also put Lia Neal on her second Olympic team.

But Dave Durden deserves this award. Durden directly placed five swimmers on the Olympic team: Nathan Adrian, Ryan Murphy, Jacob Pebley, Josh Prenot and Tom Shields, and he played a significant role in coaching Anthony Ervin as well. Durden already was named ASCA Coach of the Year back in September, and there’s no reason to believe he won’t add a Golden Goggle trophy to his shelf Monday night.

Photo Courtesy: Griffin Scott

Relay Performance of the Year

USA Swimming had some pretty good options to choose from in this category, especially considering five of six U.S. relays won Olympic gold in Rio. The women’s 800 free relay came from behind to take down Australia for the gold medal, but with Allison Schmitt, Leah Smith, Maya DiRado and Katie Ledecky on board, any other result would have been a stunner.

In the men’s medley relay, the Americans were not losing Michael Phelps’ last race, even with Adam Peaty swimming breaststroke on the British squad. Especially after Ryan Murphy led off in 51.85, breaking the world record in the 100 back.

This should go to the men’s 400 free relay, which required Caeleb Dressel, Phelps, Ryan Held and Nathan Adrian to all swim nearly-flawless splits in order for the Americans to win gold. And each one of them came through, Phelps and Adrian in a situation they were plenty familiar with, Dressel and Held in the biggest moment of their careers. All recorded swims at or just off their personal bests, forcing France, which came from behind to stun the Americans four years earlier, had to settle for silver.

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Photo Courtesy: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports

Female Race of the Year

So apparently, we’re supposed to choose between Simone Manuel’s historic gold medal-winning swim in the 100 free, Katie Ledecky’s dominant sub-8:05 in the 800 free, Maya DiRado’s upset of Katinka Hosszu in the 200 back and Lilly King’s gold medal in the 100 breast. Good luck, voters!

Manuel’s gold medal was shocking, as was the fact that she shared the top step of the podium with Canada’s Penny Oleksiak. It was the breakthrough long course performance that Manuel had been waiting years to put together. But then again, King had to execute perfectly to get by Yulia Efimova in the 100 breast, especially after calling out Efimova as a cheater the day before.

It says something about the quality of options that Ledecky, with her three gold medals, made this list just once. Snubbed was her 200 free, where she had to dig deep to get past Sarah Sjostrom. But the 800 stands out, mostly because she won the gold medal by 11 seconds and beat her own world record by two.

But earlier that night, Maya DiRado pulled off a stunner in the women’s 200 back. It was not just that she beat Hosszu—it was that she looked to be totally out of contention with 25 meters to go, with 15 meters to go and even with five meters to go. How many swimmers can end their careers like that? How many athletes in any sport can go out like that?

Maya gets my vote.

Photo Courtesy: Erich Schlegel-USA TODAY Sports

Male Race of the Year

Some good nominations in this category—Anthony Ervin for his 50 free gold medal, Ryan Murphy for his 100 back win and Michael Phelps for both the 200 fly and 200 IM—but the race that should be recognized here did not get a nomination. After all, the only American male to set a world record at the Games was Murphy, and it was in the 100 back—but it came leading off the 400 medley relay, not in the individual 100 back final.

But let’s give the award to Murphy anyway. After all, 51.97 in that final was not too shabby at all—it was only three one-hundredths off Aaron Peirsol’s then-world record and only the second time ever a man had swum two laps of backstroke under 52 seconds. Murphy showed some patience in that final and was only fourth at the halfway point, but from there, he hit the gas and finally had his long-awaited breakthrough on an international stage.

Admittedly, Phelps’ dominant effort in the 200 IM was breathtaking to watch, but the greatest-of-all-time will undoubtedly have his moment in the spotlight a little bit later on in the evening.

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Photo Courtesy: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports

Female Athlete of the Year

With apologies to Simone Manuel and Maya DiRado…

For a third straight year, this one belongs to Katie Ledecky. Duh.

Photo Courtesy: Erich Schlegel-USA TODAY Sports

Male Athlete of the Year

Again, some really good options here. Ryan Murphy proved himself to be the next in a long line of great American backstrokers as he won three gold medals in Rio, while Anthony Ervin won gold in the 50 free for the second time, 16 years after the first. And Nathan Adrian was as solid and consistent as ever.

But Michael Phelps deserves this honor without a doubt. He won five golds in a silver in Rio, upping his unbelievable career numbers to 23 gold, three silver and two bronze medals. He showed guts in holding on for gold in the 200 fly and his old dominance in his fourth-straight win in the 200 IM. The Americans might not win the 400 medley relay without Phelps’ fly leg, and they certainly don’t beat France in the 400 free relay.

For the third straight year and and eighth time overall, Phelps will walk off the stage to a standing ovation as the male athlete of the year.

Photo Courtesy: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports

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Pam Clark

7 years ago

Solid choices, David Rieder. I hope Ryan Murphy comes away with at least one Golden Goggles trophy after a phenomenal Olympics debut in Rio (not to mention a third consecutive dominant NCAA season at Cal).