Quote from: PaulNewman on December 04, 2023, 02:27:13 PM
I lost my best post of the year in the latest outage so I'll do an abbreviated version.
I'm sure, whether pro or con, we're pretty much done with Amherst talk, but as we tidy things up I have an observation and a question.
I agree with jknezek about Amherst's sustained, remarkable success for at least a decade and a half making sense. My observation is about what seems like the pattern dynamics on the board...Allowing for significant carryover effect, every year the antipathy towards the Mammoths grows as the season progresses and reaches peak crescendo level over the last two to three weeks until there is close to a unanimous verdict about the program and a desire for Amherst to get knocked out (excluding of course Mammoths Nation and some NESCAC diehards). Then some of us (like me in some previous years) see a couple of press conferences with Serpone dripping in charisma combined with direct witness observations of gracious, empathic encounters with players on the opposing teams, and especially players on other teams that were in some degree of a recruitment process with him. And then there's a feeling in the air of maybe we (and I mean a collective we) went a little far and we conclude with a bit of a correction. Until the next year verifies everything again and rinse/repeat.
The question is about exactly how expansive Serpone's recruiting goes and how many prospects believe they are truly in the mix to get a spot at Amherst (and I'm raising this with no intent for anyone to go into the weeds on 'tips' and such). Now I assume that Serpone gets most of what he wants (again, aside from any major admissions issues), but he may miss on some. One of the announcers noted during the W&L game that he has a neighbor who picked W&L over Princeton (no athletics aspect was implied). In any case, I would guess Serpone receives inquiries well into the hundreds (or more). How many does he seriously get involved with, pursue, keep the mutual interest going, etc? 100? 50? 25? And is there a point when he releases the ones under heavy consideration who he does not offer in the end?
Notwithstanding what I just wrote above, his yield has got to be very high. Nevertheless, I've heard too many opponent parents publicly and/or privately make a point of noting Serpone's positive embrace and interactions with their sons after games to just discount that. How does the process unfold concluding with his final selection of 6-8 players each year? And he can't be the only coach in D3 who recruits hard and who would embrace a recruit who went elsewhere, right? What's his hook or pitch? How does he convince a kid that the combo of Amherst athletics and academics won't be too much?
Charisma often is confused with and/or masquerades as character....and is incredibly addictive and difficult to resist.
Lastly, anyone have insight they can share about the Nuhu injury? In live action on video it did not look like much at all and the announcers surmised that he was milking it and/or trying to draw a card on the St Olaf player, but then they would pan over to the trainer seeming to work with him and he never returned. Some odd substitutions for Amherst in that final game...and of course one that paid off handsomely. Curious about ten Cate being relegated to a minor role and also Cubeddu who is so dangerous (but the latter did seem like he was a little banged up).
Paul, to answer your last question about the Nuhu injury, we were not sure of the severity of it. It didn't look as serious of a contact to the naked eye as say the Hakeem Morgan injury the previous day, but we watched how it developed and were noting throughout the broadcast he was being treated by the trainers, on the bench, and at the trainer's table. That became a good sign it was more serious than it initially appears. And then the Mammoths suffered some other key injuries, including to Landa (who really toughed it out in the second half... we knew Perez was ready to sub in if he could not continue) and Clark-Eden.
It's hard with injuries because unless you're right there listening to the conversation between player and athletic trainer, you're speculating. From personal experience, I've collided with someone at full speed on the field where they blew out their knee and I walked away unscathed. Then there's been incidents where I've planted a foot wrong and strained a hamstring. So you just never know.