Honestly pretty unprofessional by the US Army to wait until the last minute to bar him from competing.
Are you joking? There is a war going on in Europe. They have many more things on their priority list. The 5th placer at USAs can wait until next time. Now, it will be interesting to see if USATF entered an alternate at all. If Siegel is making 7 figures a year, he should have his staff organized enough that they always enter an alternate just in case something random like this happens.
Like I imagine Mantz wasn't going regardless as isnt' he doing NYC Half so it will be interesting to see if Hunter was entered as an alternate.
Mantz must have passed because he's aiming to peak by missing out on the US outdoor World's team. Passing up the opportunity to run on your first US team seems crazy to me. It's quite possible he never gets another opportunity in his career, nothing is guaranteed in this sport
Interesting that the women distance runners seem to be taking World Indoors much more seriously than the men. The women's team at 1500 and 3000 is much closer to our best possible team than the men's - which is a joke. The men's team is probably somewhere in the range of our 40th best possible arrangement.
Don't know the back story about him declining worlds, but he obviously isn't a world class 3K runner. He's good, but his strength is...well strength. He's much better off trying his hand at the NYC half.