Ever since Hocker burst onto the scene in 2021, he has greatly impressed me. He has shown time and again that he is tactically savvy, gritty and clutch. Pushing through injury setbacks in 2022-23 he has become stronger than ever. One of his greatest attributes, however, is his kick. By the time he took down Centro at the Olympic Trials I thought to myself "this kid has the greatest kick I've ever seen". Now after pulling off yet another trials upset, I figured it was time to check that hypothesis.
Here is a chart showing the winner of every Global Champion in the modern era and comparing them to Hocker's closing 100M from the 2021 trials, and his closing 300M from this year's trials. As Hocker did set a PB in these trials as well, I also compared each athletes closing 300M from their PB race. (For athletes with an asterisk, I used the race from their mile PB's, as those have faster times when converted).
I made sure to check each split for myself, as some splits online can be a little off. Each split is rounded to the nearest tenth and they may have an error of +/-(.1). Aside from Global Championships, I included Hoare's Commonwealth performance from 2022 and Ingebrigtsen's run from the European Championship's this year. Hoare's because it's the only other championship race I'm aware of that is faster than what Hocker ran just now. For Ingebrigtsen it was a European record, however it was a slower race than what Hocker just ran, and what he himself has at the last few Global Championships which makes it interesting for a direct comparison.
As you can see the 2021 trials were run in a pretty average Championship pace, but Hocker's close blows everyone else's out of the water, besides Coe from Moscow Olympics (who closed almost the exact same). However, Coe's race was over 3 seconds slower than Hocker's.
Looking at the 2024 trials, despite Hocker having one of the slowest PB's on the list, this is one faster championship races. (Outside the Ingebrigtsen era, practically no one ran that quick). Even with that being the case however, his close still places quite high. Nobody's has ever closed that quick off a pace that fast, and the next fastest time with that fast a close, is Morceli in 91; when he ran 3:32.8. Alternatively, the next fastest close off a pace that fast is Kerr, who went 39.8. Cacho holds the all-time best running 37.4 in a jog fest.
Maybe most impressively however is when looking at kicks on PB times, Hocker is in a different stratosphere. The next best is Steve Cram's 39.6 from his former mile WR. This obviously suggests Hocker is ready to go faster. However, even with that being so, Kerr and Ingebrigtsen's strength is simply superb at the moment. Hocker could set a big PB in the Olympic final and still miss out on a medal. In an era where strength is king it's tougher for the speedsters. Though as I've said, he has repeatedly shown to bring his best out for the Championship moments, and he is definitely going to need to.
I want to keep updating these lists. Maybe looking at different country's national championships, world indoors and more. As of right now, I think it's fair to say that statistically Hocker has the greatest 1500m kick of all time, with Coe at #2, and maybe Morceli at #3 to close out the podium.