RIO DE JANEIRO _ If you're wondering what happened to Missy Franklin, understand that you are not alone. Those wondering comprise a big club.
The club even includes Missy Franklin.
On Monday night, Franklin's famous smile had vanished. And so had the swimmer who won four gold medals at the 2012 London Games.
"There's a lot of things that I've been trying to wrap my mind around this year about what's been going wrong, but I've never been able to figure it out," she said in a shaking voice after failing to qualify for the 200 freestyle finals. "I don't understand everything."
Four years ago, all we saw was laughter and gold. Franklin became an immediate Colorado folk hero. She was only 17. Her swimming future was boundless.
Only it wasn't.
In 2012, Franklin was astonishingly comfortable. She was competing against the world's best, but she acted as if she were going for a ribbon at some weekend swim meet.
"This is just another swim meet," Franklin said in March, explaining the Olympic philosophy she followed in 2012. "Yes, there is so much that goes along with it and there's all this media and all these people, but it's just another swim meet. The pool is the same length."
But she's not the same swimmer. In 2012, Franklin was carefree. In 2016, she's conflicted.
After the London Games, Franklin passed on millions in endorsement money so she could retain her amateur status. Some estimates put the passed-up endorsements as high as $5 million. Instead, she enrolled at Cal-Berkeley. She wanted to live and swim in a college atmosphere.
She cherished the Cal experience, but after two years she decided to turn pro. She returned to Denver to live with her parents. She left a big chunk of herself back in Berkeley. If you're looking for what went wrong with Franklin, her departure from Berkeley is a good starting point.
"It was incredibly hard to leave," Franklin said. " ... It was so hard. I have a life in Colorado, but I also have my life in Berkeley that I developed for two years, and that life is still going on without me there."
She returned to Denver as a professional swimmer. She struggled with back trouble and struggled to juggle her time between endorsements and time in the pool. Along the way, she slowly transformed from an ultra-elite swimmer who could beat anybody to an elite swimmer who sometimes hovered just below Olympic standards.
As the Olympics approached, she was swimming slower than four years ago. At the Olympic trials in Omaha, Neb., she finished seventh and failed to qualify in the 100 backstroke. She won gold at the event in London.
She rallied in Omaha to qualify in the Olympic 200 freestyle, 800 medley relay and 200 backstroke, but her troubles arose anew in Rio.
In Monday morning's quarterfinals, Franklin seemed ready to ride to the finals, but she swam a half-second slower in the semis that night. This surprise confused everyone, including Franklin. In her brief summary of her failure, she emphasized she had tried harder Monday night than Monday morning.
Transforming from a prodigy to a mainstay is rare. Few swimmers can retain the desperate thirst required to rule the world, or at least come close to ruling the world.
Natalie Coughlin won six medals at the 2008 Beijing Games. She's still chasing medals at 33. Why?
Coughlin loves her sport, even after all these years. She jumps in the pool every day except Sunday at 6 a.m. She enjoys the rigor even more than she did as a teen.
"I'm a lot stronger and happier in swimming than I've ever been," she said.
Franklin once radiated joy. She once seemed destined for so much.
The joy is gone, at least for now. She's struggling, and she can't figure out why.
