[OT] Olympic gold medal flap vs. Fifth Down game

[billhoward]

That was another of the rules having the effect of ticking off the third, er, emerging, world: Appeals have to be in French or English. It sounded (again, this is filtered via the media sources who reported; we weren't there in person) as if the IOC was being a stickler for the rules rather than for what's right.

[billhoward]

Whoa, there. The replay affirms what the referee says he saw, or contradicts the ref  if there's a clear contradiction. It doesn't replace him, it doesn't overrule him on a close call. It rectifies clearly blown calls.

If you can't tell from the replay if the puck crossed the goal line before the goalie grabbed it, then the referee's call of "no goal" stands. And that can be subjective as we saw in I believe the Stanley Cup finals or semis this year - a shot that appeared on the TV replay to have crossed the goal line was affected by the camera angle because the puck was not on the ice. I think the word for it is parallax.

The replay's major value is overturning clear mistakes, ones that have the fans talking for days after the game.

I do believe there is computerized balls-and-strikes analysis -- already -- when it comes time to grade umpires by major league baseball for purpose of seeing who's good and who needs remedial work.

And the replay will always show the ball going between Bill Buckner's legs.

[CUlater 89]

According to Bob Costas, the "discrepancy" between the verbal and written complaints was that the written complaint by the officials was signed, but was blank, leading many to assume there was some agenda on the officials' part to cause trouble for Peirsol (who had earlier challenged a Japanese swimmer's victory by contending that he employed an illegal dolphin kick in one of the breaststroke events).

[ninian '72]

I understand the official was a Singapore native.  If his English/French language skills were weak, he may have been unable to write up the DQ slip.  If that's the case, why were such officials not provided with help from translators, or why were officials spots not restricted to individuals fluent in the required languages?  

It's easy to assume that Piersol might have been a target for retaliation.  Not only did he claim that the Japanese swimmer had used a dolphin kick on his pull-out, but Piersol also accused him of knowing what he was doing and that he knew he was cheating. It may be reasonable to cry foul about a missed call by an official or a technical error by another swimmer, but making personal accusations about the other swimmer and his motives strikes me as over the line.  Although officials are not supposed to care who wins, Piersol attracted attention by criticizing the officiating and set the bar high for himself in the process.  He's lucky his race worked out the way it did, although I heard several days ago that the Brits and Dutch were preparing a formal appeal of the results of this race.

[gtsully]

[Q]Al DeFlorio Wrote:
It's like saying if Palahicky's goal had been allowed in Buffalo the game would have gone into overtime at 3-3.  Well, who knows how the rest of the game would have played out had the goal been allowed and the game continued without the lengthy delay and a 1-0 Cornell lead?[/q]

Well, the way they were rolling at the time, they probably would have blown UHN out of the building the way Minnesota did.  Alas, we'll never know...

[billhoward]

[Q]gtsully Wrote: Alas, we'll never know...[/q]

At Alabama, it's Roll Tide Roll.

In Ithaca, you've nailed it: "Alas, we'll never know."

The disallowed goals and called-back touchdowns and deflections and feet out of bounds that kept Cornell from greater glory. The shared Ivy title Marinaro's senior year because against Dartmouth our best receiver was sick and so Dartmouth slacked off coverage and played Marinaro. The penalty at the end of the UNH hockey game two years ago.

[JordanCS]

My two cents: Piersol's turn was nowhere near illegal.  He did absolutely nothing wrong.  I was a competitive swimmer for 8 years, and I watched the replay and said 'what?'  Yeah, he was a bit further from the wall than usual, and thus had a slightly delayed flip turn, but that's not illegal...only if he is laboring to get to the wall on his stomach, which he wasn't...he just came in a bit off stroke...nothing wrong with that.  The main reason the DQ was rejected is that the written statemen contradicted what the judge said verbally...they didn't match!

Jordan

[ninian '72]

Check the replay again, if they show it.  What was illegal were the two short scissor kicks before he started his turn, but after he had brought his arms down to his sides.  We write this up as a non-continuous turning action.  It's not uncommon for swimmers to turn onto their stomachs early and find themselves too far out to start their turns.  Usually, they just slow down their arm pull and don't finish the pull until they've kicked in close enough to begin the turn.  Then everything's legal.  Piersol's kicks were so inconsequential they probably had no impact on his final time, but they did make him vulnerable to a DQ.

[Roy 82]

Ah the Olympics. the Big-O.

I expected to see a mention of Cornellians and alums at the Olympics on this board but there is none. Did we have any? There was the track star from Hahvahd, the fencer from Yale and enough medalists from Stanford alone (I live about 2 blocks from Stanford) to out-medal most countries.

Having been thoroughly Californicated, Beach Volleyball is one of my favorite sports to play and watch. Believe it or not, it is pretty popular in Europe and even landlocked nations like Switzerland are among the tops in the world.  So it is widely played.

Now don't get me started on men's soccer. IIRC It is an under 23 tournament so as not to compete with the World Cup. Since when did the Olympics settle for being a junior tournament? If you can't field the very best then drop it.

The IOC Chief said that baseball might be dropped from the Olympics. He cited that as an example of how the US doesn't control the IOC (did you notice that the ceremonies are conducted in English not Greek, French etc.). The US didn't qualify for the Olympics in baseball.  Is there any clamour for a baseball dream team (getting way overused)? Could MLB stop for a couple of weeks like the NHL does? Could you imagine Barry Bonds batting against some poor pitcher in an early round game. Whoops, could there perhaps be some reason why Barry couldn't play in the olymics.  Hmmmm:)

[Tom Pasniewski 98]

I don't believe that Cornell can claim any medals.  Caryn Davies, rowing, of the silver-medal winning Women's Eight's boat is a resident of Ithaca but I don't believe she attends/attended Cornell.

There was talk of Roger Clemens coming out of retirement to pitch in the majors this season as practice for going to the Olympics but that fizzled out when the US failed to qualify late last year and he found another reason to continue pitching instead.

[Al DeFlorio]

[Q]Tom Pasniewski 98 Wrote:

 I don't believe that Cornell can claim any medals.  Caryn Davies, rowing, of the silver-medal winning Women's Eight's boat is a resident of Ithaca but I don't believe she attends/attended Cornell.
[/q]
Davies was born and lives in Ithaca but attended...Hahvahd. ::uhoh::

[jeh25]

[Q]Roy 82 Wrote:


The IOC Chief said that baseball might be dropped from the Olympics. He cited that as an example of how the US doesn't control the IOC (did you notice that the ceremonies are conducted in English not Greek, French etc.). The US didn't qualify for the Olympics in baseball. .[/q]

My understanding is that dropping baseball is a cost containment issue for host countries. Asking countries that don't play baseball to spend large amounts of money to build a world class facility that will never be used after the games is seen as an undue financial hardship.

[CUlater 89]

All of the ceremonies are conducted in French (the official language of the IOC), English and the language of the host country.

[Greg Berge]

[Q]CUlater 89 Wrote:

 All of the ceremonies are conducted in French (the official language of the IOC), English and the language of the host country.[/q]

I noticed that this time around the order of the languages on the scoreboard was English, French, Greek.  Not sure if they randomly order them, or if this is a not so subtle reminder as to who's running the planet these days.

[RichH]

[Q]Tom Pasniewski 98 Wrote:

There was talk of Roger Clemens coming out of retirement to pitch in the majors this season as practice for going to the Olympics but that fizzled out when the US failed to qualify late last year and he found another reason to continue pitching instead.[/q]

The speculation is that the reason Clemens announced his "retirement" in the first place was specifically to pitch in the Olympics, since if you are on a MLB roster, you are ineligible to compete.  As soon as the US failed to quailify, the rumblings began about him returning for another MLB season.

Team Canada lost their ace pitcher, Jeff Francis, when Colorado notified Team Canada they would not be letting him go to Athens, despite Francis being at AAA at the time the Olympics started.  Francis was called up on Aug. 25.  Canada also lacked star first-baseman Justin Morneau, who is starting for the Twins.