Rec’ing On…Beijing Olympics – Part 10

OK…let me get this straight. You tie in gymnastics. If the A and B score totals are identical then you look at the B score for the tiebreaker. If they are identical, then you look at the judge’s scores for the next tiebreaker.  Since the highest and lowest scores have already been thrown out, then you throw out the next lowest? That’s how we’re breaking ties, now? Seriously?! Even FIG president Bruno Grandi threw up his hands, saying that it was how the IOC wanted to do things…if it were up to him, he’d award a tie. But such won’t be the case this Olympics for Nastia Liukin.

A lot of credit has to go to Liukin and USA Gymnastics. Instead of making a big stink about it (unlike some commentators), they swallowed their disappointment and said that those are the rules of the game.  Moving on. I’m not sure too many other countries or competitors would be as magnanimous…especially when the gold medalist is much more likely than not inelligible for the podium based on age restrictions.  Then again, Liukin finds consolation in that, “I got the biggest gold medal of them all [for the all-around].”

There really is no consolation for China’s Liu Xiang, the hurdling hero of the Athens games. In what should have been his greatest moment, he was felled, much like another hero, by his Achilles heel.

On to the baseball diamond…what a mess. The game between China and the USA really devolved with dubious plowings of the US runners through the Chinese catchers, and much less dubious head-hunting by China’s pitcher. Three ejections: China’s manager, pitching coach, and pitcher. The beaned U.S. player, Matthew LaPorta, was taken to the hospital for observation for his mild concussion.

Stephanie Brown Trafton won the first USA woman to win the discus since the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics (you know, the one with Babe Didrikson). I do wish that Jenn Stuczynski’s coach could have been more positive about her silver medal in the pole vault.  Instead, he basically tells her that her strategy was wrong and that she’s not the athlete she needed to be.  There’s a time and a place for blunt talk, but right after winning a silver medal to an athlete who needs some validation wasn’t it. At the same time, total props to Russian Yelena Isinbayeva for setting a new world record. Her joy is a good thing for the sport.

Still on the track…kudos to the USA men’s 400m hurdles team, who finished 1-2-3 to sweep the medals, lifting the team’s hopes after a disappointing start to the Athletics portion of the games.