Paul Hamm - Give it to Korea?

[bubie2.5]

gometros ITA

 

[MerryPoppins]

I really don't understand why he should give it up. It was awarded to him. I think he should be willing to share it if that is the decision that is made. But I don't think it's up to him to decide. If the gold is taken away, he would certainly deserve the silver.

I guess if I were in his shoes, I'd publicly state that I would be willing to share if that is what the Olympic committee should decide. That is classy enough, IMO.

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Originally posted by CookieGVB
If Paul Hamm gave up his gold medal, what would happen to the bronze medalist?

The bronze medalist would have Paul Hamm's gold medal is what would happen.

The question is what would happen to the silver medalist (also a S. Korean). Is he going to give up his silver medal to Paul Hamm (who would have finished second if the judges hadn't made the mistake) and take the bronze from the new gold medalist?

 

[missypie]

I just read this from one of the Sports Illistrated writers who has studied the tapes: Yes, they should have gien him the higher start value. BUT, the Korean guy also had 4 holds on the bar when the rules only allow 3; that's a .2 deduction that the judges missed. So if they're going to rescore it, they should rescore the whole thing...if that would happen, he would gain .1 and lose .2, for a net loss of .1.

 

[gometros]

Originally posted by palmtreegirl
I'd feel bad that it happened but I think the rules are there for a reason and should be inforced. If this happened to us I wouldn't expect another athlete to give up his medal because we made a mistake and didn't follow standard protocal. No competition is perfect and if anyone is allowed to successfully protest a result after the event is finished it could open up a HUGE can of worms, people could protest things days, weeks or even years later, where would it stop? They new the rules and didn't catch the mistake in time, it's a huge bummer and a lesson learned but as I said before the protocal is there for a reason and should be followed by all.

You obviously did not read my post. It has happened before and in one case, reversed ONE YEAR after the medal was originally awarded. When it happens to one of our own athletes, we scream foul loud and long. Wouldn't it be nice if for once we showed that we aren't the ugly Americans everyone thinks we are?

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Originally posted by missypie
I just read this from one of the Sports Illistrated writers who has studied the tapes: Yes, they should have gien him the higher start value. BUT, the Korean guy also had 4 holds on the bar when the rules only allow 3; that's a .2 deduction that the judges missed. So if they're going to rescore it, they should rescore the whole thing...if that would happen, he would gain .1 and lose .2, for a net loss of .1.

Yup. I read that too.

When you start messing around with giving out more gold medals because of judging errors, things like this are going to spiral out of control. It happened, it was unfortunate, but there could conceivably be no end to the scoring controversies on this one.

The results should stand.

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Here's the article. A good read:



Paul Hamm fought back to defeat Kim Dae-eun (left) and and Yang Tae-young in the all-around competition.
AP


Let me be clear here, since some self-righteous columnists who wouldn't know a handstand from a night stand have entered the fray: Paul Hamm should not give up his gold medal.

Nor is his gold medal tarnished, as the headline writers have suggested. Nor should a second gold medal in the men's all-around competition be awarded to South Korea's unfortunate Yang Tae Young. This is not another Skategate, where judges in the pairs competition in Salt Lake were caught colluding. It's time for the media to back off.

Here's what happened -- and I warn you in advance, it's not easy to follow. Yang did his parallel bars routine, and was scored a 9.712 -- a pretty good score. To put it in perspective, in the team finals two nights earlier, he had a 9.687 on the same apparatus with a similar routine.

The two judges in charge of assigning start values for parallel bars in the all-around, Spain's Benjamin Bango and Colombia's Oscar Buitrago Reyes, decided Yang's start value was 9.9. The head judge on the parallel bars, George Beckstead, didn't overrule them.

It was these three judges who eventually were suspended by the International Gymnastics Federation when, after studying the videotape, it was determined the start value for Yang should have been 10.0, as it had been in the team competition finals. Had it been, Yang would have scored 9.812 on the apparatus, and his total would have been .10 higher heading into his final event, the high bars.

That is not to say Yang would have finished .10 higher at the end of the night, which some are suggesting. Gymnasts don't operate in a vacuum, nor do judges score in a vacuum.

Everyone knows exactly where they stand relative to the other competitors. Yang might have relaxed with the bigger lead; he might have become uptight and choked; or he might have been perfectly brilliant. We will never know. But it's fair to say his mental outlook would have been altered.

Judges, too, might have scored his high-bar routine differently had he been further ahead than he was at the time. It's not the way it's supposed to work, but judges are human. They have their favorites. That's why the FIG rules state that any protest must be filed before the end of a rotation -- in this case, the parallel bars -- which the Koreans failed to do.

A couple of points: a 9.9 start value is not unusual. The night of the all-around competition, Yang also had a 9.9 start value on his vault, and -- even lower -- a 9.8 start value on his high bar routine.

Disputes over start values occur all the time. Blaine Wilson of the U.S. was furious after the preliminaries of the team competition because the start values for him and two of his teammates had been lowered in the high-bar rotation. In this case, the disagreement was magnified because a gold medal hung in the balance.

The two judges charged with determining a start value must do so in real time, and they make their assessment on the basis of what the gymnast actually does: difficulty of elements, grip changes, releases and positions, to name a few. Not what's planned on paper.

It's incredibly complicated stuff. The head judge, in this case Beckstead, a veteran official from Los Angeles, generally only weighs in if there's a disagreement between the two officials assigning the start value. In the case of Yang, there was no disagreement.

Was a mistake made? Yes, they admitted as much. Did it decide the competition? Well, it affected it, no question. But it is flatly untrue to say if they'd had the start value correct at 10.0, then Yang would have won.

Was there corruption or collaboration on the part of the judges? No one has even suggested as much. As long as a sport is judged, subjectivity will play a role, and there will be accusations of bias. All gymnasts know this.

All gymnasts have suffered from bias, and sometimes, whether they admit it or not, have benefited from bias. It's part of gymnastics. Heck, it's part of all sport. It's the human element that gives athletics their great, universal appeal.

So why not a second gold medal? Why not accommodate the upset Koreans and send everyone home happy? Well for one thing, you can make a pretty good case that, if you're going to go to the videotape, Yang shouldn't have won.

Yes, the videotape of the parallel bars showed the judges erred by assigning a 9.9 start value. But it showed something else, too. In the course of his routine, Yang had four holds on the bar, when the rules allow for a maximum of three. The deduction for that mistake? Two-tenths of a point.

The judges missed it.

It is not enough to say Paul Hamm should keep his gold medal. He's a deserving champion. Period.

 

[Miss Jasmine]

Originally posted by gometros
When it happens to one of our own athletes, we scream foul loud and long.

Isn't that the truth?

I did not say he should give it up, I thought he should have made a symbolic gesture of good will outside of the politics of the whole thing.

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Originally posted by Miss Jasmine
Isn't that the truth?

Of course it's the truth. And it's also the truth that every other country cries foul just as much as we do. Gometros makes it sound like the Americans are the only ones screaming and crying when something doesn't go our way while other countries' just benevolently give up their medals in the interest of fairness. Please!

I agree it would be a nice gesture of goodwill though.

 

[gometros]

Originally posted by theSurlyMermaid
Of course it's the truth. And it's also the truth that every other country cries foul just as much as we do. Gometros makes it sound like the Americans are the only ones screaming and crying when something doesn't go our way while other countries' just benevolently give up their medals in the interest of fairness. Please!

I never said we were the only ones, but it was the American Press that created a media frenzy during Salt Lake City. I don't seem to sense the same level of frenzy now that it isn't one of ours. Maybe the Korean press is being just as fervent but I would assume that they don't have the same amount of representation at the games.

 

[disykat]

oops, sorry!

 

[disykat]

I still don't get it. I think it is feasable that athletes could LOSE the gold, but totally don't get the idea that they should GIVE it away. I don't think they have that right.

I won an award last year, which I accepted even though I felt someone else was more deserving. I could have turned it down I guess, but I certainly don't think I had the right to accept it and then turn around and give it to someone else. Sure, I could give away the plaque - but only the selection committee could change who the honor was awarded.

I think Paul Hamm should graciously go along with whatever is decided. I haven't seen any indication that he won't. I still think that for him to take the process into his own hands would be extremely presumptious and I find it hard to fathom why people expect him to.

 

[calypso*a*go-go]

I'm a little confused -- at what point is the start value determined, and is it readily available for review? I guess what I'm trying to figure out is at what time should the South Korean coaches have seen the start value was too low? Much of the controvery surrounds the timing of the coaches realizing the mistake and missing the window of opportunity to file a protest.

You snooze, you lose?

 

[Laura]

Originally posted by theSurlyMermaid
Yes, the videotape of the parallel bars showed the judges erred by assigning a 9.9 start value. But it showed something else, too. In the course of his routine, Yang had four holds on the bar, when the rules allow for a maximum of three. The deduction for that mistake? Two-tenths of a point.

The judges missed it.

It is not enough to say Paul Hamm should keep his gold medal. He's a deserving champion. Period.

Excellent point. I also agree that Paul Hamm should keep his medal.

 

[DemonLlama]

SV is posted at the start of the exercise on the board for all to see. The South Koreans didn't catch it, and when they did, they waited too long to protest.

The SV controversy surrounding the US men in prelims was much more disturbing, because they were forced to add elements into routines they have worked for more than year two days before the competition or accept the lowered values that were apparently changed in the Olym[ic Year, which makes zero sense. It is incredibly dangerous to try such a thing, and yet the pressure to grab those tenths for the Olympics will push athletes to take those risks.

Think Butterfly Effect in Chaos Theory: the lowered SV can't just be "added back" to determine a true winner. Leave the standings alone.

 

[cati]

He should keep it. He earned it!

 

[missypie]

Gymnastics is a judged sport. Lots of people cannot stand to follow judged sports because human error has to be factored in. If every tape of every performance in the entire competiton was analysed by a panel of experts, there could be errors in start values, errors in missed deductions, deductions that were not justified, etc....the whole outocme could be changed. There is a procedure to file protests and like the SI writer mentioned, there is a reason that the protest must be filed and resolved by the end of the rotation. The gymnasts are human, too, and they react to their scores. You can't redo one little part of a meet without redoing the whole thing.

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Originally posted by missypie
Gymnastics is a judged sport. Lots of people cannot stand to follow judged sports because human error has to be factored in. If every tape of every performance in the entire competiton was analysed by a panel of experts, there could be errors in start values, errors in missed deductions, deductions that were not justified, etc....the whole outocme could be changed. There is a procedure to file protests and like the SI writer mentioned, there is a reason that the protest must be filed and resolved by the end of the rotation. The gymnasts are human, too, and they react to their scores. You can't redo one little part of a meet without redoing the whole thing.

This is exactly right. Sometimes, the scores go your way, and other times they don't. You open this can of worms and it's going to get even uglier than it already is.

 

[KingsFanInRI]

This is the whole problem with a "sport" where your score is based on someone's opinion of your performance.
What they should do in the sports section of your revisionist history book is take away the home run erroneously given to the Yankees by that blind bat Richie Garcia when that little punk Jeffery Maier reached onto the field and took a sure out away from the Orioles, which led the Yankees to victory and further subjecting us to nearly a decade of dominance by the Yankees which is unjust and was not earned. Oh sorry, that was just me being bitter lol

 

[WDWLVR]

I think he should offer it back. He is already a winner in our hearts and minds. Yes it was the judges fault and unfortunately next to his name will most likely always be an * that says there was a judging error. Very sad.

I would think if he offered it to the South Korean they would give them both gold.

If I decides to keep it I back him 100% it is his decision.