To reset, four teams of badminton playing pairs wwre sent home from the London games for "conduct unbecoming." To cut to the chase, they had their shuttlecocks clipped for trying to throw their matches. the video evidence of this is incontrovertible. Even D. Hulser would not argue they were trying to tank.
Where the astute reader and I differ is this: Hulser feels the problem is wit hthe format of international badminton play, and that the players shouldn't be punished. In his note to Coubertin's Rings, Hulser states, "
Is what they did so bad? How many times have we seen baseball players tank it in the bottom of the 9th down by 8 with a flight to the west coast looming in the distance?"
I have little problem with, or recourse from a ballplayerr jogging out a ground ball in the ninth inning. i get it. That isn't what the badminton players did. they were not cashing it in, saying, "We'll get 'em tomorrow." The badminton players were attempting to manipulate the draw. Since, at last check, there isn't round robin play in the American League, the comparison just does not work.
When China's number two team lost, shockingly, to Denmark in their opening match, they understood that the only way to get two Chinese teams into the Gold Medal match would be to deliberately lose and get to the bottom half of the draw.
Yes, the system is inherently flawed, and the Chinese, Koreans and Indonesians more or less colluded to get to the Medal round an paly the opponents they wanted to, when they wanted to, regardless of talent level, true ability or the 38th parallel.
Does the sytem need to be fixed? absolutely. Does the fact that the system is broken meanthat we condone absurdist behavior in an effort to stock up on Olympic medals? No way.
And by the way - thanks, loads, to Mr. Hulser for contacting us and sharing his thoughts. We may not agree, but we're thrilled to have gotten the feedback. Thanks!
Apologies for waiting so long to reply, but it's been quite a hectic week! When you work for a company that spends countless dollars on the Olympics, the late nights are as frequent as Phelp's medals.
ReplyDeleteI think the #1 thing from my note that you failed to address was the fact that what the players did was not cheating, was not breaking the rules, and they did it to try and win. This case draws me to this: http://www.snopes.com/sports/soccer/barbados.asp
Long story short, in this soccer tournament's rules, winning via PKs would give a team a 2-0 goal aggregate win. The team, up 2-1 with minutes remaining needed to win by 2 goals in order to advance to the next round of the tournament. A 2-1 victory would result in them going home. So what did they do? They scored on themselves to tie the game, send it to PKs, and, hopefully, win.
Of course this does not equate to FIFA rules, or Olympics rules, but the premise is the same. deliberately going against everything they know about the game in an effort to come out on top in the end. Is this much different than throwing a game to give them a better draw in the tournament?
You say that the players were not, "cashing it in, saying 'We'll get em tomorrow' " but isn't that exactly what they are saying? A loss today means a better chance at a gold medal.
I'm by no means saying what the badmitten players did was right, it certainly wasn't. We all want players out there playing to win every single day, but as we all know, they don't. There are days they dog it, days they groove one, and days they give their all. I agree that this should not have happened, but I still disagree that they should be thrown out.
Thank you for the comment.
ReplyDeleteIn retrospect, the Chinese, Indonesian and Korean athletes were, in fact, trying to win. But I still defend the expulsion as the right thing to do, it was, in effect, drawing a line in the Olympic sand. Yes, the rules as currently instituted are flawed...let's talk about a max of two competitors from one country being allowed to make the gymnastics individual all-around final. If you like, the eight badminton players are sad victims of a flawed system. Someone had to pay the price.