Official ***Olympics 2004 - Athens, Greece ***Thread (1 Viewer)

[andrew markworthy]

The Brits will do that.

 

[andrew markworthy]

Nor am I - it's got the largest population in the world. If I recall the statistics correctly, if you weight the medal tables according to population size, then New Zealand is the most successful Olympic nation.

Working out which is the most successful nation is always fraught with problems. First, you have the issue of population size just mentioned. Second, you have countries that will pick up a shed load of medals in one area (e.g. Turkey and weightlifting) but are pretty poor at every other sport. Do you give them the same credit as nations that send multi-sport teams, even though sporting excellence isn't spread very far? Again, swimming and gymnastic medals can artificially inflate a country's score. [There are far too many swimming medals for very similar distances, so of course if a competitor is good at one distance they'll be good at the others - the proof of this is in the swimming multi-medal winners we get at every games. Likewise, in gymnastics, repeat the same routine on three occasions and you get the team, overall individual and individual apparatus medals. Therefore, the best in the field get not one but three times the medals they'd get in other sports].

 

[Kirk Gunn]

China doesn't seem to be mentioned here http://www.sailing.org/olympics2004/

While the Americans are not tearing up the standings, the olympic sailboat classes have always had a strong international presence.

 

[Jay H]

From a person who used to fence Foil in high school, congratulations to Mariel Zagunis with an awesome gold medal in sabre and to Sada Jacobson for the bronze!

Jay

 

[Michael Harris]

Too bad NBC screwed the coverage. I watched the bronze medal match on Bravo which was shown complete. Now I am no fencing fan but I found it interesting and fun to watch and the coverage was quite good. It was then announced that the gold medal match would be shown on NBC's prime-time show. All they showed was highlights of the match.

NBC just doesn't get it. Fans and enthusiasts want to see complete coverage and given all of NBC's cable affiliates they can provide it and, when they do, they've done a pretty good job. The casual fan and those interested in overall Olympic coverage will, I believe, tune in and watch the canned four hour highlight reel at primetime.

As a cycling fan I am pissed that USA showed the entire women's road race, which I enjoyed, but the men's race was relegated to snippits on last Saturday's primetime show.

Anyway, tonight I'll be on a plane to Athens to see for myself. (Sorry, couldn't help rubbing it in )

 

[Lew Crippen]

The US women were beginning to blow out Korea this morning in basketball. The women’s soccer team is assured of moving on via their tie with Australia (Australia also moves on). And the softball team continues to impress.

Our men could not even qualify, but the women are incredibly dominant.

 

[Jay H]

Hey, the men's cycling Time Trial is going on now... Tyler is currently on the course.. Ekimov is posting a good time and Ullrich is a bit off of Eki's time.

I didn't catch any of the women's road race and only the end of the men's RR last saturday. it was good to hear Phil and Paul doing the commentary. Then I was aghast again when Al Trautwig showed up for the gymnastics commentary... Ack!

This just in:
YYYYYYEEESSSSS!!!! My man Tyler Hamilton wins the men's Time Trail.. Way to go Tyler!!!! Eki wins the Silver and another American, Bobby Julich wins the Bronze.... Wow, all three are either American or have US ties... Eki is even the second oldest person at 38 years!

Jay

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

If you are referring to the baseball team, I am in the camp that hates the way the qualifying tournament is done. It would be like if the world series was shortened from 7 games to one. Having a single elimination tournament in baseball to qualify for the Olympics is hardly going to guarantee that the best teams are in it.

 

[ThomasC]

Casey, I think he may be talking about soccer.

 

[Citizen87645]

I wasn't really following that event, but it was awesome to see a local girl win the gold!

 

[Lew Crippen]

It was my backhanded way of referring to both.

At least we still are on track to qualify for the Word Cup. Next up, Jamica.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Well, I never expect our soccer team to do anything, so anytime they do its a bonus, but baseball is a much bigger deal being the country that invented the game and all.

 

[todd s]

NBC had a poll asking which was the best way to create the US Dream team. The winning suggestion was to have whoever is the NBA champs from that particular year. So the Detroit Pistons would be our Olympic dream team.

ps-It is fun to watch the woman's beach volleyball.

 

[Holadem]

YGPM.

--
H

 

[Peter McM]

I'm an Olympic nut, watching with rapt interest anything except boxing. Thanks to five channels of coverage on DirecTV, I can keep tabs on obscure events like shooting, badmiton, and my fav--much to my wife's chagrin--women's beach volleyball!:b

My hopefuls for a gold medal: Misty May/Kerri Walsh, and whatever nation plays the "dream team".

 

[Michael Harris]

Congrats to Tyler Hamilton
for winning the men's time trial. Maybe he can avoid an accident next year and win the Tour de France.

 

[Lew Crippen]

As with many polls, reality is ignored by those responding.

As I wrote before, there remains a problem on how to get everyone on the team to actually play (don’t forget that the two finalists have played more games and played longer than any other teams—so are consequently more ready for a break). I’m pretty sure for example that at least one Piston declined an invitation this year. There is also the issue that there would be a very big next season disadvantage to the team that went (assuming that they all did decide to go) in that the whole team would begin the next season with little time off (and reduced time for injuries to heal). Finally many, many teams have key players who would not be eligible to compete in the Olympics for USA.

For example, if the San Antonio Spurs had won, instead of Detroit, their point guard would have been ineligible.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Lew is right, using the NBA champions creates more problems than it solves. A more glaring example would be if Houston won the title, then Yau couldn't play for them in the Olympics and that would be a team built around Yau, so the Rockets would still be in trouble. We've discussed this a lot in the NBA thread...

I personally like the idea of sending the NCAA champions, but I don't see that happening either.

The best of the realistic options is to pick a team that can function as a team and not a team of stars. Take guys like Brent Barry and or Michael Redd who can play the International style and are good shooters instead of the big names that sell jerseys.

 

[Karl_Luph]

I may be looking in the wrong thread here but, was hoping to see some pics of some of the hot babes in competition out there. I know I saw some in the opening ceremonies last week.

 

[Jan H]

Lew, Ginobli would've been ineligible, too. No Parker and Ginobli would've made it tougher for the Spurs, but just imagine if Duncan played for the Virgin Islands team. No Gold for the USA in those theoretical Olympics. Anyway, I still like the idea of seeing the NCAA champ represent us in the Olympics. Not a tremendous risk of having to lose a key foreigner, high motivation, amateurs, and America loves an underdog.

Props to the US relay team last night for their incredible 200X freestyle relay (What an incredible race!) and to

Paul Hamm for the first Olympic men's all-around gold in gymnastics in 72 years.