Hamm and Yang

euterpe · Aug 23, 2004

If Hamm handed over his gold medal to Yang as the columnists are insisting he do, that wouldn't solve the problem, and it's very unfair to Hamm, who didn't cause this mess.

The official results of the AA competition would still stand as 1. Hamm 2. Kim 3. Yang.

And yes, there have been assertions that a level of difficulty one point higher would not mean that Yang would have beaten Hamm at all. A higher level of difficulty also can mean higher expectations for the performance--and higher deductions. As was pointed out, there were elements in Yang's routine that should have received a .2 deduction and that wasn't taken.

So it is by no means assured that Yang truly is the gold medal winner, and Hamm should not be stripped of his gold medal. The fact is it is too late to "redo" the entire competition, and even if it were possible, it surely would not be a good thing to do. Once a precedent like that is set, no results will EVER be final, and the wrangling would never stop.

I think awarding two gold medals at SLC was probably the worst way to solve that problem, because here it is coming back to bite us.

mzheng · Aug 23, 2004

I don't believe the coincidant. But read from another Olympics news site (in chinese) that one of the suspended Columbias judge had been coaching in one of the gymnastics club in Paul Hamm's hometown.

Korean is no chinese, they will protest until they got the gold. According to the rule only SV can be requested to review. Korean did requested a review during competion by oral, the question is to whom the made the request? Was it to the supervisor (the US judge over seen the panel)? And what procedure they were told to do or to follow?

We know there were three judges being suspended, two were direct responsible for SV, the other was the US judge who supose to supervisery the panel or these two judges.

We also know in 200 back stroke judge panel there were three judges, who signed on the disqulify sheet of a US swimmer. There was no superviser involed in this case.

You got to ask question why US judge/supervisor in gymnastics got suspended, if he had nothing to do with the whole event. Was Korean's first oral request to review the SV rechead to him first?

And I doubt if you review the whole competetion, Paul would got every points he deserved either. In that competetion the Korean did out performed Paul.

chuckm · Aug 23, 2004

Yang had four stops in his performance when only 3 are allowed. Although his SV should have been higher, he also should have had a .2 deduction, which would have pushed him down to 4th place instead of winning a bronze medal.

The reality is the results are going to have to stand. There can be no second gold medal, no matter how loud the Koreans protest, or to whatever higher court they take it.

It won't do any good for Hamm to give Yang HIS gold medal, either, because the record books will still list Hamm as the winner. Maybe it seems unfair to Yang, but taking the gold medal away from Hamm is not a fair solution either.

As for Yang being the better gymnast, Hamm won the silver medal in the high bar competition, while Yang finished last of 8 finalists, and Hamm qualified for the parallel bar competition---and Yang did not.

soogar · Aug 23, 2004

Chuckm:
You CAN'T use the criteria for the individual events to argue that the Korean did not deserve to win the AA. It doesn't matter how the Korean did in prelims or whether he made the event finals or not. What determines the AA is who did best on THAT day. Paul had a HUGE error on vault which is what got him into that mess. Paul might be the best gymnast in the world but the fact is that he did not have a good performance on vault.

hockeyfan228 · Aug 23, 2004

mzheng said:
You got to ask question why US judge/supervisor in gymnastics got suspended, if he had nothing to do with the whole event.

In general supervisors don't get involved unless there is a conflict between the two judges who rate difficulty. Since they both agreed on a 9.9, he didn't look at it critically. But, when there's a screw-up, the person to whom the people who made the mistake report can be held responsible for the mistake.

mzheng said:
Was Korean's first oral request to review the SV rechead to him first?

According to the Koreans, he is the one who told them to file a written complaint the next day. To tie the suspension to this conflicts with FIG's assertion that the request never took place.

mzheng · Aug 23, 2004

I diddn't say Yang is a better gymnastics than Paul. Just that day he did better than Paul.

Anyway, IMO and some formmer gymnastists, Paul's win was not the conviced win to begin with. Even whithout the protest from Korean.

Watched Olympics, all I have to say is for the athletes from those non power house contry to win in those competetions prone to controvacial judge, not only they have to fight with the competetio, they have to fight against unfair judges as well. Some contries may just accepted the rule and result. Some may not.

China appears to easiely been convienced that 'The final result can't be changed'. The examples on top of my head, US Greg R. won over XiongNi at 10meter platform diving in one of the Olympics (1996?). He made a huge mistake just like one of this year chinese synchronize diving in 3meter spring board, where chinese got 0. yet Greg won gold. The other was this olympics men team Fencing (Foil), the outrage bias judging cause one of referee being suspended on spot, and it was done following two protest, from an officer from the governer body. Yet chinese federation just expresses 'We were dissappointed that the result can't be changed'. And this was not the first time their fencing team/athlete has been misjudged first time. Stuppid chinese officer.

Korean appears just fighting back to unfair judging against them. As they should.

chuckm · Aug 23, 2004

Hamm may have had a bad vault in the AA competition, but the lowest score he received from the judges for that event was a 9.0, and the highest was a 9.3, (and that was not from the US judge) because he had completed the vault--it was the dismount that he lost points on. But Hamm also finished first in the FX, PB and HB; 5th in the PH and 8th in the rings. Yang's best finishes were 3rds in the vault and rings, and he was 11th in the HB, 12th in the FX and 7th in the PH.

Where both PB and HB are Hamm's strength, these are not Yang's best events, and it is the PB that Yang is protesting. Yang was not deducted for having one too many stops, and he should have been, a higher SV notwithstanding.

It is NOT clear to me at all that Yang won.

hockeyfan228 · Aug 23, 2004

mzheng said:
China appears to easiely been convienced that 'The final result can't be changed'.

That was China's line concerning SLC as well. I think this is strategy for Beijing 2008. The last thing China would want is a bunch of federations gunning for Chinese athletes during their showcase event at home.

mzheng said:
The examples on top of my head, US Greg R. won over XiongNi at 10meter platform diving in one of the Olympics (1996?). He made a huge mistake just like one of this year chinese synchronize diving in 3meter spring board, where chinese got 0. yet Greg won gold.

In Seoul in 1988, competing against Xiong Ni in the platform final, Louganis missed one of his dives, received a low score, and was trailing Xiong Ni into the final dive. He hit his final dive and won by a little over one point. Like in the all-around gymnastics competition, the final score is cumulative, and Louganis was superior enough to make up the difference on his other dives with skill and degree of difficulty.

Again in Seoul, Greg Louganis received a few points for a dive as a singles diver in the 3M springboard preliminaries for a dive in which he cracked his head against the board during a reverse dive. As bad as the dive was, he still entered the water in the correct direction. (The scores from the preliminary round are dropped for the final, so the dive did not affect his win over his Chinese opponent, Liangde Tan.)

In synchronized diving, both divers must perform the same dive with the entry required by the dive. One of the Chinese divers did not make any approximation of the correct entry, and that is why the Chinese received 0 for the dive. Louganis' situation is analogous to the Russian pair in Athens: Dmitri Sautin hit his foot on the board and had a lousy, but correct, entry, and he and his partner received lousy scores for the dive, thus losing their chance for the gold medal. However, they received points because Sautin did the correct entry.

Joesitz (RIP) · Aug 23, 2004

hockeyfan228 said:
According to the Koreans, he is the one who told them to file a written complaint the next day. To tie the suspension to this conflicts with FIG's assertion that the request never took place.

Doesn't this sound like a 'he said/she said'? Surely someone besides the Koreans would have heard that there was an oral complaint. And who heard that they were told to file a written complaint the next day?

None of this is solid evidence. At first I was in the Korean corner and thought they should get the gold but now after reading much of what was discussed here I am backing off and going with Haam.

Joe

hockeyfan228 · Aug 23, 2004

I can't find the post in which someone suggested that there were enough TV cameras around to have picked up whether anyone approached the supervisor during the event. It seems strange that no tape has been aired to make a case for either side.

If the supervisor was approached, and he exploited the language barrier to give wrong instructions deliberately, then I think he should be expelled.

JOHIO2 · Aug 23, 2004

I agree with Yazmeen. The press is wrong to take this out on Paul Hamm. He did nothing wrong and second-guessing what is the "sporting" thing to do if he is a "gentleman" is unfair. He had no control over ANYONE's scores. All he could do was his own sets on each apparatus. Personally, I think he should keep his medal. I think he earned it.

And it is not only the Koreans who have a beef. Aren't the Bulgarians contesting the rings? And Svetlana Khorkino feels she was robbed of the ladies all-around.

Not to mention the disagreements we haven't yet seen on tv from tonight's event finals. Can't wait to see the event where the crowd disrupts the event and the judges change a gymnast's score!

As to whether a "powerhouse" has more pull. Hey, it happens. But does it make it "fairer" to demand they take less than they deserve? Check out the archery contest. A US athlete had a gold, but lost it because he shot the wrong target! Disappointed? You bet he was. Wrong? He acknowledged his mistake. But what mistake have these athletes made in scoring? They do their routines. It is all they can do.

We're all human. We all make mistakes. And we'll all be arguing these things into perptuity! But check out the medal final totals. Fourteen different countries won medals in gymnastics. Should we ask a young Frenchwoman to return her medal? Just because we would rather someone else won? Where did the French team end up? Not on the medal stand. That is why there are also event finals. Because we all know some people are better at some things than others and we want them all to have their chance to shine.

Not going to change anyone's mind.

mzheng · Aug 23, 2004

Yazmeen said:
I posted this on FSU, and I'll post it here. (To clarify, there is another issue of controversy--apparently, Yang had four holds on the bar in one event when only three are permitted, and he should have had a MANDATORY TWO TENTHS point deduction for that).

Well I happened to read this articel on newspaper today when I visit doctor office. This finding is from whom? By Paul Hamm's coach. Is only I know Rusian, Romanian, Korean, etc. it would be interested what exactly their analysis of Paul's routine and deduction.

TNT2012 · Aug 23, 2004

I'm saddened to see that this controversy had succeeded in eroding the spirit of unity and camaraderie between different nations and people that these Olympic Games are supposed to bring about. Many people are adamant about what they believe to be the right thing to do to resolve this tragic circumstance, but what may seems right to one person would be the complete opposite to another. So no matter how this issue eventually plays out, one thing is for sure, the athletes involved will have already pay a heavy price for something beyond their control through no fault of their own.

The Korean delegation should not be criticized for attempting to rectify a mistake that they believed has cheated their athelete from his rightful place on the podium. I would expect any other federation to do the same thing for their own atheletes. A classic recent example of that came from this year's FS World Championships when the USFSA immediately show their support for Michelle Kwan at the end of the short program because they felt her scores might have been unfairly low. Did not most of us praise the actions of the USFSA even though it was later ruled that her score deduction was valid?

Nor should we expect Paul Hamm to give up the gold medal that was awarded to him or criticize him for not wanting to share it. Some people feel that the only right thing for him to do would be to give up his medal or least be willing to share the honor while others are as equally adamant that he had earned his sole spot on the top podium fair and square. But how can people lay the burden of resolving this controversy to their own expectations of a "happy ending" on Paul Hamm's shoulders when he is completely blameless for what has transpired?

Personally, I feel that IFG are solely to blame for the escalation of this fiasco. It is regrettable that the judges erred in giving Yang the wrong start value, but how can anyone expect a sport that is judged and scored by a human being to be completely 100% objective and error-free. And although the Korean delegation has every right to appeal Yang's incorrect value, I believe the IFG's actions after reviewing their petition had only caused more harm to the sport. They should have ruled that a mistake did in fact occurred and issue an apology to the Korean delegation. But when they decided to suspend the three judges involved with the unfortunate mistake, they had basically gave the whole world the impression that there WAS something definitely wrong with the judging of the men's gymnastics all-around. The IGF stated that their reason for doing was to keep the integrity of the sport for the duration of the competition. I would certainly understand if they had said that it was an unfortunate human error. But to suspend the three judges to maintain the integrity of the sport implied that there it was much more than just simple human error. I, for one, do not think that there was some sort of judging conspiracy, but I wonder if many people do due to the actions of the IGF.

It is unfortunate that Paul Hamm's glorious moment to shine in the history books will always be shadowed by this incident. It is equally unfortunate that Yang and the Korean delegation will always be left with a heart-breaking, "what if?" No matter what the outcome will be, the damage has already been done. And we are once again left with a feeling that somehow, something just doesn't seem right.

Vash01 · Aug 23, 2004

hockeyfan228 said:
SLC was not the precedent for duplicate golds, nor was it the precedent for whining. There have been other instances of duplicate golds awarded, among them to a synchronized swimmer from Canada, whose opponent from the US won the original gold. The "all powerful" media from the US couldn't stop that from happening.

Duplicate golds had been awarded before SLC, but that was done after full investigation and it took much much longer (IIRC close to a year) to make that decision. The precedent in SLC was that duplicate golds were awarded in a hurry due to media pressure. That is what has led to other athletes demanding a duplicate gold, or quick results. They have seen that whining can result in gold medals. Some whining is pointless, and is just an example of ungracious losers, but in a few cases, as in Yang's case an obvious mistake was made. Interestingly, a US judge was involved when a US gymnast was in danger of losing the gold medal he was expected to win. I am not surprised that the Koreans screamed 'injustice'. The Americans would have done the same.

Vash01 · Aug 23, 2004

TNT2012 said:
I'm saddened to see that this controversy had succeeded in eroding the spirit of unity and camaraderie between different nations and people that these Olympic Games are supposed to bring about. Many people are adamant about what they believe to be the right thing to do to resolve this tragic circumstance, but what may seems right to one person would be the complete opposite to another. So no matter how this issue eventually plays out, one thing is for sure, the athletes involved will have already pay a heavy price for something beyond their control through no fault of their own.

The Korean delegation should not be criticized for attempting to rectify a mistake that they believed has cheated their athelete from his rightful place on the podium. I would expect any other federation to do the same thing for their own atheletes. A classic recent example of that came from this year's FS World Championships when the USFSA immediately show their support for Michelle Kwan at the end of the short program because they felt her scores might have been unfairly low. Did not most of us praise the actions of the USFSA even though it was later ruled that her score deduction was valid?

Nor should we expect Paul Hamm to give up the gold medal that was awarded to him or criticize him for not wanting to share it. Some people feel that the only right thing for him to do would be to give up his medal or least be willing to share the honor while others are as equally adamant that he had earned his sole spot on the top podium fair and square. But how can people lay the burden of resolving this controversy to their own expectations of a "happy ending" on Paul Hamm's shoulders when he is completely blameless for what has transpired?

Personally, I feel that IFG are solely to blame for the escalation of this fiasco. It is regrettable that the judges erred in giving Yang the wrong start value, but how can anyone expect a sport that is judged and scored by a human being to be completely 100% objective and error-free. And although the Korean delegation has every right to appeal Yang's incorrect value, I believe the IFG's actions after reviewing their petition had only caused more harm to the sport. They should have ruled that a mistake did in fact occurred and issue an apology to the Korean delegation. But when they decided to suspend the three judges involved with the unfortunate mistake, they had basically gave the whole world the impression that there WAS something definitely wrong with the judging of the men's gymnastics all-around. The IGF stated that their reason for doing was to keep the integrity of the sport for the duration of the competition. I would certainly understand if they had said that it was an unfortunate human error. But to suspend the three judges to maintain the integrity of the sport implied that there it was much more than just simple human error. I, for one, do not think that there was some sort of judging conspiracy, but I wonder if many people do due to the actions of the IGF.

It is unfortunate that Paul Hamm's glorious moment to shine in the history books will always be shadowed by this incident. It is equally unfortunate that Yang and the Korean delegation will always be left with a heart-breaking, "what if?" No matter what the outcome will be, the damage has already been done. And we are once again left with a feeling that somehow, something just doesn't seem right.

Unfortunately the Olympics lost their glorious purpose long ago. They have been used politically many times (1980 & 1984 boycotts of the Moscow & LA games respectively). There is national pride at stake and millions of dollars for at least some athletes. Those things corrupt any camaraderie and sportsmanship athletes may have. Not to say that is right, but it is not something new. I believe athletes and their feds are being more outspoken about it, while several decades ago (I don't know that of course) they may have accepted the judges' decision in the spirit of sportsmanship. May be in the past if the athletes protested it did not get the kind of media coverage it is getting these days.

Mathman · Aug 24, 2004

Thanks for the thoughtful post, TNT2012, and welcome to Golden Skate!

Unfortunately, the more I see of the modern Olympics the more I find myself agreeing with Vash. The Olympic Games movement has had its run. Time to discontinue them and try to come up with a new plan.

Mathman

lavender · Aug 24, 2004

I would be fine if they got rid of the Olympics.

RealtorGal · Aug 24, 2004

I hope you're wrong, Mathman. Despite the inevitable problems that arise during the Games, they remain very special because of the human element. Contested results are NOT the norm, they are the exception, and I believe they are inevitable when results are based on someone else's judgement (e.g. gymnastics, figure skating). (Yes, I know that there are occasional problems in other sports.) I find it inspiring to see so many nations come together and participate in the Olympics, and I also find it inspiring to see so many people striving to be the best that they can be. I'm always motivated to push myself harder in my own endeavors after I watch the Games.

Plus, after I watch the Games, I'm motivated to get off my fat duff and hit the gym or at least walk more often! :love:

Mathman · Aug 24, 2004

Maybe that would be a solution, Realtorgal -- reserve the Olympics for measurable sports like track and field, and kick out gymnastics, diving and figure skating.

Oh don't mind me. I'm just feeling totally bummed today. I'm sure I'll be singing a different tune if Michelle wins in Torino.

Mathman

RealtorGal · Aug 24, 2004

I'm sure you will.

I also think that you would not like to see your "solution" implemented before Michelle gets that final opportunity to skate for gold in Turino, right?

Hamm and Yang

euterpe

mzheng

chuckm

soogar

hockeyfan228

mzheng

chuckm

hockeyfan228

Joesitz (RIP)

hockeyfan228

JOHIO2

mzheng

TNT2012

Vash01

Vash01

Mathman

lavender

RealtorGal

Mathman

RealtorGal

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