2020 Olympics in Tokyo

[The_Admiral]

9 hours ago, bosrs1 said:

I don't understand the attacks against her. Both in and of themselves, and because her withdrawal likely saved Silver for the US. Guess they'd have rather she pushed through, injured herself and the US have dropped off the podium?

 

I can understand it even as I disagree with it. If you don't understand how severely you can injure yourself in gymnastics if you mess up, it's easy to default to the win-at-all-costs mentality, especially on such a stage as the Olympics, which we're made to believe is all about leaving it all out there in the highest athletic competition in the world. It's a unique and paradoxical trait of the North American mindset, one that's otherwise ruthlessly individualistic, that you fight through pain and injury for your team or country so that even if you lose, you gave it everything you had: see Kurt Angle winning the gold With A Broken Freakin' Neck, or Kerri Strug, or every Stanley Cup ever. Self-preservation at all costs as we saw here is thus a return to our true character, and some people don't know what to do with that, especially given the inherent geopolitical implications of the Olympics -- "actually, not winning makes you the real winner" and "leaving Afghanistan actually means we succeeded" would get you a win on the $25,000 Pyramid for "Things A Dying Empire Says"

[Kevin W.]

50 minutes ago, the admiral said:

you gave it everything you had:

Biles already has. She's won everything she possibly can at this point. The people who're doubting her decision to withdraw are idiots.

[The_Admiral]

Right, she was just kind of running up the score at this point in her career. Still, we don't really have a schema for taking a mental health day in the Olympics, so people don't know what to make of it. She did the right thing in the moment, but it wasn't an act of heroism equal to or greater than winning, pace the media outlets that are probably receiving strongly worded memos from Simone Biles's sponsors. That's all. 

[JerseyJimmy]

the conversation around skateboarding has made me realize just how much the popularity of THPS and other skating games has distorted public perception of its difficulty. it is very difficult to overestimate how hard some of the things that were done in the street contest actually are, let alone in an environment where you don't get multiple tries like a video shoot. the fact that Narvaez busted out a 540 flip after being genitally mutilated is ridiculous.

[MJWalker45]

14 hours ago, GDAWG said:

 

All four players will go back to playing regular basketball once the Olympics end.  

It's strange that the US picked guys that weren't even G League level good to try and qualify but the WNBA provided players for the ladies. 

[nickp91]

That's 10 straight Olympic or world all-around golds for U.S. women (Wieber, Douglas, Biles, Biles, Biles, Biles, Hurd, Biles, Biles, Lee)

[Sport]

11 hours ago, the admiral said:

Right, she was just kind of running up the score at this point in her career. Still, we don't really have a schema for taking a mental health day in the Olympics, so people don't know what to make of it. She did the right thing in the moment, but it wasn't an act of heroism equal to or greater than winning, pace the media outlets that are probably receiving strongly worded memos from Simone Biles's sponsors. That's all. 

 

My wife was a competitive diver and as soon as she heard the word "twisties" she was like "yep 100% the right thing to shut it down". It's essentially an injury where you're not mentally capable of hitting the moves the way you're supposed to so if you try to do some of these insane elements that she does and can't perform them properly then you risk serious injury. It's the yips, but in gymnastics it's not Chuck Knoblauch throwing the ball into the stands, it's landing on your head and breaking your neck.  The problem is it got hijacked and framed as "So brave. It's okay to not be okay!", which isn't really what was going on with her and then other s***heads on the other side take that and go, "mentally weak quitter". It's an annoying topic. 

[Sport]

Team Handball people are mad at me because I said a team of our most athletic NFL quarterbacks and our best soccer goalie could win gold if you gave them 6 months to practice. 

[MJWalker45]

2 minutes ago, Sport said:

Team Handball people are mad at me because I said a team of our most athletic NFL quarterbacks and our best soccer goalie could win gold if you gave them 6 months to practice. 

I mean, Tim Howard in goal and Aaron Rogers throwing darts at some poor guy from Belarus? I like our chances. 

[DG_ThenNowForever]

1 minute ago, Sport said:

Team Handball people are mad at me because I said a team of our most athletic NFL quarterbacks and our best soccer goalie could win gold if you gave them 6 months to practice. 

 

We all do the thing where we're exposed to Olympic sports for the first time and inevitably devalue them in some way. It sucks, but it's the atheltic version of "my kid could paint that" with a pretty similar response (maybe, but they didn't).

 

However, team handball does look like the rec sportiest of rec sports and seems basic enough that it could absolutely be dominated by dominant athletes (duh, of course). I agree with you, but also don't think it would take six months to learn the intracies, either. I say 6 weeks, if not 6 days. 

[DEAD!]

4 minutes ago, Sport said:

 

My wife was a competitive diver and as soon as she heard the word "twisties" she was like "yep 100% the right thing to shut it down". It's essentially an injury where you're not mentally capable of hitting the moves the way you're supposed to so if you try to do some of these insane elements that she does and can't perform them properly then you risk serious injury. It's the yips, but in gymnastics it's not Chuck Knoblauch throwing the ball into the stands, it's landing on your head and breaking your neck.  The problem is it got hijacked and framed as "So brave. It's okay to not be okay!", which isn't really what was going on with her and then other s***heads on the other side take that and go, "mentally weak quitter". It's an annoying topic. 

Wow. I get queasy thinking about jumping off a 10m platform. You are doing twists and turns while falling is not for the weak.

What Biles did was not so much "brave" as it is "smart".  Only Biles knows what it takes to have the right mental state to perform at her level. 

[Sport]

24 minutes ago, MJWalker45 said:

I mean, Tim Howard in goal and Aaron Rogers throwing darts at some poor guy from Belarus? I like our chances. 

 

23 minutes ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

We all do the thing where we're exposed to Olympic sports for the first time and inevitably devalue them in some way. It sucks, but it's the atheltic version of "my kid could paint that" with a pretty similar response (maybe, but they didn't).

 

However, team handball does look like the rec sportiest of rec sports and seems basic enough that it could absolutely be dominated by dominant athletes (duh, of course). I agree with you, but also don't think it would take six months to learn the intracies, either. I say 6 weeks, if not 6 days. 

 

I know. Normally I hate that "I could win olympic curling if I tried" bullcrap. But think about Patrick Mahomes, Kyler Murray, and Russell Wilson who were all high MLB draft picks throwing lasers at a net. You think Lamar Jackson couldn't figure it out if he wanted to? The hardest part would be teaching them defense and strategy, but those athletes who can memorize NFL playbooks would pick it up quickly.

 

This Mahomes pass from the super bowl looks like he's playing Team Handball. He would dominate the first game he ever played. 

[DEAD!]

14 minutes ago, Sport said:

Team Handball people are mad at me because I said a team of our most athletic NFL quarterbacks and our best soccer goalie could win gold if you gave them 6 months to practice. 

Water polo seems to be a greater challenge. 

[MJWalker45]

18 minutes ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

We all do the thing where we're exposed to Olympic sports for the first time and inevitably devalue them in some way. It sucks, but it's the atheltic version of "my kid could paint that" with a pretty similar response (maybe, but they didn't).

 

However, team handball does look like the rec sportiest of rec sports and seems basic enough that it could absolutely be dominated by dominant athletes (duh, of course). I agree with you, but also don't think it would take six months to learn the intracies, either. I say 6 weeks, if not 6 days. 

It also reminds me of every World Cup year when people try to pick which American football players would make a better US soccer team. 

[Sport]

17 minutes ago, DEAD! said:

Water polo seems to be a greater challenge. 

 

Water polo looks impossible and exhausting. It's like hockey where there's a separate skill that first needs to be mastered before you can competently play the sport. For team handball everybody already knows how to run. 

[DEAD!]

23 minutes ago, Sport said:

 

Water polo looks impossible and exhausting. It's like hockey where there's a separate skill that first needs to be mastered before you can competently play the sport. For team handball everybody already knows how to run. 

Water polo can be quite violent as well...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_in_the_Water_match

 

[SFGiants58]

9 minutes ago, DEAD! said:

Water polo can be quite violent as well...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_in_the_Water_match

 

Ever heard of Keli Lane?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keli_Lane

 

TW: (likely) dead baby

[bosrs1]

14 hours ago, the admiral said:

Right, she was just kind of running up the score at this point in her career. Still, we don't really have a schema for taking a mental health day in the Olympics, so people don't know what to make of it. She did the right thing in the moment, but it wasn't an act of heroism equal to or greater than winning, pace the media outlets that are probably receiving strongly worded memos from Simone Biles's sponsors. That's all. 

 

I think the underlying issue is many people don't know what to make of it. I mean these Olympics, more than most, were forced on us and their host country, in part because of the notion that "this is these athletes windows, some of them this is their only window so we have to get on with it" or some variation of that theme. To have someone who is the equivalent of their sport's Tom Brady/Lebron James/Vlad Jr/Jack Nicklaus basically pull out of their sport's equivalent of a quadrilinear Super Bowl is pretty much unprecedented in sports. I think there's a general assumption, and historically it's typically that, athletes want to win so much that they'll fight through mental/physical ailments. And historically that's how it plays out, particularly at the marquee event level. I mean you had this year's Super Bowl winning QB playing with a partially torn ACL, Conor McGregor just fought with a partially broken leg, one of MLB's super star players (Tatis Jr.) is playing with an injured shoulder, etc..., etc..., etc... No one is coercing them into doing it, they're just playing through it.

 

If I had to guess, that's the main driver of the backlash, it's so rare to see an athlete who is at Biles level stop and say, "nope... I'm done" and walk away because it's the right decision for them at that time.  And again, that's not to say those athletes that fight through are doing anything wrong either. Both approaches are right for the people making those decisions. I mean I'm sure there have been cases of coercion over the years, particularly in gymnastics. I keep seeing Kerri Strug's brought up in that light. And Strug has been supportive of Biles, but at the same time, I don't see Kerri Strug saying she regrets doing what she did just as I don't think Biles will regret her decision either. 

[GDAWG]

And tonight starts the other sport where the Russians, Chinese and Japanese won't catch up to the Americans in the medals: Track and Field.

 

Correction: the Russians and Chinese will probably have a few medals in the field events.  As for the track, it will be the Americans and Jamaicans in the sprints and Kenyans and Ethiopians in the distance events (with an occasional American).   

[The_Admiral]

3 hours ago, bosrs1 said:

Tom Brady/Lebron James/Vlad Jr/Jack Nicklaus

 

slow down, buddy!