I wouldn't say the Games sucked as a whole. There were a lot of good competitions. El Guerrouj's wins were particularly compelling. But there're always some irritating bad spots (and gymnastics seems especially prone to them, probably because it's judged, although the diving was free of scandal).
The sportsmanship medal is pretty much a consolation prize, but there aren't many other options. The possibilty that Lima would have won the gold is a big question mark, not a sure thing, so giving him an extra gold would be iffy (and, frankly, it'd still be a consolation prize because he didn't actually cross first). It kinda sucks for the other medalists, too, because there will always be a big asterisk by those medals in the record books.
I feel bad for Paul Hamm. It wasn't his fault that the judges were crooked as all get-out. I should also point out that, while the judges started Tae Young at a too-low difficulty level, they also neglected to take off a mandatory deduction for having too many of a certain kind of technique, and that could have put him out of medal contention even with the proper difficulty. I'm also not too impressed by the IOC's passive-aggressive "request" that Hamm give back his gold.
Sometimes you just can't make an unfair situation fair again.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2004-08-30 04:56 am (UTC)The sportsmanship medal is pretty much a consolation prize, but there aren't many other options. The possibilty that Lima would have won the gold is a big question mark, not a sure thing, so giving him an extra gold would be iffy (and, frankly, it'd still be a consolation prize because he didn't actually cross first). It kinda sucks for the other medalists, too, because there will always be a big asterisk by those medals in the record books.
I feel bad for Paul Hamm. It wasn't his fault that the judges were crooked as all get-out. I should also point out that, while the judges started Tae Young at a too-low difficulty level, they also neglected to take off a mandatory deduction for having too many of a certain kind of technique, and that could have put him out of medal contention even with the proper difficulty. I'm also not too impressed by the IOC's passive-aggressive "request" that Hamm give back his gold.
Sometimes you just can't make an unfair situation fair again.