[Channelcat]

They want Paul Hamm to return his gold medal. It's not his problem the judges screwed up. Hire better judges. He was declaired the winner, there is no mechanism to take the medal away. Now the Koreans say they will sue to get it back after saying they didn't want Hamm to give it back. It's time to just say no.

 

[jramm]

I agree and feel bad for the poor guy and all the **** he is having to endure. I hope all of this in no way taints his memory of this special moment in his life, but hard to imagine that it won't. My best hope is that he is back in four years and blows everyone else in the competition away.

I can't see for the life of me how all of these people who want to make adjustments to the scoring after the fact don't see what a pandora's box they would be opening up. Mistakes are made all the time and every one of them would all of a sudden become subject to question and review. It has to end sometime and the results have to be lived with.

Some people keep saying he should do the honorable thing and give up the gold. I think everyone else should do the the honorable thing and let this die and stop pressuring him (including the South Koreans and FIGA), like you said it's not his fault.

 

[Channelcat]

How did all the judges make the same mistake on the of degree of difficulty? They made a judgement based on the what they saw. I'm no expert on the judging, so I have to ask did these judges consult with each other, or were they given the difficulty rating? And just because the Koreans took their case to others, who's to say they didn't make a mistake?

 

[jramm]

I agree, but who knows. The judging in gymnastics seems to complicated anyway...tenths...hundredths...thousandths...bonuses...deductions... In the end there is a process for appeals and you have to live with the result. You can't just keep fighting it until you get your way.

 

[bill]

Why not just give two medals

it has been done before. I just don't understand all the cr*p that went on before, the pay offs ects, how in the world do some people get picked to be judges. I watched the gym part (as I do every time), the floor, bars and the bench and I am amazed at the skill...then to have some poor judgement call. If every country sends their best, why can we not get the best judges. Maybe that could be an event in itself, two years before countries send in who they think will be quality judges, then have an event and score them. I don't know, but just glad I would not have to judge or pick a winner.

 

[Ernest]

How about the other guy - competed fairly and was screwed by the Judges. What if the roles were reversed and we got the short end of the stick?

In all fairness, assuming no scoring error, he should have been the winner from what I understand. Sure life is not fair. Sure rules are rules, but this is not about money or returning next year to defend your title.

I think Hamm should be the bigger man and give his medal back. He is the one that is going to have to live with this. To me, it would be better to be the guy that said wait a minute, fair is fair, and swap medals than to be the the guy with the disputed gold medal and forever listed as the "declared" winner, but actual second place finisher. Is there any honor in not giving it back?

Perhaps the only thing tougher than winning the medal would be to have to give it back when you were not legally obligated to do so. But, is that what we have come to: doing only what we are legally obligated to do?

I am not saying I would have the strength of character to give it back. Obviously, none of us have had to face this issue on the world stage in our own lives.

Nevertheless, giving it back early this week would have made Hamm an absolute hero both for his accomplishments and his integrity.

I think sometimes we get carried away with the "just win baby" mentality. What message are we sending? Winning by technicality is the same as winning fair and square?

Strangely, I am reminded of the post a couple weeks ago about the oversized red that won the tourney.

 

[Argo]

I think he should switch medals also. and work it out with the silver metalist too.

 

[jramm]

Ernest,

I agree that it is unfair for the other guy, and from what I understand the USOC was supporting South Korea's request for dual gold's until this letter from the FIGA. However, it has been pointed out that other things may have been missed that night, the South Korean is the one who pointed out that he was not given a deduction he should have received which would have caused him to get the same score he got, even with the increased start value.

I think this in turn led to some comments that Hamm may not have recieved enough deductions on the routine where he fell. All of this kind of leads to my point, where does it end. If you open one thing up to review then why not all of it.

Also who's to say that had the South Korean been given the correct score things would have played out the same? Maybe if he has the lead going into the final event he cracks under the pressure. I just think there are two many what if's.

Your probably right about if Hamm had given it back early in the week he would have been seen in a positive light. But I think it is wrong for anyone to make him feel like he is obligatied to return it, like you said none of us have ever been faced with that situation and should not judge him for his decision, thus we shouldn't look negatively upon him for not doing so.

If the situation was reversed and we the American's were causing this fuss, I think all the people in the US who say Hamm should give it back would be saying he deserved to win (of course most of those people are in the media and are apt to take the opposite side of anything to get a response.) But the rest of the world would probably also be frowning upon us pressing the issue as much as the South Korean's have and would call us sore losers.

In the end, it's gymnastic's (men's gynamistic's at that) and in a month I probably won't care about it again until they bring it up again in four years.

I feel bad for the S. Korean guy, but he has nothing to lose by protesting this forever. But you have to feel bad for Hamm as well cuz he's "damned if you, damned if you don't."

 

[NaClH2O]

If the Koreans want to get technical about it, Yang Tae-young's routine should have been scored two tenths lower than it was. He had an extra hold in his parallel bar routine that they didn't catch. So he should be happy with what he got. Paul Hamm's being brought into the whole situation when nothing was his fault. The FIG actually tried to send him a letter through the USOC asking that he give up the medal. But they won't do anything to fix the situation. The USOC read the letter before it ever got to Paul Hamm and told the FIG to basically stuff it. And the IOC said it won't intervene unless there is a clear case that there is tampering or unfair acts.

 

[VJER]

If the tape was replayed it would have shown...

that the Korean fellow would have not won anyway. What I have seen on the telly, that the Korean gymnast had four verticle holds in his routine. You have to have one verticle hold, but no more than three. With the deductions for the extra verticle hold he would not have won anyway, even with the wrong difficulty factor. The head of the IOC said it was a dead issue and admitted a mistake was made, but it was not made because of corruption, but it was a simple human error.

I feel sorry for Paul Hamm, because this is tainting his Olympic experience. It was NOT his fault. The International Gymnastic Federation should drop it and go on. My .02...VJER

 

[Tsip]

When you talk about subjective judging, there will always be conflicts. Everyone knows this and knows you live with it when it's over. Personally, I think EVERY gymnastics judge that showed up this year to the Olympics should be banned from the sport for life. They were a fiasco from the get-go.

Tsip

 

[Channelcat]

I think he should switch medals also. and work it out with the silver metalist too.

So you think they should ruin the Olympic experience for two winners just for the sake of a crybaby loser?
They say it would show great sportsmanship for Hamm to give it up, well it would have shown greater sportsmanship for the crybaby Korean to have just accepted the judges ruling and kept his mouth shut.

 

[Tall1fin]

Its really simple the winner should have the Gold medal and thats that. If you didnt earn it then it really is meaningless to keep it. Be like me buying a huge marlin to hang on my wall and pretend that I actually caught it. Maybe nobody would know but I would.

Anyone seen integrity or honor around lately? Been missing for some time and hoping they will turn up again soon!

 

[Channelcat]

Its really simple the winner should have the Gold medal and thats that. If you didnt earn it then it really is meaningless to keep it. Be like me buying a huge marlin to hang on my wall and pretend that I actually caught it. Maybe nobody would know but I would.

Anyone seen integrity or honor around lately? Been missing for some time and hoping they will turn up again soon!

Hamm was declaired the winner. Then after the medal was awarded, and after the Korean accepted his medal, the Koreans protested. There was a period between the competition and the awards that it could have been protested and they didn't. The Koreans accepted the judging, then changed their mind.
This is nothing like your example, Hamm had nothing to do with the judging and was judged the winner. He didn't "buy" it. But now the Korean wants to steal it. No, the decision of the judges is final.
Smells kinda like a Russian basketball victory long ago. Keep giving them another shot till they make it.

 

[Ernest]

There are two things here- objective and subjective. The determination of the start value is objective. Done before the event based upon the tricks in the routine. Thats where the mistake was made. Its verifiable and not subject to interpretation.

The actual judging is subjective. Each judge is entitled to his own opinion. I agree that you can't argue a subjective judgment call. Just like you can't argue balls and strikes.

I have also heard that the Koreans did dispute the scoring immediately after the event in question. They claim that they were told by the officials that the issue would be taken into consideration later. Then again, I was not there and don't know whether it was a timely protest or not.

Based on the objective information, the Korean won. The only way Hamm won (based upon the objective info) is by questioning the subjective calls by the officials during the Koreans routine.

In an era of corked bats, doping, pay offs to Judges and Olympic officials, assaulting competitors prior to events, points shaving, and the like, Hamm is missing a huge opportunity for himself and for sports in general to do the right thing.

 

[Freshwaterman]

Amen Channelcat

Some countries seem to have a hard time distinguishing between athletic competition and handouts, aka Foreign Aid.

 

[Channelcat]

The sad part of the whole thing is all this bickering between countries and no one will remember who won what a year from now.

 

[Stuart]

Hmm, kind of reminds of John Kerry and his medals he was awarded fair and square. Mmm right?

Now look what I've done. Probably get this thread moved to the "other" board.

 

[Channelcat]

Hmm, kind of reminds of John Kerry and his medals he was awarded fair and square. Mmm right?

Now look what I've done. Probably get this thread moved to the "other" board.

Not sure how this can be associated with the Olympics, but since you throw it on the table. Yes, he was awarded his medals and now thirty years later some crybaby wants to protest.

 

[Waistdeep]

Right and Wrong not Judges

To me this is black and white, right or wrong. It was not an intrepretation of performance, the judges were supposed to start the Korean off with a difficulty factor of 10 then deduct from there but they started off with a 9.9 difficulty factor. Had they started with the 10, we would have clearly won a silver medal. It is like starting off a football game with a 3-0 score and then losing the game by 2 points. If my son was on the winning team I would have to ask him if he really deserved to win. I would hope my son would understand that his team really did not earn the win.

That gold medal will hang around his neck like an albatross. I love America and I would like to think right and wrong are still more important than personal glory.