Congrats to the new Canadian medalists: Alexandre Despatie (silver, 3m springboard), Jason Burnett (silver, trampoline), and Priscilla Lopes-Schliep (bronze, 110m hurdles).

Canadian silver medal-winning men: Jason Burnett, Simon Whitfield, Alexandre Despatie

So the IOC is getting rid of Softball because the Americans are dominating the sport? I propose getting rid of Diving, the Chinese are just too dominant.

Ugh....why is NBC grating my nerves with Mary Carillo? Could they not find anyone besides that goofball?

Meanwhile, I feel like since tennis is through and there is no more Phelps watch, my interest level is not nearly as much as it was. I do like diving and track though so I am keeping my eye on that. But boy the fur is flying between the Chinese and USA. There was some real shadyness going on in that baseball game.

I have to disagree about the Chinese getting boosts in scores in some areas-

1) Nastia Liukin was clearly better than the Chinese gymnast in the uneven bar routine apparatus finals- less errors deserved a higher score for Nastia.
2)Cheng Fei went to her knees on her second vault and clearly did not deserve the bronze medal over a more solid Alicia Sacramone- even though her first vault was excellent.

In the team finals, if you compare the U.S. versus Chinese male performers on the high bar- there is absolutely no way that on the high bar the Chinese gymnasts earned higher scores with less difficult in their routines and the near flawless performances of the Americans.

I have no problem with earned scores being higher and losing out to the best, but the shadiness of some of the scores being elevated for the home team are a bit ridiculous.

In trampoline- the Chinese winners were questionably better than their opponents- I think trampoline could exit the Olympics and it would definitely not be missed.

I hope Jeremy Wariner can win the GOLD in the 400...

In men's basketball quarter finals action: Spain over Croatia (72-59), Lithuania vs. China, USA vs. Australia, Argentina vs. Greece.

Men's beach volleyball final to be: USA vs. Brazil.

I haven't watched to much of the olympics on TV, but did watch gymnastics when time permitted and the hoopla surrounding the under age Chinese gymnasts.

They should put those so called 16 year olds next to the actual 15 year old girl divers. If anyone needed more proof they are way under the age of 16, this is it.

All the judging and scoring controversy in gymnastics brings up an interesting question. Why can't two people, (or teams), tie for gold? Anyone know?
I've seen ties for silver and bronze. I though I've seen in the past other sports tie for gold. Maybe it comes down to the international gymnastics organization with their rules, or olympic gymnastic rules.

Amazing performances by the Team USA Women's Volleyball team, defeating the #2 and #3 teams back to back matches to make the Gold Medal match and win at least their first team medal since 1984. Interesting that Team USA played against China in that match in 1984 and that their present coach Lang Ping was the hero for China in that match.

I am hoping China pulls the upset over Brazil and will set up a Team USA coached by Lang Ping (the Chinese hae been rooting for Team USA because of this) versus Team China in the finale. That would totally rock the house and be a true dream finale for the Beijing Games.

Here is to hoping that Team USA can beat Team Russia in the Men's semifinals!!!!

While a few athletes have been caught for doping (pre- and during the Olympics), there haven't been any major scandals... until now. Horse doping! In a breaking story, it would seem that horses from 4 different countries were caught with illegal substances, and Norway may lose a bronze medal.

Congrats to Japan for taking down Team USA Softball- that was an amazing pitching performance taking them down- Ueno is a stud!!

I am thinking that USA Track and Field are going to fire a bunch of coaches for 1) field events and 2) the training on the relays- there is no reason why Team USA shouls not have made the final in both 4x100 relays and also not to have medaled at least. There is no reason and this is a clear failure of not getting the athletes enough practice working on baton relay, etc. So many failures for field events- are they following up to make sure the athletes are training like they should in order to optimize their performances?

C'mon- no finalists in Men's Long Jump or Triple Jump or High Jump- that is just truly sad.

I have no problem with the U.S. losing to better teams, but not to achieve personal bests at the Olympics when it is essentially their sole focus right now- is unacceptable and the powers that be need to change things.

Hi Kick!

Congratulations on some honest viewpoints related to the under-performance of the American Track & Field team.

It has seemed to me that throughout the track and field events, many of the USA "stars" have appeared to believe that it is simply a matter of turning-up and medals and achievements will neatly fall into their laps. This must be their worst overall team performance for years.

And as for the sprint relay teams........particularly the guys............. is it not down to arrogance to believe that you can simply throw in your "reserve squad" and your place in the final is automatically guaranteed?How may times in major international championships have the USA squad failed to finish or messed-up the baton-passing?

Lessons will only ever be learned when a certain amount of humilty is used! It is simply not a case of choosing your four best sprinters and believing that all will be well. Just check out the other teams, where sprinters who have nowhere near the talent or abiliy of the Americans, can link-up and produce the goods!

Very sad and disappointing indeed!

Thank God for Taylor, Merritt, Clay and others, who continue to "Fly The Flag!"

Cheers!

Superman UK

Breaking news: IOC orders investigation into the age of Chinese gymnast He Kexin.

Saw the tape of the final round (and jump off) of show jumping, and congrats to Canadian gold medalist Eric Lamaze. Canada also picked up a silver in women's platform diving for Emilie Heymans (haven't seen the tape of that yet).

And what an embarrassing flop. Both the U.S. men's and women's 4x100 relay teams drop the baton on the final exchange. Start engraving those gold medals: Jamaica.

LaShawn Merritt looked great in winning the 400m. Jeremy Wariner looked terrible in coming second. What was billed as a 2-man showdown, turned into a rather boring race.

[quote name='canmark' date='Aug 21 2008, 07:48 PM' post='

Both the U.S. men's and women's 4x100 relay teams drop the baton on the final exchange.
[/quote]

Will the US still participate in the 4x400m Relay heats and possible finals?

no GOLD for Wariner but it's all good.

Canadian Thomas Hall won a bronze in the 1000m canoe, but Adam van Koeverdan, the Canadian flag bearer, flopped in the 1000m kayak, finishing 7th in the final. van Koeverdan still has the 500m final to go. I haven't seen the tape of these races, so I have no further comment. But Canada is/was expecting gold from him.

I can't believe BMX is an olympic sport. This ranks right up there with the trampoline. Who decides this stuff anyway.
Baseball and softball are being cut while these other two are official. I heard these two team sports are being dropping because of the American dominance. What about BMX, the U.S. won most of the medals.
And don't get me started about rythemic gymnastics. What kind of a sport is this.

And Canadian kayaker Van Koeverdan, who didn't win, as nothing to feel bad about. He competed in the games for his country. In my opinion, thats what the olympics is all about.
In fact, it really pisses me off when someone is discussed they didn't win or medal. THATS NOT THE POINT. Do your best, represent your country and participate.

And those poor UK track and field athletes. Well, you know...

I was proud of Lauren Williams for picking up that baton and crossing the line, even if the team had been disqualified. So disappointing, yet she continued in the Olympic spirit.

Someone above commented about the US relay teams needing to do it differently....reminds me of US men's basketball, which has maybe finally learned that having the best lineup of individual players does not a team make, esp. when international ball emphasizes team play more than the one-on-one isolation style of the NBA.

In light of BMX being an Olympic sport, baseball being dropped is still so surprising. Since Cuba and the Dominican Republic are great baseball countries. Just the rivalry between Cuba and the US alone makes it interesting. Oh, btw, Panama, Venuzuela, Mexico, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, all can field good teams. Isn't that enough of a mix of countries, especially since East Asia is well represented and has an interest in baseball as well? And now the US women lost to Japan, so even that dominance is not what it once was.

Part of the baseball cut is because MLB won't send their best players to the Olympics. They don't want to shut down for 2 weeks like the NHL does, and they don't want to take players away from their teams in-season. So they send minor leaguers.

Both can apply to be reinstated for 2016, but there are other sports trying to get in as well.

One of the other reasons they got rid of the team sports versus individual sports is because they wanted to control the number of athletes and this was the reason they gave for it- although the vote was purely anti-American and political. But the reason they gave was that not enough countries had baseball or softball national programs as part of their NOCs.

Another problem I have is the Athletes for Hire program going on. The country of Georgia hired a bunch of Brazilian beach volleyball players from Brazil. Sadly and mockingly, the Brazilians representing Georgia went by the nicknames Geor and Gia. The women's team they hired admitted to only being in Georgia 2 times in their lives.

Although I still think it is shady- I don't have as much of a problem with Becky Hammon playing for Russia because she actually worked in the country playing for a Russian basketball team (actually several WNBA players play in a league there and get paid really well).

I felt bad for the Trinidad runner and Spearmon after they made their victory laps. Ugh- talk about heartbreaking.

What's the name of NBC's diving commentator? I've heard her many times before, but I never did catch her name... and I'm not even sure I know what she looks like. Anyways, I like her. I like her sharp, incisive comments. CBC has a good diving commentator, too.

I don't know her name either, but was thinking the same thing. She talks and communicates info to us non-divers, but in a clear, direct way.

Adam van Koeverden got some measure of redemption following his disappointing finish in the K-1 1000 with a silver in the 500m. It's not gold, as he, and Canada, were expecting. But it's a medal.


Is it me, or does Canadian bronze medalist in the C-1 1000 Thomas Hall look like Jake Gyllenhall (in Jarhead)?


There were somewhat surprising winners in baseball and softball, in their last days:

Men's baseball gold goes to Korea over Cuba 3-2. In women's softball, Japan defeated the dominant American team for gold.

While there has been some very questionable judging in taekwondo, it was a shocker when Cuban athlete Angel Matos kicked the referee in the face following a disqualification, while yelling at and threatening to fight with other match officials. Can you say anger management? Matos has been banned for life by the taekwondo federation.

He should have been arrested too.

Matthew Mitcham, gay and GOLD:



Sydney Morning Herald: A perfect 10



Pics. Tears of joy:

I believe that is Cynthia Potter.

How about that gay guy!! He better get some OUT press in the mainstream media. These are the kinds of heroes we need kids to be able to SEE.

I'm really looking forward to the men's volleyball final tonight. The men's matches have been really entertaining. I am so glad they did away with the sideout rule where you could only score points on your own serve. The matches could become insufferably long. And after the murder of the coach's father-in-law it would terrific to see the US men come away with gold. As it is it's a great accomplishment to have gotten to the final.

I saw the end of the women's volleyball final, with Brazil defeating the USA for the gold. Men's final is also Brazil-USA.

There's a Reuters article on Matthew Mitcham that is posted on the Guardian website that mentions that he's out... and mentions Outsports.

There is NO question that Cynthia Potter knows what she is talking about. Her color commentating for the diving events is always on the money. However, in my opinion, Cynthia should focus more on the positive aspect of each divers performance. In other words, I think her insight is hyper-critical. With the benefit of 'every-angle' camera monitors, Cynthia sees what the judges cannot see. We see it as replay, where Cynthia confidently critiques every meter of the diving aerial performance, and even the controversial 'crow-hops' which the judges can't view, in which the divers, particularly on platform, jump just about an inch or two, to get extra launch on their back takeoff dives.

Here is a wiki entry about Cynthia, who was a member of the 1980 Olympic Non-Competing Team, which included Greg Louganis, and my hometown friend, Cincinnatian Barbie Weinstein:

An 11-time All-American, Potter won a record 28 national diving championships. Potter was the U.S. outdoor champion in the 1-meter springboard from 1968 through 1977. Potter was the 3-meter springboard in 1971 and 1972 and from 1975 through 1977; and in the platform competition in 1970 and 1971. Indoors, Potter won 1-meter springboard titles from 1969 through 1973 and in 1976 and 1977, the 3-meter in 1969, 1970, and 1973.[1] Additionally, Potter was chosen as World Diver of the year in springboard competition in 1970, 1971 and 1972.

Potter was a member of the 1968, 1972 and 1976 U.S. Olympic diving teams. She was selected to the 1980 U.S. Olympic diving team, but due to the United State's boycott of the games that year, Potter was unable to compete. In 1972, Potter placed 7th on the 3m springboard and 21st in the 10m platform partially due to a foot injury, and in 1976 Potter claimed a bronze medal in the 3m springboard.[1]

In other international competition, Potter won a gold in the 3m springboard and a silver in the 10m platform at the 1970 World University Games, a bronze in the 3m springboard at the 1975 Pan-American Games, and a silver in the 3m springboard at the 1978 World Championships.[1]



Please don't get me wrong, I really like Cynthia, but she has 'an edge'.

TRL

That's what I like about her. I like that she's critical and points out the minute flaws that the casual specator might not see. I think the play-by-play person should to be more positive and neutral, but I think it's good if the colour commentator adds a little, uh, colour.

There was one diver who made a rather large splash and she said, in a serious tone, "They're going to have to add more water to the pool." Fun-ny!

I think she has actually lightened up quite a bit. She used to be hypercritical to the point where you could not even enjoy the most beautiful diving. But I think she has become more positive and still points out flaws, but also mentions how difficult the dives are or why certain divers might have trouble with a dive
(height, strength, injury). Before she would just completely annihilate everyone with razor sharp criticism.

SIDENOTE: That Cuban Angel Matos should be charges with assault. That was disgusting.

OK, I heard that comment, and had to laugh myself. Good catch.

TRL

Just wanted to add my congratulations to Matthew Mitcham. You make me proud to be a Gay man.

AMEN to that! What a great finish!

USA basketball dudes just won gold!!
If my math is correct, with this win, it puts us at 109 total medals. A new record beating the old record by just one.

I stayed up to watch the REDEEM TEAM win it all...SWEET!

I actually find the diving commentator, Cynthia Potter, to be pretty balanced in her analysis. She made sure to point out the positives of silver medalist Luxin's and GOLD medalist Mitcham's diving - the air positions, the lines, Mitcham's "kickout". But she also points out exactly why a certain dive got 7.0's, another 8.5's, and another 10.0's. It might sound like nitpicking, but her comments are almost always then reflected in the judges' scores, so they're obviously noticing the same things. While it's terrific that an out and proud athlete won gold, I'd like to say that Mitcham is a simply superb diver, period. He is beautifully "tight" in the air - legs straight and together, feet pointed, great positions in the flips and twists - and he has a cat-like sense of spotting the entry (Greg Louganis had the same talent - must be a gay thing ). While I felt bad for Luxin that he was doing so well and then choked the last dive, that's sport sometimes, and Mitcham was undoubtedly a deserving champion. Even with Luxin's poor final-round dive, Mitcham still had to post a monster score to win gold.

The gold medal men's bball game was way more exciting than I (or anyone else) expected it to be. I wasn't planning to stay up to watch it, just thought I'd check the score in the 2nd quarter. Holy sh*t, Spain's within 6 points. Oh well, after half, the USA will start blowing them out. Nope, kept it tight in the 3rd as well. 4th quarter, HOLY CRAP!! The Spaniards are within TWO!!! But Kobe kicked it up a gear (or two), the team seemed to get a lot tighter with their ball handling, while the Spaniards finally got a bit sloppy. But the Spaniards should be damn proud of themselves, from getting blown out by 37 last week to a close (until the last minute or so) gold medal game. Congratulations to the Redeem Team!! Gone are the days when all the NBA superstars could just show up and win gold. The rest of the world has gotten a helluva lot better, and the USA had to work for this one.

Congratulations to the men's volleyball team for winning gold for the first time since '88. Especially congrats to the coach, Hugh McCutcheon after having to endure an unimaginable tragedy. Sadly for him and his family, this medal will forever be linked with the horrific murder of his father-in-law.

But screw NBC for not airing it live. Yesterday afternoon, their listings said it was scheduled for 10pm EST. Then, at 11 last night, when it still hadn't aired and no mention was even made of it, I checked again and it said 12 midnight EST. So when the Olympics came back on at 12:30 of course they went to cover that oh-so exciting and critical Women's Mountain Biking and didn't even mention volleyball and since I knew they'd be all over the Redeem Team (the stupidest f@cking nickname ever BTW) I knew that they had no intention of showing the gold medal match for volleyball live after having shown all their previous matches live.

Me. too. That was an amazing event--as Matthew said, he was jealous that it came so late in the games. He would have gotten a lot more social time in if this had come last week....or something to that effect. See the wonderful video of him and his partner.

There is a lot of press this morning about how NBC so obviously avoided talking about his partner or being gay. Matthew sure didn't . And good on him!

NBC has been pimping the men's volleyball match as part of their prime time coverage tonight. CBC did show it live... and I was up till 2am watching it. I did keep flipping to NBC and wondered why they weren't showing it live, but were instead showing women's mountain biking and men's table tennis (a China-China match).

Haven't seen the men's basketball (which started at 2:30am EST), but hopefully it'll be replayed somewhere.

Saw the end of the closing ceremonies live on CBC. Will watch it again tonight on tape, as I didn't get up early enough this morning to watch it from the beginning.

I think the Beijing Olympic Games have been an unqualified success, despite all the doubters and haters.

Canada's final tally: 3 gold, 9 silver, 6 bronze, 18 total. Our team accomplished the stated goal of being in the top 16 in total medals. Our 18 was tied for 14th place (with Spain).

USA has most total medals: 110 (36 gold).

China has most gold: 51 (100 total).

Next Olympics: Vancouver 2010 - London 2012

Over 24 hours late- that is disgusting not to show it live. F**K NBC!! They could have shown it on the other stations live. The couldn't even show the women's gold medal match live. Truly SAD!

I don't know hwo makes the decisions at NBC, but they sure as hell do not make good ones... especially in this day and age of technology- they need new blood at NBC Sports- and get rid of Barry McKay commenting on tennis- he was smacking his lips, sniffling his nose, scribbling on paper- and disrupting all of the tennis coverage.

The 2012 logo still makes me laugh- it totally looks like Lisa Simpson giving a blowjob.

Cool feature from the NY Times showing a map of the world that highlights the relative number of medals from each country (as larger or smaller circles): Map of Olympic Medals

And commentary like that is an example of why I stay with this board. Love it!

A lot of press? What press? There's a lot about Matthew Mitcham winning the gold by coming from a 30 point deficit to the Chinese diver. But Matthew's orientation is NOT the story. It amazes me sometimes about gays and lesbian only hearing the "gay" word in a story about a homosexual and miss all the rest of the story.

NBC didn't ignore anything. They had limited air time to get the story out and focused (in my mind admirably) on his diving. Mitcham is an Australian and was not supposed to be the story in that event. He landed some great dives and nailed a gold medal. THAT's the story NBC picked up.

Now on a lighter side, if America couldn't figure out he was gay those hand waves when he came out of the pool were great indicators. I almost cracked up laughing every time he would give them to the camera. Way to go Matthew!

I'm not trying to defend NBC in this thing but I'm not going to take them down for something that wasn't a story in this case. Would it have bene great? Yes. Did they screw it up? Heck no. After full coverage of the men's marathon and more track and field to cover they did what they had to do to get the event in. I'm glad we got to see it in prime time.

Sure you can claim they could have cut to his partner and all but the only people they cut to in the crowd was David Boudia's family (American) and the female Chinese diver (the Chinese were expected to win). Who did they not cut to? British Prime Minister Gordon Brown (watching 14 year old Thomas Daley). They did catch Mitcham's Aussie team members in their outrageous outfits (the yellow wigs were great).

To quote Mitcham himself - "Being gay and diving are completely separate parts of my life. Of course there's going to be crossover because some people have issues," he said. "But everyone I dive with has been so supportive. I'm happy with myself and where I am. I'm very happy with who I am and what I've done."

Yeah they did. They specifically said he had left the sport for "personal reasons," when there clearly was a story there. They did not show his partner in the stands. How many family members of nongay people were shown and interviewed over and over? I think part of this was because of the timing--the fact that it was late in the games, they did allow only a small amount of time for the broadcast, etc. But this is huge for gay people. For an open and out person to win a gold medal against a "dynasty" of Chinese divers. For him to take the gold when it was a 99% given that the Chinese would take all 8 medals.
Matthew made it clear in all the interviews that he was grateful to his partner, "Lachlan," for coming and supporting him. It is people like him that help the rest of us make huge inroads in our lives.




Of course they are separate. I mean, DUH.

Looking back at the backlash Ellen Degeneres had to take from gay people because they wanted her to mesh being gay into her TV persona, when all she wanted to do was be honest, and then be herself. So I totally get it that diving was the issue and he didn't care about the gay thing being talked about. BUT, it is a personal story that is a human interest story, just like the others. That's ok. The story will be out, and we will all reap the benefits of it, particularly because Matthew treated it like it WASN'T an issue.
Maybe it means that being gay isn't that big a story anymore. We're here, we're queer. Get used to it. And they are.......

Thank you, Matthew.

You know, call me someone who tries to respect a person's life but "personal reasons" are my code words for let Matthew be Matthew and stay out of his life. Maybe you're someone who feels a public figure's life is an open book but I'm not in that camp. There may only be the issue of coming out in that but there could be a whole lot more that I don't want to delve into. I'm leaving that up to Matthew to figure out what he wants to reveal and not NBC to go dig it up.

Regarding interviews with family members, the only one's I ever saw were American family members. Remember, Matthew is Australian and wasn't expected to be in the spotlight. Did they ignore his celebration? No and it was touching and great to watch. In the days to come maybe there will be a story there but give it a rest on last night's coverage.

NBC will never get Olympic coverage right because we have become a very critical public and will never be satisfied. With an Olympic news cycle filled with the men's marathon, a TKD competitor kicking a judge (the most unthinkable) and some great events in the Bird's Nest they focused on what they needed to. They focused on him coming back which I've noticed you have yet to recognize. BOCOG even focused on the real story here - overcoming the 32.5 point gap.

Cynthia Potter is a hoot. I wish all the NBC commentators had her insight and grace.

Matthew Mitcham is awesome. There's already a ton of arguments here about the meaning and media handling of an out athlete winning a gold. Later or probably sooner it will be part of the mainstream. I'm just going to focus on the fact that he's matter-of-fact out and he did this. It might sound or even be overly simple, but that type of honesty has probably helped his diving. Bravery is what won him the gold.

Too bad the CBC feed isn't available in the states--other than places like border towns like Detroit. I was able to watch the riveting men's gold medal match -- and it was great! No doubt NBC will chop it up when they air it tonight.

I read that ESPN is going to be aggressive in bidding for the 2014 and '16 Games (apparently NBC has both 2010 and 12 locked up) -- and that a large part of their bid will be that they will air everything they can live.

That would be cool-- I'm just not sure I'm ready for Chris Berman calling the Track events.

Well put and I couldn't have stated Mitcham's accomplishments better. Truly a good Olympic athlete achieved gold on a day when another competitor in another sport demonstrated the ultimate in unsportsmanlike conduct, the assault of an official. It was great to see Matthew's reaction when he realized what he had accomplished.

Other discussion in this thread have been about Jacques Rogge's comments in an interview with Bob Costas. While I have been disappointed lately in Rogge's approach to heading the IOC he summed the experience up so well regarding what winning Olympic gold means. He spoke of seeing Roger Federer after winning gold in men's doubles and reacting with tears of joy. For an athlete who is at the top of his sport and earning millions he still comes to the Olympics for one goal - to win an Olympic gold medal and that is all.

I just did some review of the results from the 10m platform and that last dive for both Mitcham and Zhou are what is causing us to even have this debate. It was a perfect storm situation. Matthew dove his most incredible dive on the last one scoring 4 10s with one of the highest degrees of difficulty. Zhou dove one of his worst dives with an average degree of difficulty.

If they had dove based their prior dive results Zhou would have been the gold medalist since Mitcham had a 32.5 deficit to make up. If Mitcham had dove that perfect dive and Zhou still dove according to his prior dives Mitcham still wouldn't have been able to make up the deficit. Mitcham pulled the last dive with incredible finesse and Zhou botched his badly. That's what put Mitcham on the gold medal stand.