Winter Olympics 2014

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXtqvBOlibY

[LieLowTheWantedMan]

Awesome game! Our defense was monstrous and when they weren't there Price always was to take away the goals. Good stuff!

[gmillerdrake]

Something else that's annoyed me about the Olympic coverage is that every time I tune in it seems to be some event that just doesn't translate well to television. Do we really need to watch all of a 2 hour cross country race where nothing will ever happen between the first and last 10 minutes? Christ, even NASCAR has the occasional pass or fatality. Why not intersperse other events with updates? Hell, it's all time delayed anyway. This seems to happen a lot this time around. Every time I turn it on I last through 15 minutes of yammering, 3 commercial breaks, and then turn on something else.

For me, there really aren't that many excited or compelling Winter Sports. The newer ones....all the snow boarding and more extreme skiing is fun to watch, the Hockey.....but even when you get into figure skating to where (again for me) if a chic or dude doesn't fall it's not entirely noticeable or distinguishable who did better than who. Some routines are more fluid sure.....but they are the same moves.

[Dark Castle]

I spent a lot of time watching figure skating, and you get to notice whose performance was tougher than the other, but there was some incredibly biased judging going on. Like I think the Russian gal who won gold deserved it, but the 15 year old "prodigy" fell and biffed it twice, and got 2 places (5th)higher than Ashley Wagner whose only mistake was not rotating enough(barely) on her first jump spin(while still landing it with finesse) Hell even the other American placed higher(4th) and she biffed it once or twice as well. Made no sense to me. Ashley had a pretty exciting routine that wasn't a cake walk by a long shot.

[King Postwhore]

I always liked and watched the 2 & 4 man bobsled.

[rumborak]

This BTW is why I don't like seeing team sports at the Olympics. It just becomes an extension of the NHL, NFL or whatever.

Sorry, but this is a dumb statement.  Football isn't played in the Olympics for starters, and why shouldn't the greatest athletes play, no matter what their vocation is outside of the Olympics?  The USA, Russia, Sweden were all stacked with NHL players... which just goes to show that the NHL attracts the best players in the world.

Why don't you like that?

Also, Gary nailed it... perfect team execution; brilliant defense, and generating enough offense.

Thanks for the "dumb statement" comment 

I don't like watching *major* team sports at the Olympics. Because all it is is an extension of the regular leagues those sports have anyway. Just FYI, it's not just hockey. I don't like that soccer has become part of the summer Olympics either. It's irrelevant when compared to the World Cup, Champions League etc, and only takes away from other sports, some of which are getting pushed out (e.g. wrestling)
To me, the Olympics are a competition of *personal* perserverance.

[jingle.boy]

This BTW is why I don't like seeing team sports at the Olympics. It just becomes an extension of the NHL, NFL or whatever.

Sorry, but this is a dumb statement.  Football isn't played in the Olympics for starters, and why shouldn't the greatest athletes play, no matter what their vocation is outside of the Olympics?  The USA, Russia, Sweden were all stacked with NHL players... which just goes to show that the NHL attracts the best players in the world.

Why don't you like that?

Also, Gary nailed it... perfect team execution; brilliant defense, and generating enough offense.

Thanks for the "dumb statement" comment 

I don't like watching *major* team sports at the Olympics. Because all it is is an extension of the regular leagues those sports have anyway. Just FYI, it's not just hockey. I don't like that soccer has become part of the summer Olympics either. It's irrelevant when compared to the World Cup, Champions League etc, and only takes away from other sports, some of which are getting pushed out (e.g. wrestling)
To me, the Olympics are a competition of *personal* perserverance.

Didn't mean to insult your intelligence the first time 'round... it just seemed like a minimalist statement - uncharacteristic of you.  Your more detailed comments make more sense as to why you dislike the professional sports being part of the Olympic competition.  There are some team sports that don't fall into this category (water polo, volleyball in the summer... speed skating, bobsled in winter).

[El Barto]

I spent a lot of time watching figure skating, and you get to notice whose performance was tougher than the other, but there was some incredibly biased judging going on. Like I think the Russian gal who won gold deserved it, but the 15 year old "prodigy" fell and biffed it twice, and got 2 places (5th)higher than Ashley Wagner whose only mistake was not rotating enough(barely) on her first jump spin(while still landing it with finesse) Hell even the other American placed higher(4th) and she biffed it once or twice as well. Made no sense to me. Ashley had a pretty exciting routine that wasn't a cake walk by a long shot.

I agree with all of this, and I noticed the exact same thing about Wagner, Gold and the tiny Russian girl. That said, I think it's more a function of how silly the scoring actually is rather than overt bias. Perhaps I'm just being naive, though.

As for the team sport thing, I'm with Rumbo on that one. The parts of the Olympics I'm interested in tend to be about perseverance, overcoming adversity and demonstrations of tremendous aptitude. It's the personal aspect and you really only get that with the individual events. A fine example of that was the smoking hot Rooskie that won the figure skating gold, after the Russian team passed her over. That's a great story and it showed in her enthusiasm. Same thing with the Japanese girl who was well out of contention but turned in the best performance of here career knowing that it was going to be her last. This is what I tend to enjoy.

That's not to say that there's nothing to be said for the team sports. It's pretty much an allstar game but divided by nationalities rather than conferences which is quite interesting. Still, it rarely offers what I actually want to see in these sorts of things.

[jingle.boy]

That's not to say that there's nothing to be said for the team sports. It's pretty much an allstar game but divided by nationalities rather than conferences which is quite interesting.

I can understand everything in your post up to this point.  The All-Star games in basketball and hockey are NOTHING like their respective games in the Olympics.  The All-Star games are a sham.  No emotion, nothing to play for... they should be outlawed.  The Olympics are the exact opposite, and if anything, I'd say there is more emotion, and more to play for than in the pro league.  Representing one's country for a gold medal every four years is more meaningful and prestigious than playing for the NHL/NBA championships, representing the city that hired you.

[rumborak]

Lol, well played, Russia, with the Olympic rings.

Also, Russia just has the best anthem. Hands-down. It's that perfect combination of epic, sad and uplifting.

[Cool Chris]

Representing one's country for a gold medal every four years is more meaningful and prestigious than playing for the NHL/NBA championships, representing the city that hired you.

No. But then, they aren't really 'representing the city that hired them" either. They are playing for the same thing everyone else plays for: being able to hold up the trophy after the last game of the season (that, and the fat contract extension).

And All-Star games are just exhibitions. I don't care for them either, but I don't think we should ban athletic exhibitions.

[El Barto]

Lol, well played, Russia, with the Olympic rings.

Also, Russia just has the best anthem. Hands-down. It's that perfect combination of epic, sad and uplifting.

No idea what the rings were, but I agree completely about the anthem. Not only perfect for a national anthem, but distinctly Russian, as well.

That's not to say that there's nothing to be said for the team sports. It's pretty much an allstar game but divided by nationalities rather than conferences which is quite interesting.

I can understand everything in your post up to this point.  The All-Star games in basketball and hockey are NOTHING like their respective games in the Olympics.  The All-Star games are a sham.  No emotion, nothing to play for... they should be outlawed.  The Olympics are the exact opposite, and if anything, I'd say there is more emotion, and more to play for than in the pro league.  Representing one's country for a gold medal every four years is more meaningful and prestigious than playing for the NHL/NBA championships, representing the city that hired you.

Yeah, that's a valid point. These events are certainly far more meaningful and serious than allstar games. Still, I don't find them particularly interesting to watch as compared to the individual accomplishments seen in other competitions.

[jingle.boy]

Fair enough, and you have a valid point... we see top notch hockey/basketball/soccer all the time.  We don't get mogels, luge, skeleton etc .... except at the Olympics.

[Anguyen92]

Fair enough, and you have a valid point... we see top notch hockey/basketball/soccer all the time.  We don't get mogels, luge, skeleton etc .... except at the Olympics.

That's a funny thing.  After watching these events with a good amount of attention and enthusiasm on how the sport is played, I'm thinking that I should tune in more to the Universal Sport channel that holds these events and the "World Championships" events that the commentators are always plugging before a run or something.

[rumborak]

Lol, well played, Russia, with the Olympic rings.

Also, Russia just has the best anthem. Hands-down. It's that perfect combination of epic, sad and uplifting.

No idea what the rings were

During the opening ceremony, one of the mechanical Olympic rings didn't open. They got some flak for showing rehearsal footage for that section on the TV stream. Well, during the closing ceremony they had hundreds of people doing the Olympic rings, and one of the rings didn't open again Than was great self-deprecating humor.

[jsem]

Fair enough, and you have a valid point... we see top notch hockey/basketball/soccer all the time.  We don't get mogels, luge, skeleton etc .... except at the Olympics.

If you live in Europe, you're going to get those events in their regular seasons through Eurosport. There must be someone who broadcasts across the pond...

[Anguyen92]

If you live in Europe, you're going to get those events in their regular seasons through Eurosport. There must be someone who broadcasts across the pond...

I think there is a channel owned by NBC called Universal Sports that has these sports.  I think I can get it through my local channels via digital converter box or something like that.

[bosk1]

Lol, well played, Russia, with the Olympic rings.

Also, Russia just has the best anthem. Hands-down. It's that perfect combination of epic, sad and uplifting.

No idea what the rings were

During the opening ceremony, one of the mechanical Olympic rings didn't open. They got some flak for showing rehearsal footage for that section on the TV stream. Well, during the closing ceremony they had hundreds of people doing the Olympic rings, and one of the rings didn't open again Than was great self-deprecating humor.

I didn't see it, so I am only going off of your vague description.  So they intentionally screwed up one of the rings in the closing ceremony to poke a bit of fun at what happened during the opening, is that right?    If so, that's really cool.

[rumborak]

Yeah, exactly. I mean, this was people running around in the stadium to make the various shapes. At the very end they made the rings, and the top-right group just stood in a tiny compressed spot. Eventually they opened up to become a circle too

[El Barto]

[King Postwhore]

It was Rumbo.  What a great sense of deprecating humor.  I loved it!

[gmillerdrake]

I spent a lot of time watching figure skating, and you get to notice whose performance was tougher than the other, but there was some incredibly biased judging going on. Like I think the Russian gal who won gold deserved it, but the 15 year old "prodigy" fell and biffed it twice, and got 2 places (5th)higher than Ashley Wagner whose only mistake was not rotating enough(barely) on her first jump spin(while still landing it with finesse) Hell even the other American placed higher(4th) and she biffed it once or twice as well. Made no sense to me. Ashley had a pretty exciting routine that wasn't a cake walk by a long shot.

Just read this article. I don't think there is any question that there was some heavily biased judging going on in favor of that Russian skater. It's not her fault....she's a great skater, but c'mon.

https://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/olympics-fourth-place-medal/russian-figure-skater-gold-medalist-hugs-judge-moments-after-win-103935597.html

[El Barto]

Meh. People looking for controversy. I will say that somebody who was suspended for trying to rig a vote shouldn't be a judge ever again; seriously, WTF? That said, the voting system is just strange as hell. Nevertheless, we were already discussing the Wagner thing, and I seriously doubt they were trying to rig the 5th-7th place finishes.    As for Sotnikova, she was hugging everybody she could find (shame I wasn't on hand), so this doesn't surprise me. Furthermore, she skated a technically stronger routine, and while I agree that Korean Chick's performance was more graceful, that's not all there is to it. I watched the whole thing live and I had no problem with it.

And to fix the thing, why not just have 10 judges, remove the high, low and 3 random judges for each skater, average it out, then factor in LoD.

[gmillerdrake]

The only part I found conspiratorial was:

In addition to the cases of the two questionable judges, it's also worth noting that four of the 13 free skate judges hail from former Soviet republics — Russia, Estonia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan.

I just don't see how they could have been completely unbiased. To be clear....I think the Russian chic did awesome...she was fantastic! But to top the performance with questionable judging....ehh....i don't think speculation will ever end when you have that type of judging system anyway. I just thought the article was interesting in pointing out some more 'fuel' for the fire.

[El Barto]

There were 13 judges for that event? So goes the conspiracy, as far as I'm concerned. To respond to your point, I don't think anybody can be completely unbiased, so the best you can do is to try and minimize the impact of an indvidual judge, and having 13 of them goes a long ways towards doing that. If they still remove the high and low votes, all the better. I still maintain that the scoring is silly and ineffective, but this is just yellow journalism, AFAIC.

I'll also point out that being a former Soviet Bloc nation doesn't necessarily fill you with fondness for Mother Russia.  Who's to say the Azerbaijani's father wasn't killed during the Baku crackdown of 1990? I think the Estonians might have been caught up in that unpleasantness, as well.

[rumborak]

To be honest, I can only shrug my shoulders at the purely subjectively scored sports. Like, you got a girl dancing an "Awake", but then you got Blob as a judge who says "this is the worst dance of all I've seen today".

[King Postwhore]

Are you "DTF" dumbing it down for us?

[jsem]

I'd say that he made it more sophisticated.


And is there no talk of Bäckström's positive test in this thread? It has exploded in Swedish media of course.

[gmillerdrake]

And is there no talk of Bäckström's positive test in this thread? It has exploded in Swedish media of course.

I thought it was just allergy medication? Was it something more substantial?

[El Barto]

And is there no talk of Bäckström's positive test in this thread? It has exploded in Swedish media of course.

I thought it was just allergy medication? Was it something more substantial?

It was just allergy medication (Zyrtec-D) but that contains pseudoephedrine. Not surprisingly, Pseudofed is on the banned list. I guess I can understand why they banned it (at certain levels) since it is a mild speed, but unless you're really tweaking it really shouldn't be that big of a deal.

[gmillerdrake]

And is there no talk of Bäckström's positive test in this thread? It has exploded in Swedish media of course.

I thought it was just allergy medication? Was it something more substantial?

It was just allergy medication (Zyrtec-D) but that contains pseudoephedrine. Not surprisingly, Pseudofed is on the banned list. I guess I can understand why they banned it (at certain levels) since it is a mild speed, but unless you're really tweaking it really shouldn't be that big of a deal.

I'd say that's a failure of coaching/management then not to fully vet their players. The dude has allergies and is probably used to taking that medication. Was it banned only in the Olympic Games.....or is it banned in the NHL also? Either way, if it's prescribed (or not) for actual allergies it seems a bit ridiculous he was banned from the game.

[jsem]

Well, if there is one thing I have learned about professional sport, it is this: If you give people a chance to get even a 1% benefit from something, they will generally jump on it. Sometimes people get careless and get caught. Not sure what to think about this specific case, but I've learned not to trust the words of athletes and doctors.

A former NHL player said in Swedish media that pretty much everyone in the NHL had at some point used pseudoephedrine, that it is commonly used even among players who do not medically require it.

Not sure how the ban status is in the NHL. I don't think there should be any differences between NHL and the IOC/WADA. The NHL and other organizations should IMHO obviously follow WADA doping rules.

[El Barto]

I don't think there's much advantage to be gained from pseudoephedrine. It's a little speedy, but not much. Given the risk/reward you'd probably be better off just doing a rail or two. But I agree with GMD about his coaches and trainers. They should have known that this would be a problem. Also, Zyrtec is going to be an OTC drug, and pretty much all athletes of any sport are going to have it hammered home which OTC drugs can get them into trouble. 

[KevShmev]

To be honest, I can only shrug my shoulders at the purely subjectively scored sports. Like, you got a girl dancing an "Awake", but then you got Blob as a judge who says "this is the worst dance of all I've seen today".

 

But yeah, it has always been difficult for me to really enjoy the olympic events, summer or winter, where the winners completely depend on the subjective opinion of judges.

[Tick]

Thank god this shit is over!