The Newest Olympic Event?

“If whining was an Olympic Sport then America would take the Gold.”

The 2008 Beijing Olympics are coming to a draw and this must have been the most controversial Olympics YET!

After reading report after report, blog after blog and comment after comment, the consensus is unanimous – The USA has been the biggest bunch of whiny-babies this Olympics; except for 16 year old Shawn Johnson of U.S. Women’s Gymnastics. She’s been the model of good sports(wo)manship.

Jim Caple of espn.com takes on all the complaining in a column peppered with wit and subtle sarcasm. He even takes on U.S. Athletes who have pledged their allegiance to foreign flags, such as Becky Hammon and Milorad Cavic. I’m sure I could add another name to that list. Anyway, here is an excerpt from his article:

Which brings me to all those nations who keep stocking their teams with ringers. Becky Hammon competing for Russia even though she doesn’t speak the language? Milorad Cavic swimming for Serbia even though he grew up in Anaheim (I didn’t realize Disneyland had been part of the former Yugoslavia)? Appalling. America would never fast-track athletes for citizenship, unless perhaps they were from Africa and had awesome qualifying times.

Jim’s article is one of the only articles that makes light of all this controversy and puts a mirror to America’s face so we (Yes, I’m American) can laugh at how ridiculous we are making ourselves look with all this whining.

There has been another writer/Yahoo! contributor who published a blog in the “4th Place Medal” section of Yahoo! Sports that really had readers annoyed. I’m not sure what school of journalism Ms. Maggie Hendricks graduated from, but her blog lacked organization and substance. Yes, yes, I know, who am I to judge Ms. Hendricks, other than the fact that I teach English to Business Executives…What qualifications do I have?!

Here is the entirety of Maggie’s blog:

Fans of the Fourth-Place Medal real medal count just picked up one more reason to dismiss judged sports. Steven Lopez, a two-time gold medalist, lost the match that would have sent him into the gold-medal match on a controversial referee’s decision. He filed a protest, but that was badly bungled, according to taekwondo team leader Herb Perez. Taekwondo is rumored to be on the chopping block for Olympic sports, and they didn’t need any bad publicity. They probably should have mentioned that to the the judges.

“When (poor judging) happens to you, you’re told to shut up and not say anything because of what will happen to you, or what will happen to the sport,” Perez said. “If this is truly what taekwondo is about, maybe taekwondo shouldn’t be in the Olympics. Maybe they should fix it.”Oh, Herb. With taekwondo at the very end of the Olympics, I assume that you have been busy helping your athletes prepare to compete. You probably haven’t seen that bad judging is exactly what the Olympics are about, and if that’s what taekwondo is about, it will always have a home in the games. Just ask Ara Abrahamian and Alicia Sacramone.

As you may have guessed it, the readers sharply criticized Maggie’s tone and have labeled her style of writing as “whiny”. If you’re as annoyed as I am with Yahoo! Sports for enlisting such a “writer” then I encourage you to leave your feedback by emailing them or filling out their feedback form.

Well, after Steven Lopez fussed about his 3rd place finish and “dissed” the World Taekwondo Federation (WTF) for its “poor judgment,” along with his coach Herb Perez (winner of a Gold Medal in Taekwondo at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona when Taekwondo was still an exhibition sport) it seems that USA Taekwondo has been in spin-control mode. On the USA Taekwondo Official Website, they quote Steven as saying:

“I came here expecting to win a gold medal, but I guess it wasn’t in the cards today,” said Lopez. “I should have been in the finals. It’s hard, but I’m happy with the bronze. It’s better than nothing. I have two ways to look at it, either succumb to it and think ‘I should have been in the finals’, but a champion goes out there with dignity and I wanted to prove to myself and others that I am the best….It encourages me to keep going,” he said about his future. “I am upset. I love winning, I hate losing. And in no way does this discourage me from wanting to go to the 2012 Olympic Games.”

It looks like Steven was prompted to have a change of heart. USA Taekwondo wouldn’t want their Golden Boy tarnishing the image of Taekwondo in the U.S., now would they? I mean, USTU USA Taekwondo has been a clean cut and scandalous free institute since…..Oh, bother! I couldn’t tell ya!

They further go into damage control by adding the following disclaimer at the end of their August 22nd press release:

NOTE: The views expressed by the U.S. Olympic Head of Team for Taekwondo, as published in some news articles regarding the Olympic taekwondo competition, do not necessarily reflect the views of USA Taekwondo. USAT continues to work with the World Taekwondo Federation to ensure a level playing field for all athletes.

Seems Herb Perez The U.S. Olympic Head of Team has been made the scape-goat publicly scolded. I wonder, what ever happened to USA Taekwondo’s Regional Development Program? Wasn’t Herb Perez’s school awarded the “open” bid? “Level” must have a different meaning.

Really, a simple “I’m sorry for being such a poor sport and I’m honored to take home a bronze medal for my country.” would have sufficed. Instead, the spinning just keeps making us spectators, practitioners and enthusiasts all the more dizzy. ~What a cop-out!

Luckily for Steven & Herb there are two other Taekwondo Sour Pusses bigger than them. I’m talking about 80+Kg Taekwondo player Angel Matos and his coach Leudis Gonzalez of Cuba!

Swedish referee Chakir Chelbat disqualified Matos after his permitted 1 minute injury time ran out. Looking at the video Matos gets up while the “time-up” siren sounds, but the ref is quick to disqualify Matos from the Bronze medal match which sets the tempers of Matos and his coach ablaze.

After aggressively trying to rip the ref “a new one” with words, Matos has a mental snap and kicks Chelbat square in the face. The kick was so fast that a slow motion replay had to be used to demonstrate the accuracy of his attack.

YouTube has been swift to remove the footage, so go to the YouTube site if it doesn’t play when you click on it.

Yes, Steven and Herb can breathe a sigh of relief! They will not be the ones credited for the demise of Taekwondo as an Olympic sport. Matos and his coach received a lifetime ban after the incident and they will most likely be scape-goated for Taekwondo’s booting from the Olympics.

I wonder what Fidel is going to say when they get home? Could Political Asylum be in the near future?

After watching the footage of Matos knocking the ref’s face in, I have to say, it looks like Steven is going to take the Silver on this one. Matos definitely wins the Gold for being the biggest “Whiny Baby”.

Maybe when NBC is done with the Olympic coverage they can create a new reality show, “The Sorest Loser.”

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TRIVIAL GOODIES

Since blogging about the Lopez Family Taekwondo controversy, my blog has received a 65%+ increase in traffic. I thought I would share some of the Search Engine Terms used to direct traffic to my blog. Please note that these are the words people are typing when searching. I don’t make this stuff up!

• “was there controversy in diane lopez olympics”
• “taekwondo lopez sore loser”
• “steven lopez sucks”
• “we hate diana lopez taekwondo”
• “steven lopez favoritism”
• “steven lopez, sore loser”
• “diana lopez controversy”

I also want to mention that I’ve had a HUGE deal of traffic from OEPlayers.com, a Taekwondo forum. I’d be interested to know what topic the link is located under. I’ve visited the forum and the debates seem to be pretty lively, so they get kudos from me (except for f*ul language -tsk tsk!) for being able to discuss both sides of the issue(s) with open minds.