Gatlin Loses WR

[EPelle]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... rss_sports

[tafnut]

:-)

did you have a nice nap, EPelle?

[EPelle]

Yes, but woke up to a nightmare (9,77 thread) -- though the whole thing was about Powell, so never opened it.

[tafnut]

You missed me with my dander up - rare occurence! :-)

[Daisy]

Epelle, Shouldn't the title of this thread be 'Powell didn't lose WR' or 'Gatlin has to share WR'?

[skyin' brian]

Epelle, Shouldn't the title of this thread be 'Powell didn't lose WR' or 'Gatlin has to share WR'?

ha, at first powell lent it to him, but now decided to share it for a while

they had better both be careful since Fasuba just might steal it from both of them!

[cornstarchwilson]

this is another example of the kind ot thing that causes the sport to lose respect.
i was just celebrating the fact that the media gave primetime coverage to a positive newsworthy event. there were frontpage headlines, there were tv show interviews.
now the media will have another excuse to not cover our sport. this is just bush league. this is one of the reasons why i'm against drug testing. the results just cannot be trusted. our leaders are just too incompetent to be trusted with peoples life and careers

[gh]

Not to try to put a false spin on it, but my first reaction was that it will actually be GOOD for the sport (seriously). First there's the sympathy factor for Gatlin, "innocent pawn screwed by incompetent officals," which always resonates with the man in the street. Second, think of it like when there are two heavyweight champs and they have a "reunification" bout (or better analogy, when there is NO heavyweight champ, and the vacant throne needs to be filled). The Powell/Gatlin head-to-head just took on extra gravitas.

[eldrick]

Not to try to put a false spin on it, but my first reaction was that it will actually be GOOD for the sport (seriously). First there's the sympathy factor for Gatlin, "innocent pawn screwed by incompetent officals," which always resonates with the man in the street. Second, think of it like when there are two heavyweight champs and they have a "reunification" bout (or better analogy, when there is NO heavyweight champ, and the vacant throne needs to be filled). The Powell/Gatlin head-to-head just took on extra gravitas.

certainly it means safa still has something to bring to the table

until the rounding up, he'd lost his one bargaining tool & was probably on the butt-end of a 60/40 or 65/35 split

now he can maybe up that to the butt-end of a 55/45 split

[kuha]

In business we always try to cover our butt-end...

[bekeselassie]

"innocent pawn screwed by incompetent officals,"

Next cover headline?

[Fielding Melish]

Kudos to Tissot for owning up to their mistake even if it took a few days.

If only the timing company at the 1988 US Olympic Trials had had the same cujones to admit they had screwed up and their equipment had worked improperly at the first two rounds of the women's 100 meters quarterfinals. Track and field wouldn't be stuck with FloJo's bogus 10.49 as the WR, along with a lot of other phony wind-aided but 'legal' performances from those 2 races.

[gh]

We don't know that Tissot owned up to anything (or that they didn't). It appears that just the availability of the photofinish picture caused everybody short of Helen Keller to call foul.

As to '88, a teeny-tiny amount of slack can be cut on the "admission of guilt" thing. Partially because nobody has ever proven--far as I know--for certain that they screwed up and knew about it. And partially because--if rumor is true--they didn't figure it out for some time (like maybe even years) thereafter. If last part is true, they still should have owned up to it at that point.

(The rumor, by the way, is that the anemometer type required a few minutes of running before it operated properly. The two blow races in Indy were the first of the day.)

[gm]

Come on, GH, you oughta know by now that people don't need proof to scoff at events in the past (i.e. 1988 Trials). They probably heard it from one of the 100,000+ people in the stands that day

[EPelle]

Second, think of it like when there are two heavyweight champs and they have a "reunification" bout (or better analogy, when there is NO heavyweight champ, and the vacant throne needs to be filled). The Powell/Gatlin head-to-head just took on extra gravitas.

Question is: How many times this season should they meet? How many Rocky bouts can the public handle - or want to - in 2006?