Clueless writing about our sport

[tandfman]

This appeared today, April 3, on Yahoo's site. It's attributed to NBC Sports Northwest, but it's obviously an old item. I'm sure it was accurate when NBC Sports Northwest first published it, but Yahoo was totally clueless in publishing an article today that's all about the World Championships coming to Eugene Augst 6-15, 2021! Those dates would, of course, overlap with those of the Olympic Games announced four days ago.

https://sports.yahoo.com/eugene-oreg...221324356.html

[Trickstat]

The vast majority of t&f athletes and those in most other sports in the Olympics cannot be considered "amateurs".

If they only compete once every 4 years, how would countries select their teams?

[Conor Dary]

This one is hard to believe. In a piece on the CNBC website about the status of the Tokyo Olympic Games, there appears this sentence:

Oh, really? Do these guys really think that track athletes have only one quadrennial opportunity to compete in their sport? And by the way, the last time I looked CNBC was an affiliate of NBC, which broadcasts the World Championships and other meets (including those on NBC Sports Gold).

Clueless. Totally.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/17/ioc-...eeping-in.html

Not hard to believe at all...99.9% of the public doesn't follow the sport one bit...except for the Olympics reality show...And CNBC is especially dense...when the Irish prime minister was on CNBC a couple of years ago ....the hosts didn't know Ireland used the euro.

[tandfman]

This one is hard to believe. In a piece on the CNBC website about the status of the Tokyo Olympic Games, there appears this sentence:

Amateur athletes in sports such as swimming and track and field can only participate in events every four years.

Oh, really? Do these guys really think that track athletes have only one quadrennial opportunity to compete in their sport? And by the way, the last time I looked CNBC was an affiliate of NBC, which broadcasts the World Championships and other meets (including those on NBC Sports Gold).

Clueless. Totally.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/17/ioc-...eeping-in.html

[tandfman]

How about this for clueless headline writing:

Eastern Illinois Men and Austin Peay Women win the 2020 OVC Outdoor Track & Field Championship

That was posted yesterday, and of course it was the indoor championships, not the outdoor championships.

http://ovcsports.com/news/2020/2/27/...mpionship.aspx

[tandfman]

Here's a good one. It's an article about the 2020 Olympic steeples.

Men

The American men absolutely killed it in 2016, with all three representatives finishing in the top three. The squad was led by Evan Jager in second place, running a time of 8:04.28 to finish just behind Kipruto of Kenya. He was joined in the top 10 by Hillary Bor and Donald Cabral in seventh and eighth respectively.

Hmm-m-m-m So the 7th and 8th placers are in the top three? But wait, it gets better.

The steeplechase is always one of the most fun events to watch on the track given the potential for big falls and huge lead changes. The U.S. is dominant like no other nation in this event

Oh really? Isn't there a country in East Africa that's done pretty well?

http://wfuogb.com/2020/02/hopefuls-t...-steeplechase/

[El Toro]

Some woeful (absent) fact checking from the BBC in the Rojas indoor WR article linked on today's front page:

The outdoor record stands at 15.50m, set by Sweden's Inessa Kravets in Gothenburg in 1995.

I suppose somebody believes athletes only competed in their own country back in the dark ages...

[tandfman]

This one just astonished me. Penn junior Nia Akins ran the 800 on Friday in 2:00.71. This was #2 on the all-time collegiate indoor list (and #1 among American collegians). The university put out a press release that included these two quotes:

Her achievement broke the Ivy League record in the 800m . . .and made her just the fourth collegiate woman to break 2:00 in the 800m during indoor competition.

So you break 2:00 by running 2:00:71? That's news to me.

She was less than a second away from the all-time indoor collegiate record in the 800m, which is held by Texas A&M’s Jazmine Fray, who ran a 2:00.69 in 2017.

That's the understatement of the year. Yes, .02 is less than a second.

https://penntoday.upenn.edu/news/nia...m-ncaa-history

[wamego relays champ]

Perhaps it has been rightfully ignored here on this board, but I don't know where to start with the viral reporting about the Indian buffalo jockey being compared to Usain Bolt. At least the local governing body says the comparison is ridiculous.

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

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-51528201

[Conor Dary]

But as dj noted...this is on the USATF site. They should know better or hire people who do.

[Atticus]

Here's a situation where the headline doesn't match the story:
FEBRUARY 07, 2020
KUNZ POSTS EIGHTH BEST ALL-TIME U.S. PENTATHLON AT USATF INDOOR COMBINED EVENTS CHAMPIONSHIPS
Annie Kunz . . . set indoor lifetime bests in all five events on the way to tallying 4,610 points, making her the No. 8 all-time U.S. performer.
The story is correct regarding Kunz becoming the #8 U.S. performer, but not with the 8th-best U.S. performance. It's an all-too-common error, but this is on the USATF site.

I see your point, but totally give this writer a pass, as even many T&F-savvy writers would use the same headline.

[dj]

Here's a situation where the headline doesn't match the story:

FEBRUARY 07, 2020
KUNZ POSTS EIGHTH BEST ALL-TIME U.S. PENTATHLON AT USATF INDOOR COMBINED EVENTS CHAMPIONSHIPS
Annie Kunz . . . set indoor lifetime bests in all five events on the way to tallying 4,610 points, making her the No. 8 all-time U.S. performer.

The story is correct regarding Kunz becoming the #8 U.S. performer, but not with the 8th-best U.S. performance. It's an all-too-common error, but this is on the USATF site.

[tandfman]

How's this for clueless:

Dacres, who won his first global medal in Doha 2019, threw the discus 69.67 meters to take the top spot. The winning mark lowered the 68.84m he recorded in 2017.

https://trackalerts.com/Articles/fed...ingston/115731

I guess in Jamaica, they're so focused on sprints that it didn't occur to this writer that field event performance improvements involve raising, not lowering, the mark.

[bambam1729]

If he was West German he wouldn't even have been at the 1980 Olympics!

Really think the person who wrote that would have any clue about that?

[Trickstat]

https://sports.yahoo.com/eliud-kipch...113213376.html

"Kipchoge will try to become the first repeat Olympic marathon champion since West Germany’s Waldemar Cierpinski in 1980..."

No, he was from EAST Germany.

If he was West German he wouldn't even have been at the 1980 Olympics!