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Topic: London 2012 Summer Olympics (Read 67295 times)
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Evildrider
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Posts: 5521
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I think most of the X-Games stuff should be added to the Olympics.
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RhyssaFireheart
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Posts: 3525
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Golf is being added, I believe, although I don't really get why that's OK but, say, water polo or crew isn't. Nothing about "team" suddenly makes a sport less a showcase of athletes doing their athletic thing.
I'm totally on board with bowling being added. The more sports that have a wide range of ages capable of competing, the happier I am. Shit like "women's" gymnastics gets me down when you're basically too old for the sport before you even hit the legal drinking age in the US, you know?
Most of those "women" are barely legal adults as it is. |
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Sjofn
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Posts: 8286
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Women's gymnastics probably shouldn't skeeve me out as much as it does, but it does.
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God Save the Horn Players
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pxib
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Posts: 4701
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All the artistic gymnastics skeeve me out. They're creepy and bizzare. At least rhythmic gymnastics is beautiful.
I knew a guy in college who did the male gymnastics stuff.. and he had callouses on his hands so thick that when he closed them into fists they formed solid tubes. Then one day while on the pommel horse the ones on his left hand cracked and while he was having it examined by the medic the WHOLE SURFACE OF HIS PALM CAME OFF.
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if at last you do succeed, never try again
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Paelos
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Posts: 27075
Error 404: Title not found.
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I liked women's gymnastics at UGA. I don't think that's the same thing as the Olympics though.
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CPA, CFO, Sports Fan, Game when I have the time
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23628
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Basketball is becoming the worlds biggest sport after soccer. It is played everywhere now, and the olympics have become basketballs equivalent of the world cup. The tournament is highly anticipated and heavily watched all around the world. Dropping it would be silly.
Personally I think they should make the world championships for all ball games be based around the Olympics instead of there own tournaments, but I know that's not realistically possible for a number of reasons.
I would dump basketball because it's ridiculously 1-sided, the the talk is that the NBA isn't going to send the best anymore after this year. Outside of Argentina winning in 2004, when the USA again didn't send it's best players, we are unlikely not to win the gold medal. Basketball was pretty interesting when the US wasn't sending the dream team. It should go back to amateurs or under 19 or somesuch. There's talk that the NBA (i.e. David Stern) may do something similar to soccer and only allow NBA players 23 and younger to play in the Olympcs. |
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Cyrrex
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Posts: 10603
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Here's the problem with some of those professional sports (team or otherwise), in my opinion:
- Watching the Dream Team isn't compelling in any way, unless you enjoy lopsided humiliations. Watching a group of multi millionaires pummel a sorry group from Country X that only might have 1 millionaire on the team is not good sports.
- Watching the Williams sisters, who have won countless individual and doubles titles the world over - and have made millions upon millions of dollars doing so - go in and beat a random combination of other tennis players and then proceed to act as if they have actually accomplished something special (complete with possibly fake dance of happiness), is not interesting. If you actually think they care as much as they would about, say, a French Open title, then you obviously didn't watch Federer play yesterday (and why would you?)
- There are already plenty of tournaments, to determine who the best soccer teams in the world are. We already know, without a doubt, who they are and we don't need yet another tournament to find out. And when Bolivia or some other country ends up running away with the gold, not one of us actually believe them to be the best soccer team in the world anyway, so why waste our time?
- The best golfers in the world play each other every week already. I mean, practically every damn week, and almost all year round. Why on earth would we need to see yet another week of it?
And so on. There are exceptions. Volleyball is still so obscure that it can be compelling sometimes. Hockey somehow manages to become more interesting in the OL.
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"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
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Merusk
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Posts: 27449
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Hockey is interesting because there are no international competitions to put the best from the US and Canada against the rest of the world at other times.
As you point out, this already happens in Tennis, Golf and Soccer. Basketball isn't as competitive anywhere else in the world as it is in the US (which is why you 'retire' to the European league) so that's a lopsided and unfun affair.
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The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
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shiznitz
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Posts: 4268
the plural of mangina
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But all you young ones don't remember the US getting tarred in basketball for decades because NBA players weren't allowed in while European semi-pro players were. I have no issue with our basketball team winning by 50.
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I have never played WoW.
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DraconianOne
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Posts: 2905
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Not in all sports. Football (ie the round type) in the Olympics is under 23s if I recall.
No it's not. Or, if it is, someone forgot to tell Ryan Giggs. |
A point can be MOOT. MUTE is more along the lines of what you should be. - WayAbvPar
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ghost
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Not in all sports. Football (ie the round type) in the Olympics is under 23s if I recall.
No it's not. Or, if it is, someone forgot to tell Ryan Giggs. Each team gets three exceptions to the rule. |
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23628
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Not in all sports. Football (ie the round type) in the Olympics is under 23s if I recall.
No it's not. Or, if it is, someone forgot to tell Ryan Giggs. Each team gets three exceptions to the rule. Also the women teams aren't U23s. |
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ghost
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US womens' soccer is trying really hard to lose to Canada. Christine Sinclair is pretty much a badass.
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DraconianOne
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Posts: 2905
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Each team gets three exceptions to the rule.
That makes more sense. Not that I've watched a single second of the football. Greco-roman wrestling though - there's a sport I absolutely cannot take seriously. |
A point can be MOOT. MUTE is more along the lines of what you should be. - WayAbvPar
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K9
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Posts: 7441
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Handball, hockey and water polo are fucking dull to watch. I don't doubt their worth as sports (well, maybe handball's) but they are not made for spectators.
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I love the smell of facepalm in the morning
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23628
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Water polo I would agree, unless you follow the sport, cause so much happens under the water but handball? That seems very spectator friendly. It's like a cross between basketball and soccer with lots of scoring.
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K9
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Posts: 7441
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Most of the handball I have seen seems to involve an awful lot one team standing in a line in front of the other team with everyone waving their arms a lot and not much happening. It doesn't have the movement of either basketball or football. I'm also going to make the probably unpopular observation that beach volleyball as a sport is pretty poor, and vastly inferior to true volleyball in terms of how fun the games are to watch. YMMV.
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I love the smell of facepalm in the morning
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murdoc
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Posts: 3036
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US womens' soccer is trying really hard to lose to Canada. Christine Sinclair is pretty much a badass.
That was a ridiculously entertaining soccer game until the refs ruined it. |
Have you tried the internet? It's made out of millions of people missing the point of everything and then getting angry about it
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caladein
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Posts: 3174
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I also prefer indoor volleyball to beach, but part of that is that a lot of my family played volleyball through our school years so it's something I keep up with outside of the Olympics.
I've found team handball to be pretty fun. I randomly flipped over to a women's pool play game the first day and have been hooked ever since. It does have some of that "pass along the perimeter and wait for an opening in the defense stuff" that K9 talks about, but it also has a lot of the drive and kick that's really fun in basketball. It also gets sufficiently violent for my tastes and the relatively small size of the court makes the "goal kick" equivalent a super exciting outlet pass. Also penalties are fun.
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"Point being, they can't make everyone happy, so I hope they pick me." - Ingmar"OH MY GOD WE'RE SURROUNDED SEND FOR BACKUP DIG IN DEFENSIVE POSITIONS MAN YOUR NECKBEARDS" - tgr
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01101010
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You call it an accident. I call it justice.
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I also prefer indoor volleyball to beach, but part of that is that a lot of my family played volleyball through our school years so it's something I keep up with outside of the Olympics.
Only sport I ever played throughout college. Messed around in beach leagues in the summer, but preferred indoor when I could get it before the season started. It is the only thing I actually try to catch during the Olympics. |
Does any one know where the love of God goes...When the waves turn the minutes to hours? -G. Lightfoot
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Teleku
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Posts: 10510
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Even if the current matches are lopsided, I'd like to see it stay in the Olympics to help it grow, because eventually its going to be very competitive. Basketball has become the top played youth sport in many countries around the world (higher than soccer in many places even). Globally, its basically at the point soccer is in the US, as being primarily a kids sport with semi-pro leagues. Another generation or two of kids growing up primarily playing that game should result in some great competition, and help grow the sport even more around the world.
I like both styles of Volleyball, but do find Beach Volleyball to be more exciting.
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lamaros
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Posts: 8021
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In Australia basketball basically died after Jordan retired. Only just got a new men's pro league in the last two years.
Lots of the decent players, who aren't good enough to play OS, get picked up by the football codes which pay better. As most decent sports kids here play 2-3 or more sports.
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Hoax
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Posts: 8110
l33t kiddie
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Hiroki Sakai, Japanese soccer player. |
A nation consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, then that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation.
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Bunk
Contributor
Posts: 5828
Operating Thetan One
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US womens' soccer is trying really hard to lose to Canada. Christine Sinclair is pretty much a badass.
That was a ridiculously entertaining soccer game until the refs ruined it. I've always hated soccer refereeing, but I'm willing to admit that debatable calls happen in the box - no one's perfect. But to have a call, that no one seems to even remember ever being called before in that manner, to give a free kick from the penalty spot, for delay of game in an Olympic semifinal - yea, I honestly really don't feel like watching any more of the games right now. I don't know if I will. |
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ezrast
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Hiroki Sakai, Japanese soccer player. Charlotte Dujardin and Georgina Cassar. Dressage and women's gymnastics.  |
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lamaros
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Posts: 8021
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Miguel Nunes, Portuguese Sailor or Milica Mandic, Croatian Taekwondo or Aymen Mejri, Tunisian Rower.
Carl Myerscough must be massive.
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Sjofn
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Posts: 8286
Truckasaurus Hands
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Hiroki Sakai, Japanese soccer player. Charlotte Dujardin and Georgina Cassar. Dressage and women's gymnastics. Aleksandar Karakasevic, Serbian table tennis player. <flex> |
God Save the Horn Players
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Rasix
Moderator
Posts: 15024
I am the harbinger of your doom!
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You're tall. Neringa Aidietyte, Lithuania, Women's 20km Walk  |
-Rasix
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proudft
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Posts: 1228
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I get Matthew Wells (UK rower), Glen Robinson (UK water polo), and Kevin Sireau (France track cycling). Had a Great Britain mastery of the seas theme going, but then France guy ruined it.
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Sjofn
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Posts: 8286
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You're tall.
Heeeey, for all you know ol' Aleksandar is 5'3". OK, yes. I am kinda tall.  |
God Save the Horn Players
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DraconianOne
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Posts: 2905
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You're tall.
Heeeey, for all you know ol' Aleksandar is 5'3". OK, yes. I am kinda tall. He's 6ft. And looks like an extra from GTA IV  |
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« Last Edit: August 07, 2012, 06:25:47 AM by DraconianOne »
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A point can be MOOT. MUTE is more along the lines of what you should be. - WayAbvPar
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Cyrrex
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Posts: 10603
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You know you just outed Sjofn's height and weight, right?   |
"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
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Lucas
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Posts: 3298
Further proof that Italians have suspect taste in games.
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" He's so impatient, it's like watching a teenager fuck a glorious older woman." - Ironwood on J.J. Abrams
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DraconianOne
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Posts: 2905
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You know you just outed Sjofn's height and weight, right? They outed themselves by giving answers to that test. Why do you think I haven't said who I resemble? |
A point can be MOOT. MUTE is more along the lines of what you should be. - WayAbvPar
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