We did not mention any other 5th place finisher besides Wheating. Plus, an American record and a world's best was set in THREE OTHER EVENTS, by AMERICANS! So tell us again why we are idiots for not focusing half an hour on Andrew Wheating.
We did not mention any other 5th place finisher besides Wheating. Plus, an American record and a world's best was set in THREE OTHER EVENTS, by AMERICANS! So tell us again why we are idiots for not focusing half an hour on Andrew Wheating.
I think NBC missed a great story. They should really check out letsrun before the broadcast and learn that we are obsessed with Wheating. I think the average American can become obsessed with Wheating as well if he continues to run like this. I wonder if he will ever lose to another American again in the 1500 before the age of 35? That's how good he is. Wake up NBC!
soccer is boring wrote:
I think NBC missed a great story. They should really check out letsrun before the broadcast and learn that we are obsessed with Wheating. I think the average American can become obsessed with Wheating as well if he continues to run like this. I wonder if he will ever lose to another American again in the 1500 before the age of 35? That's how good he is. Wake up NBC!
You are correct, this was a huge deal. Before that race he had never went below 4 minutes for the mile, and he ends up running 3:51! I cant wait to see the race on flotrack, Im pretty sure the crowd will be going nuts.
Good luck to Andrew Wheating, he gets a lot of negative comments on here (last finished was the speculation by some), but to my mind he more than held his own in that field.
Hello everyone. Kiprop is a gold medalist. He won the race last year waving to the crowd and did again this year. Wheating took a beating like everyone else did in field. Long live Kiprop!!!
Look, all criticisms are valid, and they did show 3 minutes of no heighting in PV which is just mindless to me.
BUT, and a huge But, no one ever, ever mentions the 5th placer in anything, even if he is American unless it is like a Golf Tournament or Tour de France.
Come on now, Wheating ran a GREAT time. but was hardly visible in this race unless you knew who he was and he is easy to spot.
But he was a NON factor plain and simple, a great time yes but even at 1200, 3/4 almost 2.5 back and barely in the frame.
The time is great, but it is hard to talk about someone so out of the race for all of it.
They mention Lagat and Lamong because unlike Wheating up til that race they had done something in races with the big time international competition. Now that Wheating has finally done something worth caring about he will be mentioned much more often. Before this race Wheating hadn't accomplished anything near what Lagat has done.
Right, it's about competing and placing, not times. Unless there's a genuine threat to an existing significant record.
Listen to that British announcer in the old Coe.Ovett, etc videos- he mentions every runner as they cross the line. Plus, he calls the race (expertly I may add) and doesn't waste time with stupid stories while moves are being made.
Thamesvalleyharrier wrote:You are correct, this was a huge deal. Before that race he had never went below 4 minutes for the mile, and he ends up running 3:51! I cant wait to see the race on flotrack, Im pretty sure the crowd will be going nuts. .
I think you've been under a rock for a few years. Wheating broke 4 in the mile outdoors in 2008, and he broke it indoors in 2009 and 2010. Not to mention he went 3:38 in 2008, and 3:37 in 2010 in the 1500. This was a huge performance no doubt, but you're blowing it out of proportion.
how about when one of them claimed that sub 4 and sub 13 were analogous feats
Your correct, sorry. I misread something on another website. What was his previous PR?
You're right- watch World Cup soccer, Tour de France, or even football and baseball:
The announcers appeal to the knowledgeable fan and bring the average Joe up to that level.
These guys are doing the opposite and turning off the real fan and giving a boring, meaningless presentation to the average person. They mentioned, but didn't even get into the Diamond League enough.
To Wheating, I was in awe at their ignoring him- he moved up, ran fast, and he's a local product who has a cool story with his background and Olympic berth two years ago.
fsa;lfm wrote:
how about when one of them claimed that sub 4 and sub 13 were analogous feats
Or when they said that Lagat wasn't going to be keeping track of laps. In the 1500m.
IMO track events are the easiest sporting competitions to announce/commentate. In the 5k/10k/800/Mile there are only about 5 to 8 real "players" in the race (more of course for WC or Oly venues). In the sprints and hurdle finals there are really only 2 or 3 such "players." These guys are usually the same ones you'll see for about a 2-5yr span (Lagat, Symmonds, Manzano, Wheating, Solinsky, Teg, etc). How hard is it to familiarize yourself with 5 to 8 athletes who you will see at EVERY broadcast? It's not like other professionaly sports where you have 30 teams with 20 man rosters each that can be constantly changing with shifts/subs/trades/injuries/etc. THERE ARE ONLY 5 OR 8 GUYS IN T&F AND IT'S YOUR JOB TO KNOW ABOUT THEM!
I don't understand why they can't just pay some NCAA Top 10 or 20 program XC coach a couple Gs to come and commentate on the distance events? This seems like an easy solution.
That was a dark. dark moment in American track broadcasting history. One of the greatest moments for American middle distance...totally, completely missed by NBC. There is no excuse, and we want a sincere and complete apology from NBC Sports
He TOOK 5TH place! The american public doesn't care, it's 5th place. The meet is on TV for thepublic in general not track fans that know what's going on.
That was a dark. dark moment in American track broadcasting history. One of the greatest moments for American middle distance...totally, completely missed by NBC. There is no excuse, and we want a sincere and complete apology from NBC Sports
He TOOK 5TH place! The american public doesn't care, it's 5th place. The meet is on TV for thepublic in general not track fans that know what's going on.[/quote]
Surely people are jesting about things like this?
I think thsi gets Wheating to about the top 12-14 guys if that in U.S. History, hardly ground breaking, even in a nistorical sense many could say "so what" Jim Ryun ran faster over 40 years ago at a younger age.
It is barely noticeable in that perspective.
It IS to many of us, who can see the potential and what may lay ahead.
But:
The guy was not even in the race, even the most ardent Wheating fans had to think at one point he might finish even further back than that.
It is 3:51.7x a great mark, can't folks leave it at that.
I do not see anyone bringing up Byers and Harbour and Spivey on any regular basis and they all ran faster a looong time ago.
In other events how many 5th place finishers got mentioned?
palejingoism
NBC to letsrun: wrote:
We did not mention any other 5th place finisher besides Wheating. Plus, an American record and a world's best was set in THREE OTHER EVENTS, by AMERICANS! So tell us again why we are idiots for not focusing half an hour on Andrew Wheating.
True, but you did more than mention a 9th place finisher and a last place 4:06 finisher in the SAME RACE multiple times. No one said you should have focused a half hour on Wheating, but to think the coverage of the men's mile was even merely competent would be a vast overstatement.
Why is it that you watch the Kentucky Derby or Belmont Stakes or any other horse race and the announcers manage to call the race front to back. As horses drop out of contention they are not mentioned, but as a back marker moves up it does get mentioned. How come horse race announcers can manage to mention 10-15 horses in a 2 minute race but our T&F announcers can't do the distance races justice?
When Wheating started moving up, I think it was at about 600-700 to go he went from being in the back 2-3 to midpack, that would have been the perfect spot for an announcer to note his history of similar moves and the old "watch out for his kick" statement.
small story in a big meet wrote:
In other events how many 5th place finishers got mentioned?
palejingoism
In other events how many Oregon athletes and ex-Olympians had a huge breakthrough? To dismiss this as an example of "well they didn't do it in other events" is pathetically myopic.
hammond and bolden are just awful. they have no idea what is going on...i was astonished they couldn't find wheating in that field or mention his name once.
and the 200 was even worse. they are so hell bent on creating melodrama out of nothing: "...AND TYSON GAY HAS MADE IT PAST THE PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIER OF THE FIRST 20M WHERE HE PULLED UP IN 2008!..."
what complete idiocy.
how hard can it possibly be to find two competent people to call these races?