Are falling times "good" for t&f, and if so, why?
I know about "the Bolt effect". I suppose if his exploits increase participation, that is a positive thing...if. However, are there downsides to Bolt's participation? What is his net effect?
And what is this crap about "the sport"? What do you even mean by that? I'm referring to a previous poster here. Do you mean an entertainment spectacle? Are you reducing "t&f" to an entertainment spectacle embodying particular activities?
Cali Guy wrote:
Cowherd is slamming Bolt because...
1. He's an assertive, self-confident black man
2. He's not an American
Cowherd knows his audience. It's more like a ref's whistle than a dog whistle.
And Cowherd thinks the NFL is clean? C'Mon the NFL is the most doped up sport and everyone knows it. The difference between track and the NFL is that the IAAF actually tries to catch people and the NFL does not. The NFL's policy is only in place so they can look like they have a policy. The IAAF (at least was) but maybe not is anymore to try to catch people (and they have).
Track is so much cleaner than football.
Sprintgeezer wrote:
Are falling times "good" for t&f, and if so, why?
I know about "the Bolt effect". I suppose if his exploits increase participation, that is a positive thing...if. However, are there downsides to Bolt's participation? What is his net effect?
For his country of origin, Bolt is an invaluable asset and a huge inspiration in the entire region. He has shown the Jam govt. the value investing in and retain their athletes. Prior to Bolt (and I use Bolt to represent all the top Jamaican sprinters), US scouts were siphoning off Jamaican athletes at a very high rate. I would imagine they are trying even harder now but it's going to take more than promises of a full ride. Many like this Cowherd idiot might not know the deep history of athletics in Jamaica but trust me, the U.S. scouts are quietly aware and have been highly active there since the seventies. The country has always had an ample supply of talent but the talent would just wander away.
For the USA, Bolt epitomizes the need to make drastic improvements to track & field, which has always been an Olympic stalwart. Jamaica is on top of the world right now but make no doubt about it, this country of 300 million + is not about to take that lying down. Bolt is exactly the spark that is needed to funnel investment and change attitudes about the sport. The cogs are slowly beginning to turn. Maybe it will never be like the big three here, but if T&F became a quarter as popular as it is in Jamaica, the results would be huge!
Your question about whether falling times is good for the sport puzzles me. What is the whole point of the sport if not to go faster and improve times - push the limits of human athleticism? If a race ends with the winners way behind the WR, isn't that a 'nice that they won' but otherwise a ho-hum affair? Didn't you hear the crowd and the announcers going nucking futs when the US Women and Jam men blew away the WR? Did you not go nuts yourself when you first saw 9.58 years ago? Doesn't it excite you in the least that a clean running Bolt can beat anything doped, clean or in between? For many of us, these are exciting times!!!
Who cares
No record in modern Track and Field is clean
Get over it already
An American accusing a non-American champion in a once American domain of cheating? Get outa here!
Why do you people even listen to the cesspool of humanity that call themselves sports talk? It's really only sports bashing and it doesn't matter what sport or how good or bad the participants are.
My advice is to delete those station off your favorites and find something else more positive or productive to listen to. I guarantee it will make you a much happier person.
...the truth hurts, and it hurts a lot!
No way Bolt is that superior to Carl Lewis and a slew of others and not by such a huge margin.
Just like McGuire, Sosa and Bonds were so, oh so much better than Mantle, Aaron, & Ruth.
Smells/reeks like H E double hockey sticks to me too!
Dan Bernstein likes to skewer popular sports figures and what he views as idiotic popular wisdom. Cowherd likes to make waves by attacking someone very well thought of at the moment. But above and beyond, Bernstein is a smart guy who understands that the record for dominating sprinters is not very good. Were you all shocked by the gold medal winning women's shot putter from the former Soviet Union testing positive? Of course not. And lots of top sprinters have also tested positive or been caught in other ways, including Blake, Mullings, Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery, Dwain Chambers, Ben Johnson, and on and on. Bolt absolutely dominates the competition and runs .34 seconds faster in the 100m than anyone ever ran prior to Ben Johnson, so it is entirely reasonable to suspect him. For the time being, that connection is specious, no positive tests have occurred, and we can enjoy watching his domination.
Anyone who listens to Cowherd is wasting brain cells and their time.
people accuse bolt of doping for the same reason they accuse the other team of cheating or blame the refs for why their team lost. they cant understand how someone could possibly be better than them so it must be something else. they must be cheating.
Track athletes doping for better performance is a result of them not being good enough to make it with or without dope in the big money sports. Tell me otherwise that track athletes in general are skilled enough or tough enough to take the beatings in other sports. They are tough in different ways but not where the money is.
This could also be considered self preservation too but that doesn't make any money either. The money isn't good enough in track so the few that can be good enough with or without drugs will do so while the rest scrape by chasing dreams of being great at their passion. Nothing wrong with that if they can live on less.
The general public looks down on cheating track and cycling athletes but love it when they hit a lot of home runs, grow to gargantuan proportions and smash each other on the football field etc... for their entertainment. The general public doesn't care about track because it's a pure sport that doesn't keep the opponent from advancing toward the main objective of what it takes to win. There is no defense in track or cycling, swimming type sports.
Now if you let guys carry weapons and attack each other on their way to the finish line, the general public would be more entertained and take a greater interest and therefore be willing to pay what it takes to be entertained and therefore the wages would increase.
Sorry but track, cycling and swimming just aren't violent enough for today's society and the only people who care about them are people that long for the old days of fairplay, that are interested in human performance in getting from point A to B the fastest.
So, it's a bad combination of not enough money in the sport for too many millionaires like the major sports. In addition, the general intellect of appreciating what it takes to produce great performances in society is very minimal these days.
Therefore, track and field will be a minor sport for a long time to come and those that don't care about getting the same kind of attention as the major sports are really ok with that. There's just a lot of carry over from people interested in the major sports that want track to be one of the big guys and it never will.
That's why the NCAA sanctions against Penn ST. in the guise of trying to change the culture of college football is such a joke. As long as people are willing to shuck out their hard earned money and drive the system to what it is, there is nothing anyone can do to change that culture. Just shoot the guys that molest kids and jail the rest that knew about it to curb that behavior. But don't try telling us that you are going to change a culture by taking away a few scholarships for awhile and that will fix it.
What does the future hold in sport? What will sate the appetites of the crazy sports fan? Can you say Running Man or Rollerball? How about Gladiators in the Colloseum?
Think about it.
Rojo,
Victor Conte says that "Memo" (Angel Heredia/Hernandez) has made public statements about helping the Jamaicans. Based on that, you can't say the prior reporting is "100% not fact."
https://twitter.com/VictorConte/status/235145379325300736
You can't say that 3 guys running blazing fast, placing 1-2-3 in the OG all from same town and same coach isn't suspicious. And you can't say that Bolt running 9:59 isn't suspicious. Based on the history for the sprints, it just is.
C'mon, Colin Cowherd is ESPN's shitty shock jock personality. The guy constantly says controversial things to get conversations started and pages clicked. He's simply a troll, and Rojo is just perpetuating his act. Ignore Cowherd's opinions about everything. He's an idiot.
Less than a year before the 08 Olympics Bolt was getting smashed by Gay in the 100 and 200. In that year he dropped from 10.04 to 9.72 and two world records. By the way 2007 Worlds 19.91 to 19.30. Bolt didn't make it out of the first round in the 2004 Olympics with his 21.05. Yes, I believe that people can improve but really?
The Jamaican rise didn't come out of the blue? Really? Think about these facts for the Jamaicans:
2000 Olympics
0 gold medals
5 silver (womens 100,400,400h,4x100, 4x400)men 4x400
3 bronze (womens 100, 200) mens 400
2004 Olympics
2 gold (womens 200m and 4x100)
1 silver (mens 400h)
2 bronze (womens 100m, womwns 4x400
2008 olympics
6 gold (mens 100m, 200m, 4x100)(womens 100m, 200m 400h)
3 silver(womens 100m tie with two Jamaicans, 400h)
2 bronze (women 200m, 4x400)
You're going to tell me that was them dominating 2000 and 2004? I don't think so. They may have had some good runners but nothing like 2008 when they suddenly had 6 golds and world records everywhere.
I love track and field but the Jamaicans did come out of nowhere and there is plenty of evidence to question their performances, especially Bolt. I'm glad Cowherd spoke his mind even if he doesn't follow track and field like some of us.
justthefacts wrote:
You can't say that 3 guys running blazing fast, placing 1-2-3 in the OG all from same town and same coach isn't suspicious. And you can't say that Bolt running 9:59 isn't suspicious. Based on the history for the sprints, it just is.
They are not from the same town. They are great sprinters who went to train at Racers Track Club under Glen Mills. There are two major track clubs on the island. MVP and RTC. Frater and Carter, for example, run for MVP.
http://racerstrackclub.com/You can be suspicious all you want. Sorry to tell you but you can't dope for 1,2 and 3. Things aren't that linear, especially considering that others would be doping too. The sweep shows the depth of the Jamaican team.
What else would track be but an entertainment specatale?
100% professionalism?
What does that even mean, Comedians are 100% professional too.
I dance after a win and suddenly that's a huge crisis, filled with disrespect and showboating?
What, is this Football, do I have to play 90 minutes, then after words shake everyone's hand and go home?
What is with America sportsmanship ideals? What ever happened to rivalries? Trying to make all sports a gentlemanly and a healthy competition is stupid. I want it to be hard, brutal and cutthroat so only the best make it to the top.
I do know the women world records and which one(s) are you talking about. Flojo, wasp soup?
giddy wrote:
But that's also the same reason why I believe people only like track and field once every 4 years... because its the only time they see people running as a team. They see team USA out there and want someone from the USA to medal every time. I guarantee you most Americans would turn that Olympic 10k off, but they see a guy from the USA up there running great... they keep the channel on, they've got someone to root for, feel proud of, be a part of something special.
Our sport isn't unpopular because of drugs, it's unpopular because there is no one for the lay fan to root for. It's tough to be fans of the individual and no one else. It's the same reason why smaller market basketball teams are in such deep water... more people like Kobe Bryant in Milwaukee then like the Bucks. It's starting to hurt the league.
i 100% agree with you. I always have felt that one of the main roles of letsrun is to make it possible for people to root/cheer for the athletes they love/hate. People need to know the stories so they can have a favorite/disfavorite. The team thing makes the Olympics easy to watch.
If you aren't watching the Olympics, you really need to know the athletes so you can root (or not) root for. So many people - agents, wives, etc - get upset when something negative is written about athletes on the mboard. I'm like 'Welcome to big time sports.' Sports is about cheering for a particular entity (and likely against another)- it's very hard to cheer for an individual unless you know their story.
that's why i'm surprised NBC doesn't play up the college team someone ran for a bit more . if I was a shoe company, I'd put the team logo on the jersey real small - like put a UF gator on taylor's jersey.
Jefe in the CO wrote:
This is my problem with LRC coming out in defense of Bolt. LRC absolutely ruins its credibility by labeling one of their major advertiser's athlete as a victim of “sloppy journalism" while muckraking accusations against a non-advertiser. It’s almost as if LRC believes that they can guilt Nike into some type of sponsorship; if they do then there is the implied message of unwavering support if not then there will be hell to pay. I understand why LRC would take this stand but if you are playing the game then please spare the message board your sanctimonious outrage.
I'm of the opinion that doping has the same effect, if not greater, on team sports as they do for individual sports. If you can snuggle up to that opinion then I think we can all come to the conclusion that doping accusations and positive drug tests are not going to kill T&F.
What will kill track and field is hypocrisy and cherry picking who you protect and who you vilify for the sake of the almighty dollar.
I think people totally misunderstood my original quote that doping is killing track and field's popularity. Yes, I said that but my solution isn't too look the way like it was for so many people in th esport in 1995. My solution is to clean it up - all of it.
I have no problem with people asking questions about Bolt or pointing out Blake had a 3 month ban. I do have a problem with people saying Bolt was tied to Angel when he hasnt' been and saying Bolt made sudden improvements of late.
I will go after and do go after any and all drug cheats. You think I go after athletes because they are Nike? That is financial suicide.
I go after people to try to help the sport out even if it hurts me.
The fact that most athletes are sponsored by NIke is simple - Nike carries the sport financially and sponsors by far the most athletes.
I fully appreciate Rojo's point: the suspicions do hurt our sport in the public's eyes, but I tell you what really bothers me about the American sports media.There is no sport in America bigger than the NFL, and from August to February, year in and year out,they trot 350 pound men out on to the field and they'd have you think it's the result of meat and potatos and countless hours in the weight room. Thousands of reporters cover American football year round and never a whisper about steroids. I live in Washington, DC, and two Redskins were suspended for four games last season.... for marijuana ! No sport has done more than our sport to combat the use of PEDs with its testing and severe penalties. How many times have Cowherd and this Chicago reporteer mentioned track and field in the past four years, and this is what they come up with ? It's not right.