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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Jeff Streu added to this discussion on July 13, 2016
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Over the weekend I was watching the US Women's gymnastics Olympic Trials on TV, and I came across an interesting article afterwards.
For anyone that doesn't know, the winner of the all-around competition at the trials automatically earns a spot on the team, and the rest of the 5 person squad (and we thought wrestling had it tough with six spots!) is hand picked by a three person committee, which incudes their national team coordinator Martha Karolyi.
About halfway into the article (http://www.nbcolympics.com/news/us-womens-olympic-gymnastics-team-biles-douglas-hernandez-kocian-raisman) it says:
"Karolyi jotted down a list when the process began months ago, the same one she presented on Sunday night. While there was temptation to change it — particularly as Douglas struggled to regain the form that made her a champion in London — she never did."
Basically, the team would have been exactly the same if there had been no trials. I personally don't like the idea of hand picking a team, but you can't argue with the success of the women's gymnastics team over the last few cycles. What's everyone's take on a selection process? For fun, feel free to post what you think our wrestling team would look like if it had been hand picked.
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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Ethan Moore added to this discussion on July 13, 2016
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Jeff - I watched and found myself annoyed. Douglas finished 7th in the all around and earned a spot.
Made me miss wrestling.
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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Jeff Streu added to this discussion on July 14, 2016
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Quote from Ethan Moore's post:
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"Jeff - I watched and found myself annoyed. Douglas finished 7th in the all around and earned a spot.
Made me miss wrestling."
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Agreed. They claimed that two of the selection criteria were world class presentation and professional attitude, but Douglas's body language looked anything but confident on Friday.
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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Hank Kornblut added to this discussion on July 14, 2016
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Dominique Moceanu, former Olympic gold medalist and Cleveland resident, wrote a very interesting book about her gymnastics career. She slammed the Karolys. Some people thought sour grapes but maybe not. Bottom line--the Karolys are very controlling and play favorites (according to the book).
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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Jason L. Jackson added to this discussion on July 15, 2016
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The thing to take into consideration is that the Gymnastics team competition is so different from wrestling. They send three women on the team to do each event.
The US team is fortunate this year to have three gymnasts who are world class in three of the four events. One of those three, Simone Biles, is world class in the fourth event (Uneven Bars), but the other two are not quite to that level.
That allows the committee to realistically focus on competitors who can help the US in that one event alone, which Douglass can.
The only way to make it similar would be if the wrestling team medal had individual skills competitions. If you had a leg lace competition, a double leg competition, a par terre defense competition and an arm bar competition, your US team might look different than currently comprised.
I don't doubt favorites play a role in the selection process, but any time you allow people to pick a team rather than simply taking the top performers at a trials event, that will happen.
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Discussion Topic: Olympic Team Selection Process
Josh Lowe added to this discussion on July 15, 2016
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The Karolyi's do control USA Gymnastics. If I recall correctly, the couple of Olympics prior to 2012 (or whenever the Karolyi's regained control of the women's team) the USA struggled. Their regain of control came with conditions, one of which was roster selection (as opposed to the trials being the driving force). That regain of control has resulted in World and Olympic success, so USA Gymnastics has been amenable to their wishes.
There have been changes over the years (slightly) in how the team all-around is contested. I forget what exactly the present format is, but it's some combo of not all five rostered athletes participate in each discipline and/or a number less than five scores count for each discipline. So there's some "mix-and-match" that is going on.
From a wrestling standpoint, there isn't a true centralized club from which the top athletes or coaches reside for a dictatorship/stacked deck to occur. Over recent years, each program (FS, GR, WO) has had slightly different procedures in order to facilitate the best athlete (i.e. most likely to medal) can get on the World/Olympic team. However, the procedures have to get approval from athletes and coaches advisory boards.
Examples of procedures which have been used for wrestling team selection that aren't 100% open include:
-champions of the Open getting a "skip" to the Trials final (whether they had to meet a criteria to get that "skip" or not)
-a challenger who beat a returning world medalist in the trials final would have to then out-place them in an international tournament (not used this cycle though)
-the Trials final is best-of-three, while the tournament is single bouts
-procedures are in place to determine qualifiers for the trials (though everyone has access to qualification)
NOTE THE FOLLOWING: I am not at all implying that the wrestling team selection process is unfair or anti-democratic, just that there are certain aspects that are not perfectly open/democratic (even if they've been approved within a transparent process, and that access to the team is decided in competition and not via a selection panel).
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