As I said back in post #47 I agree the tournament organisers are at fault for creating the incentive to throw the game. But all four teams involved should have just played the games as normal, hell the laws of badminton as cited in post #35 require it. So yes they should have “played hard based on some noble selfless ideal.” Isn’t that the whole point of the Olympics?
I’m not so sure that playing the game properly would have hurt either of the first two teams (China and Korea) ultimate chances anyway. The bogey team they’re trying to avoid (China II) had already lost a match to the Danes, so they’re clearly not unbeatable.
You make it sound as if the teams would have been kicked out of the tournament if they had won the game in question, as if how dare we ask them to place their medal chances in jeopardy.
But they didn’t do this to try and stay in the tournament, they didn’t do it to survive. They did it just to try and get a different opponent in the next round.
Think about that. They went to the bloody OLYMPIC GAMES, and purposely tried to LOSE. And why? So that instead of playing against one team next, they would instead be able to play against a different team.
I don’t know which Olympics is publicised and broadcast where you are, but the one I’m talking about involves a degree of lip service paid to sportsmanship and ideals and so on while winning is glorified beyond belief, and medallists are worshipped. I didn’t ask for the Olympics to be that way, but that’s the way it is.
You are strawmanning me by saying that I’m making it sound as if the teams would have been kicked out of the tournament if they had won. In fact of course I am saying no such thing. You are strawmanning me because if you had to deal with the reality of what I’m saying, you would have trouble denying my point. These are sportsmen who would ordinarily be congratulated for finding the tiniest winning edge. And yet incompetent officials have put them in a position where they are supposed to throw away an edge on purpose.
And actually it’s far worse than that. Because by castigating these players what you are actually saying, in pragmatic reality, is that they should have either:
a/ been sneaky deliberate losers; or
b/ taken a risk of being patsies who played their hardest while their opponents were sneaky deliberate losers in order to gain an edge,
… so that the dipshit officials who put them in this invidious position could avoid being shown up.
Not only that, but imagine that you are in the players’ position and you know that winning your current match is to your slight disadvantage. Do you really think you would be capable of sufficient selflessness to motivate yourself to play quite as hard and well as you ordinarily would? I don’t think so. I think that the situation the officials put these players in was one that slightly favoured the players least able to kid themselves they should play their hardest when it wasn’t to their advantage to do so. Great.
At least these players were honest enough to make their situation obvious.
Several swimmers were lauded (at least by the commentators) in the first few days for “conserving energy” when they obviously weren’t trying their best to win a race when they already qualified for the finals. Even if they weren’t lauded, they certainly weren’t sanctioned. It didn’t look as ridiculous as the badminton fiasco (it’s hard to), but the effect is the same.
i don’t think this is comparable to swimming or track heats.
yes, you may not go full out for each heat, but you have to be in the top 3 or 4 to advance. you get knocked out if you don’t put up a good time.
a team sport may play second string players, however those players are going to play their best to win the game. by doing their best they have a chance to show that perhaps they should be moved up to first string.
here the badminton team can lose, on purpose, and still advance.
Well the Olympic games I’m watching start with an opening ceremony that contains (amongst dark satanic mills and nurses pushing around bedsteads) an athlete taking an oath on behalf of all the competitors to:
[QUOTE=Olympic Oath]
In the name of all the competitors I promise that we shall take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules which govern them, committing ourselves to a sport without doping and without drugs, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honor of our teams
[/QUOTE]
Now you’ll no doubt cyncially sneer that it’s a load of rubbish so let’s look at the situation ‘pragmatically’. By trying to gain a ‘slight advantage’ (an advantage which I’ll repeat was probably illusory anyway) all four teams broke a clear rule in their sport and made a mockery of it. And so they were all disqualified, thus pissing away all their years of training. And the Chinese team which started the whole farce wasn’t pursuing an advantage anyway, they just wanted to be on the other side of the draw from their fellow countrywomen to open up the possibility of an all-Chinese final.
There’s no doubt that the tournament organisers are the real villains here (seriously check out format here, 16 teams, with two each from Japan, Korea and China as well as one from Hong Kong!). But the great thing about blame is it’s an inexhaustable commodity. And I for one have plenty of blame for the players as well.
Is saying that a sport that’s set up so that (i) the object is to win the tournament (ii) to have your best prospects of winning the tournament you must take steroids (iii) it’s illegal to take steroids similarly problematic?
They don’t want intentionally losing to be a part of their sport, whether it’s strategically benefical or not, so they make it against the rules. Because it’s against the rules, it makes it such that point ii in your statement doesn’t apply - intentionally losing does not give you your best prospects of winning the tournament, because it will get you booted altogether.
You know, I actually agree that the badminton players were probably correct, strategically, to do what they did. That said, here’s what I think is the underlying issue that no one’s brought up.
In order for Team X to win the tournament, it needs the capability and ability to defeat any other team in the tournament. If Team X can do that, then it doesn’t matter whether it meets strong team A in the round robin or the quarterfinals or the finals. Team X can win or at least has the ability to win. So the strategy should be “bring it on. I can win against anyone who crosses my path.” and just play your hardest.
But they didn’t do that. They tanked matches to give an easier road into the championship round. Why is this a problem? Here’s what I think is key. If Team X goes up against Team A in a round robin and loses, they get nothing. If Team X goes up against Team A in the finals and loses, hey, at least they get Silver, right? And that, I think is the key thing about this situation. What they were trying to do is give themselves the best chance to medal. The teams that tanked, in my opinion, weren’t trying their hardest to win the tournament. They didn’t have the confidence to win the tournament. I think that may be what’s grating on some people.
Different situation. The swimmer still has to do well in a race to advance, and his starting position will be determined by his time. Being in lane 8 puts you at a disadvantage, too, so you want to avoid that. But even with that, you still have a chance a gold medal and the results of the final aren’t being manipulated.
With the badminton, the results were being manipulated. If the Chinese had won the match they tanked, they would have faced the other Chinese team in the semifinals. This meant that the Chinese could not win both gold and silver. By losing, they wouldn’t play each other until the finals, when they could win both. Once South Korea realized this was going on, they started playing terribly, too, to avoid playing the better Chinese team. The second South Korean team also played poorly for the same reason – to avoid playing their countrymen before the finals.
In swimming, this couldn’t happen. If the swimmer didn’t do his best, he might miss the finals, or get an outside lane. All they are doing is not going for an all-out world record until the final so that they don’t exhaust themselves and have nothing left. But if they needed to do this in order to qualify or get a first (and thus the best lane), they would. Finishing last would do them no good.
I think the teams that tanked did the right thing. They just shouldn’t have been so obvious about it.
If there are 3 top teams, A, B and C, and each has a 50% chance of winning any given match against the other two, then the team that has to play just one game has the best chance of winning overall. If there is a weak team, D, also in the mix, then A, B and C would rather play D first and then the winner of the other match. Otherwise, you’d have to beat two quality teams to win the tournament.
Football teams that put in second stringers aren’t trying to win the game. The players might be trying to win, but the coach isn’t putting forth the best effort to win. The coach is trying to win in the playoffs.
If the sport doesn’t want teams throwing games, they need to setup a system where it isn’t rewarded.
There’s a difference between not trying to win and deliberately losing. In the NFL, teams don’t deliberately tank games. Even with second stringers, the coaches are implementing their game plan. They need to see how those second stringers might shape up for the future (Matt Flynn being a pretty darned good example of this effect last season for Green Bay, which paid off for him, Green Bay, and potentially Seattle).
It’s like the swimming analogy. They might not be actively trying to break records in the pre-lims or semifinals, but they aren’t actively trying to lose, either.
I see the closer analogy being the NBA with teams pretty much giving up at the end of the season to position themselves better for the next draft. That’s a lousy way to approach games.
The badminton teams were actively trying to lose, and that’s not acceptable.
While true, you increase your chances of not meeting the superior team if you force them to win more times before you play them. If there were 64 teams with 63 being equal and one being superior, then the chances of you meeting them go down as they are forced to win more games.
That’s a good explanation of what this was really all about. The Chinese team (rather than the individual players) wanted to optimize their medal output (gold & silver vs. gold & bronze).
This is a bit of a problem in all knockout-style tournaments. For example, take the tennis - the semifinals are Federer-Del Potro and Djokovic-Murray. Say Djokovic beats Federer in the final, and Murray beats Del Potro for bronze. Why should Federer get silver and Murray get bronze? They both beat Del Potro and lost to Djokovic.
You have similar problems in any sport where competitors (teams or individuals) go head-to-head. Even if you have a round robin, Team A may go 9-1 and lose to a Team B that goes 8-2. Team B is better head-to-head with Team A, but doesn’t win. Team C also goes 8-2, but lost to Team A and beat Team B. Team D is 7-3, but beat all three of them.
Unless a sport allows for more than two sides competing at once (e.g., a race), you always have arbitrary rules to determine who finishes second and third. With a knockout-style, at least you know the winner won all their games and the quibbling is with second and third place.
Couldn’t happen. Team A has one loss and that was to Team B.
[QUOTE=Great Antibob]
There’s a difference between not trying to win and deliberately losing. In the NFL, teams don’t deliberately tank games. Even with second stringers, the coaches are implementing their game plan. They need to see how those second stringers might shape up for the future (Matt Flynn being a pretty darned good example of this effect last season for Green Bay, which paid off for him, Green Bay, and potentially Seattle).
It’s like the swimming analogy. They might not be actively trying to break records in the pre-lims or semifinals, but they aren’t actively trying to lose, either.
I see the closer analogy being the NBA with teams pretty much giving up at the end of the season to position themselves better for the next draft. That’s a lousy way to approach games.
The badminton teams were actively trying to lose, and that’s not acceptable.
[/QUOTE]
I see it as a distinction without a difference. The badminton teams were using the rules to set themselves up for the best possibly shot at winning gold. It just so happens that in badminton coming in second in a preliminary match was the best way to do that. You are making a difference between not trying to win and actively trying to lose. I draw the line at not trying to win. If a competition doesn’t want teams who don’t want to win, setup the rules in such a way that every team in every game has an incentive to win. What if the Colts played second stringers all year? Would you accuse them of doing that to “asses the players”? Maybe they were doing it just to give them experience. Maybe they were doing it to protect the high priced talent for THIS year. The Colts were already being accused of employing the “Suck for Luck” strategy. If they had been even more obvious about it by playing even worse players (who would be playing to win), would it still be okay?
No, in the case of football the team that plays the second-stingers is still trying to win, it’s just that if they lose it won’t change the standings. Or they may be far enough ahead in score that it’s impossible for the opponent to catch up in the remaining time left to play. I think there’s a difference between that and intentionally throwing a game.