Ok…what are the alternatives?
Did she help her team?
“Did she help her team” is also subjective and judgemental, since “help” is subjective.
IMO yes, she did help her team, just like Joe Thiesmann helped his team that time.
You are saying she helped her team by not participating and only after it was impossible for someone else to take her place.
Is that really subjective?
And again, as I have said before, if she cannot compete because she thinks she will be unsafe then fine. But, IMO, we should not be praising her. Nor ridiculing her.
If she wanted praise she would have backed out while it was still possible for an alternate to take her place. She let her team down by not doing that.
Is my opinion subjective? Are you serious??
Again: did Joe Thiesmann let his team down that one time?
What does Theismann have to do with anything?
How is he equivalent to Biles?
I don’t see how it’s any different than any other kind of ‘burnout.’ A lot of talented people – businesspeople, coaches, entertainers, and even athletes - have taken time away from the sport for ‘personal reasons.’ It happens.
Sometimes it’s probably better to admit that you’ve hit an emotional wall and take time to reflect on what you want at this stage in your career and life than to press on, knowing that you’re not mentally ready. Gymnastics is a sport that requires an incredibly amount of concentration. I trust that one of the most accomplished gymnasts in the history of the sport knows when she’s off and needs a break.
By the time the problems started, it was too late for an alternate. She’s not precognitive. There was no way she, or anyone else, could have anticipated that this would happen. It was literally impossible for her to withdraw in time for an alternate to be named.
You saying that she should have withdrawn earlier, before she started having problems, is unreasonable. Furthermore, by phrasing it as “backing out” and “letting her team down” you are implying that she had a choice about this happening and when it happened.
As for why people are praising her, it’s because, unlike too many athletes, she chose to say that her mental health was the issue. If she’d broken a leg, no one would have had a problem, but because it wasn’t a physical issue they’re acting like she could have just gutted it out.
I submit that it is unlikely her problems only poofed into existence in the last few weeks.
Maybe they did but, considering she has spent the better part of her life competing, it seems weird to mentally lose it out of nowhere at the last moment.
Maybe she did and, again, to be 100% clear, she was right to withdraw if she felt she could not compete safely. And, again, we should not praise her as if she won gold for doing so.
Do you think Joe Thiesmann let his team down that one time?
You have yet to establish why Theismann is relevant to this.
Other gymnasts report that is indeed how it happens. One second you’re fine, the next you aren’t. This is also not the first time it’s happened to her, it’s just the first time it happened when she didn’t have time to work her way past it. Which she is trying to do.
We’re not praising her as if she won gold. We’re praising her for recognizing that she had a problem she couldn’t deal with and she put her teammates before her own hopes by withdrawing when she did. Think about what might have happened if she had tried to continue and fell and/or injured herself. They’d have had no chance for anything between the low scores and the upset they’d feel by seeing their friend hurt.
We’re praising that she actually said “it’s a mental health issue” rather than covering it up as if it were shameful.
Why won’t you answer the question, Whack-a-Mole?
Just answer the question.
Because it is a non sequitur.
Establish its relevance.
It is nearly exactly the same situation: a player is injured during competition and withdraws.
A mental health issue that only appeared at the last possible moment?
I would be praising her if she realized she was not capable of competing in time to let an alternate take her place.
It’s not the same.
It’s the difference between Tom Brady losing his arm in a motorcycle accident just before the Super Bowl and Brady saying he doesn’t feel like he can play 10 minutes before the Super Bowl starts (and at least they have a backup quarterback).
You think mental health issues are on a schedule or something? They maybe make appointments about when they’ll arrive so you can plan ahead?
From experience, I can tell you this is not the case. All it takes is one little thing to tip you from being able to handle your life and going to pieces, and the stress of the Olympics and the attention on her was not a little thing.
What part of “it happened too late for an alternate to be named” are you not getting? She didn’t realize she couldn’t compete in time for an alternate because she was able to compete right up until the second she couldn’t.
What @Snowboarder_Bo is trying to explain to you is that Simone experienced the equivalent of an injury on the field during play, just like Thiesmann did with when his leg was snapped. Unpredictable and out of her control. The only difference is that her’s was mental, not physical, and a mental injury is just as significant and just as dangerous and debilitating as a physical one.
I am suggesting they rarely appear out of nowhere. Usually they build. She is accustomed to competing.
But, for the millionth time, if it poofed out of nowhere fine. She was right to withdraw. She deserves no kudos nor ridicule for it.
And battlefield soldiers are accustomed to being shot at, too, but that doesn’t mean they can’t reach a breaking point. There’s that old saying about the straw and the camel’s back.
The kudos are not for withdrawing. The kudos are for putting her team before her own ambitions and for being open about why she had to withdraw, because too often athletes are expected to continue no matter the cost to themselves and she’s provided a very visible example that it is ok to say, “no, I’m not going to do that to myself.”
I would suggest a battlefield soldier would notice they are getting to a breaking point before they break. Particularly if they have been in many battles before.