why is team USA stinking?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like swimming, shooting, and archery, and to a lesser degree gymnastics, allow countries to run up the medal counts. China can focus an entire country on just shooting and diving and lead in gold medals. It's kind of a silly measurement (total gold count). So team of 10+ players has to play through group stages and tournament but it only counts as one medal (all team sports like soccer, rugby, handball, volleyball), but a single swimmer or diver can win a bunch of medals in many variations of the exact same thing.

Excuses. Maybe the US should just get better at swimming, archery, and shooting then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like swimming, shooting, and archery, and to a lesser degree gymnastics, allow countries to run up the medal counts. China can focus an entire country on just shooting and diving and lead in gold medals. It's kind of a silly measurement (total gold count). So team of 10+ players has to play through group stages and tournament but it only counts as one medal (all team sports like soccer, rugby, handball, volleyball), but a single swimmer or diver can win a bunch of medals in many variations of the exact same thing.

It’s called strategy bozo

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Calm down Trump

Hahaha I was reading the OP in Trump’s voice as well.

#maketeamusagreatagain

I would love to know more about OP’s athletic skills since they’re so quick to criticize “only” getting medals that aren’t gold.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Even when they win they are not great. This women's gymnastics team that won, not impressive. So maybe talent is decreasing worldwide in sport. Maybe too much time on phones, not enough at practice.

I think something broke your brain. The US womens' gymnastics team is unquestionably the best in the world with 2 olympic all-around champions who are still somehow at the top of their game 4 and 8 years later. Simone Biles is considered by everyone who matters both inside the sport and out to be the greatest womens gymnast of all time. She has pushed the sport to levels I don't think people previously though possible and the fact that she is still able to compete at this level so far above even the best gymnasts from every other country at 27 is just unheard of. She has Phelps level dominance in the sport.

Put Simone next to any prior gymnastics great and she would absolutely dominate them. She does things no one has ever done before and she does them with perfect execution and power and even is artistically strong. If you don't understand that then you don't understand the sport at all.

Is this a Gen Z thing, to insult strangers? I don't get it. It I'd rude but at the same time ineffective. It is like telling me I have green hair. How would you know, and even if I did, why would I care what you think?

I'm Gen X and I assumed your brain wasn't working properly because you were arguing that a US womens gymnastics team containing both the greatest womens gymnast of all time (no question) and multiple olympic and world champions is "not great." And tried to argue that if they are winning it must be because all the athletes all over the world are not training hard enough because they are on their phones.

Either your brain broke or your a troll. Or both -- not ruling that out.

They are not great, that is the issue. The U.S. team is the best of the mediocrity of world gymnastics. The fact that the U.S. won without artistry, ans will falls, misteps, and mistakes, shows this.

Just because you are really aggressive doesn't make you right.

Ok now I get it -- you don't understand the sport. This makes sense now.

The US made almost no mistakes in the team final. The most glaring was Jordan Chiles falling off the beam during her mount. While this was a major error the team is so much better than other teams that it wound up not being a factor at all. Compare this to China who made several major errors that knocked them out of medal contention. The US did clean and error-less gymnastics.

I am guessing you are one of those people who is mainly familiar with womens gymnastics prior to the last 10 years or so and think that the steps and jumps you often see on landings now are evidence of a decline in overall quality. The opposite is true. Today's gymnasts could do the skills of 10+ years ago in their sleep with stuck landing after stuck landing -- it would be very clean and very safe and no particularly exciting. Instead the best gymnasts today are doing skills that no one thought would ever be possible. In fact for the gymnasts of yesteryear who were mostly much younger and not as strong these skills would be impossible or result in career-ending injuries. Todays gymnasts are better athletes -- better trained and more experienced plus physically more solidly built. It helps that we have rid the sport of the people who used to abuse and manipulate they young girls in the sport into eating disorders and unsafe training. The result is that womens gymnastics has "leveled up" and you now see them doing skills that are bigger and harder with more twists and rotations and more blind landings and technical difficulty.

I'm sorry you don't understand this. Genuinely. Because it means that you are watching extraordinary and record-breaking gymnastics and don't even know it. You remember the tiny but miserable young teen girls you saw compete back in the 90s or 00s and think they were "better" because they fit a mental image you had been *sold* about what female gymnast was supposed to be -- delicate and girlish and elegant. Think about this. In what other sport would it be a benefit to look weak and small. It was a messed up approach that held the sport back. Now we see it leaping forward. It's an exciting time and you can't even see it. Sad.

If they are doing all these so called amazing things and falling and tripping and not sticking their landings then they are not amazing because they are not following through. So they really can't do these advanced things you are talking about, because they can't complete them. Think of the divers, they can do all sorts of things in the air but they also need to enter the water cleanly (but that is another story the divers' quality is diminishing also)

I truly can't tell if the PP is an aging Boomer longing for yesteryear (when everything was better), an addled conspiracy theorist seeing boogeymen under every corner, or a bored Gen Z on summer break.

I think they have the classic DC (and DCUM) disease where they think a tiny bit of knowledge and a little bit of personal observation makes them an expert in anything -- Olympic sports or international dipolomacy or bridge engineering or parenting.

Or they are just doing a pitch perfect imitation of people with this disease. Hitting all the notes.

Would you go as far to give them the gold in know it all-ism?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Calm down Trump

Hahaha I was reading the OP in Trump’s voice as well.

#maketeamusagreatagain

I would love to know more about OP’s athletic skills since they’re so quick to criticize “only” getting medals that aren’t gold.

I would like to know your political credentials and how many executive positions as the head of state you've ever held. How can you possibly criticize senior politicians then if you've never been a politician who has run a state?

What stupid logic you have. Using your asinine logic, how can any sports fans of any major leagues criticize players if they've never made it to the pros?

Dumb dumb dumb...

[Anonymous]

OP, you are terrible. And WEIRD.

[Anonymous]

Pfff yet another gold for China.

China: 8
US: 4

This squad is limp this far.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pfff yet another gold for China.

China: 8
US: 4

This squad is limp this far.

How many times does it have to be said that most of the events the US are strongest at/expected to win gold have yet to occur? Yay China has 8 golds on Day 5! It's like saying the women's gymnastics team was not in 1st place mid event and you see how that turned out.

[Anonymous]

China number. 1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:China number. 1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Calm down Trump

Hahaha I was reading the OP in Trump’s voice as well.

#maketeamusagreatagain

I would love to know more about OP’s athletic skills since they’re so quick to criticize “only” getting medals that aren’t gold.

And her brilliant plan for improvement - “just get better”!

Lol, you’re a silly numbskull, OP.

[Anonymous]

It's a miracle the USA medals at all in country club sports like swimming. Only a small segment of the population in this country even gets a chance to try those sports, much less has the means to pursue them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:China number. 1

They can eat those Americans for lunch

[Anonymous]

I've been following swimming a while and I'm not sure I agree with this line of criticism that US is "stinking" in the pool. There've been chances for gold that didn't go the US's way... Regan Smith, most noticeably. But she and Kaylee McKeown have traded the WR back and forth for a while now, and last night was McKeown's night. Lilly King missing out on a medal in the 100br was also a bummer. But the US has gotten some surprising podium finishes with Emma Weyant and Luke Hobson, and is performing about where I'd expect them to be everywhere else (silver in women's 4x100fr relay, silver for Bobby Finke in 800fr, some others). Ledecky winning the 400fr would have been an enormous upset - people who are disappointed with the bronze are being ridiculous. There are plenty more chances for gold to come, too.

The US has noticeable gaps in some events where we never seem to have any medal contenders (women's 200fr, for starters). Up until Bobby Finke arrived on the scene, same was true for the men's distance events. Given the depth of NCAA and age group swimmers, I'm confident US will do very well in the pool in 2028. Helped out by being on home turf, of course.

Also fwiw if anyone's having a bad meet in the pool so far, it's China.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not just enjoy watching talented athletes from all over the world?

Because China tries to take it a lot more seriously as some sort of display as soft power projection.

Perhaps you are unfamiliar with their women’s gymnastics team.