Wednesday, August 1, 2012

No Medaling With the Rules, Please

Sportswriters who dislike the National Football League's different stances on celebration and hotdogging sometimes use its initials to call it the "No Fun League." But the NFL ain't got nothin' on the IOC.

American swimmer Michael Phelps has won the most medals of any Olympian ever (19), beating the 48-year-old record held by Russian gymnast Larisa Latynina. Latynina, now 77, was actually on hand at the race, having bought a ticket. She has said a sportsman like Phelps is deserving of the honor, joking that after 48 years it was time for a man to finally do what a woman had already done.

Latynina, in a graceful gesture that would have been PR gold, so to speak, for the Olympic games, said she would be pleased to present Phelps his tie-breaking medal.

Nuttin' doin', said the IOC, always willing to shoot itself in the foot when it comes to its self-image. It's against some rule or another, I'm sure, but I'll have to guess because the IOC isn't talking about why it let what could have a fine moment slip through its fingers, and why it rebuffed one of its great champions when she offered to give it a once-in-a-lifetime moment, basically on her own dime (she did, after all, buy the tickets).

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