I've had some rough experiences in my life, but I wouldn't trade places with Nastia Liukin on Monday night for all the X-Box 360's in the world.
The US Gymnast and All-Around gold medalist came up short on Monday night in the finals of the Uneven Parallel bars event. Liukin finished the event with a silver medal, her fourth medal of these Olympics.
Liukin lost to gold medalist He Kexin, who had the same score as Liukin.
With tiebreakers in place, it was He getting the gold and Liukin getting the silver.
I don't know much about gymnastics. I admit ignorance on my part. I'm the first to admit that and I probably always will. Maybe it's my American bias, but even I thought the judging is a little messed up.
I understand that they've modified the scoring, but I'm still confused. I feel as though it lacks clarity. I mean come on, the announcers aren't always the brightest, but even the NBC crew had a tough time and needed the score sheets for both women. I wouldn't try and read it, unless you do understand, then please try to explain it to me, preferably in some sort of a diagram.
If there's a tie, then let's call it a tie. Otherwise, we have some sort of an OT showdown. We can do it kind of like a walk-off, minus David Bowie. Something simple! We have the technology people! Let's make use of it!
Granted, things won't be perfect, but we can at least try to put together a scoring system that even an idiot like myself can understand.
Photo Credit: Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images
