The award for the most ridiculous, self-absorbed, overzealous all sports entertainment network in the world goes to...
ESPN, for the 10th year running.
They have once again proven that outside the 4 major sports, Tiger Woods, and the Williams sisters, you're really not much of an athlete. Unless you count token consideration of Cael Sanderson and -ahem- Sarah Hughes (don't even get me started on figure skating).
No offense to college athlete of the year Sue Bird (UConn BB) but a certain swimmer from Cal who set at least 6 AR and 1 WR over the short course season would have had my vote.
Anyone else? Natalie Coughlin, female college athlete of the year as awarded by the USMS discussion crew?
-RM
Parents
Former Member
The format of preliminaries, finals, is dreadfully boring. Also, good swimmers rarely last more than a few years, so the general audience does not get too familiar with the swimmers. In other sports like basketball or baseball a good player will often play professionally for 20 years. Excitement and some sort of perceived personal relationship (if only through the newspaper) is what makes a sport popular. As much as I hate to say it, on-deck seeding may be participant friendly, but not spectator friendly, especially when events are seeded by time, and not by age group.
But the swimming organizations have known this for quite a while (even if USMS hasn't quite got it.) That is why you are seeing some pretty exciting new meet formats. One example is the team competition between Australia, U.S., Europe, and the rest of the World that occurred last year. Another example is the pro SCM circuit that seems pretty successful, at least in terms of world records and attendance (and taught me something; I did not think swimmers could swim so fast so often.)
Another format that I have heard about is elimination rounds of sprinters. You get a lot of good 50 meter freestylers together. They swim against each other in small groups. The winners of these groups swim against the winners of other groups, and the winners of these groups swim against the winners of . . . and the ultimate winner gets some money. You can do variations, such as different strokes or multiple strokes, single or double elimination, or vary the amount of rest between races.
Relays are good for excitement - in college meets they are by far the most exciting part of the meet. If swimming were to utilize natural rivalries some interest could be generated. In USMS, for example, a Pacific - NEM relay competition would be fun.
But advertising won't really do it - the event itself has to be exciting. As an aside, USMS has an advantage that swimmers are around for a long time. Wouldn't it be fun to track all of the really fast Olympians as they mature and age?
The format of preliminaries, finals, is dreadfully boring. Also, good swimmers rarely last more than a few years, so the general audience does not get too familiar with the swimmers. In other sports like basketball or baseball a good player will often play professionally for 20 years. Excitement and some sort of perceived personal relationship (if only through the newspaper) is what makes a sport popular. As much as I hate to say it, on-deck seeding may be participant friendly, but not spectator friendly, especially when events are seeded by time, and not by age group.
But the swimming organizations have known this for quite a while (even if USMS hasn't quite got it.) That is why you are seeing some pretty exciting new meet formats. One example is the team competition between Australia, U.S., Europe, and the rest of the World that occurred last year. Another example is the pro SCM circuit that seems pretty successful, at least in terms of world records and attendance (and taught me something; I did not think swimmers could swim so fast so often.)
Another format that I have heard about is elimination rounds of sprinters. You get a lot of good 50 meter freestylers together. They swim against each other in small groups. The winners of these groups swim against the winners of other groups, and the winners of these groups swim against the winners of . . . and the ultimate winner gets some money. You can do variations, such as different strokes or multiple strokes, single or double elimination, or vary the amount of rest between races.
Relays are good for excitement - in college meets they are by far the most exciting part of the meet. If swimming were to utilize natural rivalries some interest could be generated. In USMS, for example, a Pacific - NEM relay competition would be fun.
But advertising won't really do it - the event itself has to be exciting. As an aside, USMS has an advantage that swimmers are around for a long time. Wouldn't it be fun to track all of the really fast Olympians as they mature and age?
