I don't know a damned thing about gymnastics, and even less about scoring gymnastics, but there are some basic principles that any sport should adhere to, imo.
- If judges take several minutes to compute a score, the athlete should be given at least as long to review the judges' work.
- If the athlete is given only one minute to protest the scoring, the judges should be given no more than one minute to declare the protest came too late.
- If the athlete is given only one minute to protest the scoring, another athlete shouldn't be given a whole day to protest that the first athlete's protest came too late to be considered.
- If the athlete is given only one minute to protest the scoring, the governing body shouldn't be given five days to decide the original protest came too late to be considered.
- Someone with a sense of fairness should be given however long it takes to realize that if the original scoring was, in fact, wrong, then correcting *that* mistake should carry more weight than correcting the mistake of accepting a protest that was submitted a few seconds too late.
- Judges shouldn't be allowed to ruin what had been up to then a beautiful Olympics.
Today's news from NY Times? "Head of Panel That Ruled Against Jordan Chiles Represents Romania in Other Cases." This story just keeps getting worse. The head of the panel should have been disqualified from even ruling on an appeal, to say nothing of approving a Romanian appeal and then denying an American appeal of that decision without even hearing it at all. It just adds more evidence of bias, unfairness, and corruption in judging in the Olympics.
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