world sports

[karl_1052]

Originally Posted by CrazyKell

First of all, the NHL isn't YOUR league

Tell that to Gary "I will never let another Candian team in the league, and will do my best to move the existing Canadian teams to the United States" Bettman.

[EpyonXero]

Originally Posted by Katherine

Take it a step further. What if athletes could only play for their closest local team?

Then kiss parity goodbye.

[Apoc]

Originally Posted by CrazyKell

I see your point. I'm not in the US though so I wasn't aware that team sports aren't a big deal.

You do alright in individual medals though no?

Think of it though? And this is not a dig on their athletes. But to be conservative, ill say they have 5x the talent pool we do. We each have 8 Gold (and were quite likely to get 2 in curling today), they have 12 silver and twelve bronze. We have 6 silver and three bronze and a shitload of 4ths and 5ths that coulda gone either way. Both countries lost medals that were almost expected, and both countries support athletes in college that compete for their country in the olympics.

In fact, most of the womens hockey team from the USA, come up here play all winter in the Canadian womens pro league.

[goof2]

Originally Posted by Trip

If we focused on medals much more so than we do now, we could rise to meet the chinese.

The only country that has beaten us for total medals won in any olympics from 2000 on has been Germany. They did it in the 02 and 06 winter olympics. It doesn't look like that is going to happen this year though. China won more gold medals than the US did in Beijing, but the US won more medals overall. That was also with the advantage of China hosting. I don't expect that to continue in 2012.

To the original question, I think most foreign competitors are training at America's colleges while students there. The colleges are paying for the facilities. They also decide who attends their school. They appear to believe they ultimately benefit from bringing these foreign athletes over. I'm not sure how it would function either outside of a total ban on foreign athletes at American colleges. My other issue is I really don't care. Its just the olympics. Outside of generating a bit of nationalism and xenophobia it isn't like they really matter. The whole idea seems impractical to implement and of limited value.

[Apoc]

Originally Posted by karl_1052

Tell that to Gary "I will never let another Candian team in the league, and will do my best to move the existing Canadian teams to the United States" Bettman.

He destroyed the NBA, so they gave him a job in the NHL.

I honestly cant believe he hasnt been asked for his resignation yet.

[Trip]

Originally Posted by goof2

The only country that has beaten us for total medals won in any olympics from 2000 on has been Germany. They did it in the 02 and 06 winter olympics. It doesn't look like that is going to happen this year though. China won more gold medals than the US did in Beijing, but the US won more medals overall. That was also with the advantage of China hosting. I don't expect that to continue in 2012.

To the original question, I think most foreign competitors are training at America's colleges while students there. The colleges are paying for the facilities. They also decide who attends their school. They appear to believe they ultimately benefit from bringing these foreign athletes over. I'm not sure how it would function either outside of a total ban on foreign athletes at American colleges. My other issue is I really don't care. Its just the olympics. Outside of generating a bit of nationalism and xenophobia it isn't like they really matter. The whole idea seems impractical to implement and of limited value.

Again, it has no basis on reality and is a hypothetical. Basically would the US medal count go up or down? No bearing in xenophobia or the practical implementation of it.

It takes a very non human rights oriented country with very little freedom to do such a thing.

[CrazyKell]

Originally Posted by Apoc

I honestly cant believe he hasnt been asked for his resignation yet.

You and me both. He sickens me.

[goof2]

Originally Posted by Trip

Again, it has no basis on reality and is a hypothetical. Basically would the US medal count go up or down? No bearing in xenophobia or the practical implementation of it.

It takes a very non human rights oriented country with very little freedom to do such a thing.

OK, from that standpoint I think our medals would go up, possibly by a pretty significant amount, in the summer games. For the winter games, if we assume that other countries would follow suit, I think our medal count would remain the same or possibly decrease.

[Apoc]

Originally Posted by goof2

OK, from that standpoint I think our medals would go up, possibly by a pretty significant amount, in the summer games. For the winter games, if we assume that other countries would follow suit, I think our medal count would remain the same or possibly decrease.

You'd be banned from world cup and have no way to guage your skills against others, bringing down your medal count drasticly.

[goof2]

Originally Posted by Apoc

You'd be banned from world cup and have no way to guage your skills against others, bringing down your medal count drasticly.

As I read Trip's post he wasn't talking about banning international competition, just international training and competing in other county's leagues. If you mean World Cup soccer, not being able to have our players play in Europe would definitely hurt our national team, but we could still field a team. Our men's team hasn't won shit in over 100 years and our women's team only accounts for one medal per olympics anyway.

Our downhill skiers would still be able to compete in world cup skiing. There is a World Cup for rugby but I doubt we will be in medal contention when rugby sevens comes to the 2016 games. Beyond that I don't know of any other world cups.