Hmmm, is the drone scandal symptomatic of a bigger fall from grace for the Olympics?
Oh, for the good old days when an Olympic scandal was as simple as an athlete caught doping. Remember Ben Johnson? I was on a train with friends traveling through England in 1988 when the news broke about Johnson being stripped of his gold medal. Welcome to the technological age. Doping has taken a back seat to spying using drones.
If you have not paid attention to the news, coaches for the defending gold medal champion Canadian Women’s Soccer team were caught using a drone to spy on the New Zealand team. The resulting punishment was harsh. A 200,000 Swiss francs fine. One-year bans for head coach Bev Priestman and her assistant coach. An unprecedented six-point deduction for the team in the Group A standings.
Priestman has since spilled the beans on how widespread the practice has become. Internal e-mails attributed to her indicate that illicit scouting “can be the difference between winning and losing and all top 10 teams do it”. She also implied that the men’s senior national team may have employed a similar scouting tactic.
There was a time when the Olympics were a pure expression of the best in amateur sports. Athletes training for years, sacrificing other life pleasures and giving their all to represent their country and come home with a prized medal.
But the new reality is not so virtuous. In some team sports, such as basketball and hockey, professional athletes now compete at the Olympics. While it is entertaining to watch the very best compete, it arguably betrays the Olympic culture when some of the athletes competing have million dollar annual salaries.
In case you did not know, the Canadian Olympic Committee Athlete Excellence Fund provides athletes with performance awards of $20,000, $15,000 and $10,000 for winning Olympic gold, silver or bronze medals. These amounts pale by comparison with the endorsement contracts gold medal winners can secure.
Note: I do feel for the athletes on the Canadian Women’s Soccer team. The punishment handed out for their coaches and the governing body has trickled down to their level quite unjustly. They are courageously battling on to pursue their Olympic dream as are many of the dedicated and untainted athletes at the games.
I do not know how much Olympic coaches earn. But it is a safe bet that coaching a team or group of athletes to Olympic gold medals can be a stepping stone to job coaching a professional team with a six or seven figure salary.
The coaches for the Canadian Women’s Soccer team have clearly fumbled the ball in their efforts to lead the team to another medal. But I am inclined to believe the ball has also been fumbled at the highest levels of the Olympic’s governance.
The Olympics have lost their sheen as the epitome of all that is noble and pure about amateur sport’s competitions.
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Tags: Bev Priestman · Canadian Women's Soccer Team · metaphor · Michae Robert Dyet · Olympic drone scandal · OlympicsNo Comments