Term Limits for the Olympic team | Page 2 | The Boneyard

Term Limits for the Olympic team

vowelguy said:
This idea only comes about when you’re winning all the time. As soon as the team lost a game, everyone would realize that you needed to have the best players.

The selection committee should consider longevity as one of many factors. If the 12th slot is between a 40 year old and a 20 year old, I would hope they would recognize that selecting the 20 would help down the road.
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This
 
ndmb said:
This
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I think the committee has done a good job of bringing in young talent.

Let's be honest, the whole issue here is that 1/3 of the players are Huskies. From the Favor article:

Most every team we send to an international tournament ends up whipping opponent behinds by huge margins. The average cushion of victory in Rio last year was somewhere between outrageous and embarrassing. It has been like watching National Champions play community colleges, these last several Games.
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Sound familiar? It's the United States ruining women's Olympic basketball, only in this case they really do get most of the best players.
 
Wasn't Sue Favor one of those who were crying that Parker should have been on the team? And hadn't Parker at that point already won 2 gold medals? So where was Sue with her "take turns" argument then? I don't remember Sue suggesting that Catchings and/or Parker step aside for some younger player(s)

I'm not sure but I think Sue's orange slip is showing. :)
 
This is such an interesting issue: team sports, in which participants are picked by a committee based on what's best for the team, vs. individual sports in which the individuals compete directly against each other and are chosen simply by best performance. (I realize that neither is always the case, but more-or-less).

We don't mind those in individual sports dominating Olympic slots, because they've proved that they are the best. But we wonder whether in team sports, where we could win with a variety of different participants, that we might want to share the wealth.
 
I think it's awesome that the older players still treasure what performing for your flag and country means!
The older players such as Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi, can certainly use the time off to recuperate from the tolls the WNBA and Overseas wars take on their bodies but they are honored and proud to put the USA on their chest tax their bodies more to show the world that Americans can be athletically and patriotically dedicated to their nation!
 
I think there is a bit of a catch 22--the committee seems to value international/Olympic experience quite a bit, but it's been impossible for many players to gain that experience because a handful of players have dominated the roster for the last 10-15 years.

I'm not quite sure about Bird and Taurasi, but I want Whalen and Augustus out. The current selection process is for 2018 World Cup, correct? But I wonder how much change there will be from the World Cup team to the Olympic team in '20. Seems like '18 would be a good opportunity to bring in some new players and get them some experience before the next Olympics happen.
 
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wire chief said:
There's no math to determine that player A, ranked by humans or computer, is better than player B. This is not science. Given the large pool of very good players, who can demonstrate that taking turns is a deficit?
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That's ridiculous. Given that stance, just make up a list of 200 players, put their names on lottery ping pong balls and pick 15 out of a hopper. Do away with the selection process entirely. No tryouts, no practices, no warm up exhibition games. And you think that will always result in putting our best possible team on the court? That's insane.

Yes, there is some subjective thought process that goes into the selection process, but that's true of almost everything. You live with those slight imperfections, but you don't throw away the entire selection process.
 
I think the best should go to the Olympics. Some of the all-time greats are recognized because of longevity: Edwin Moses, Carl Lewis, Alexander Karelin, Paavo Nurmi, et al. Whether it's team sports or individual sports, I don't like the idea of a limit.
 
wire chief said:
There's no math to determine that player A, ranked by humans or computer, is better than player B. This is not science. Given the large pool of very good players, who can demonstrate that taking turns is a deficit?
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Coaches such as Geno Auriemma and the USA selection committee. They establish the type of team, players, skill level, chemistry, team system, experience, etc. What USA basketball does is go with tried and true winners and a subset of young players who have had success winning and playing in winning programs that provide a real understanding of basketball. Will they make a mistake or two? Yeah. But goal is to win and so far USA basketball has a very good track record. Sorry only many brass rings to go around. ;)
 
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Yes, term limits. I don't care if it's a LV or a UCONN player. we have enough talent for limits. more than a select group of players should be able to represent our country. there is enough talent and gold to go around.
 
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UConnNick said:
That's ridiculous. Given that stance, just make up a list of 200 players, put their names on lottery ping pong balls and pick 15 out of a hopper. Do away with the selection process entirely. No tryouts, no practices, no warm up exhibition games. And you think that will always result in putting our best possible team on the court? That's insane.
Yes, there is some subjective thought process that goes into the selection process, but that's true of almost everything. You live with those slight imperfections, but you don't throw away the entire selection process.
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What is ridiculous and insane is how you suddenly jumped right to a pool of 200. The current pool of players for the World Cup is set at 29. 15 random ping pong balls chosen from a pool of 29 would be entirely practical & might remove some of the subjectivity.
 
Orangutan said:
It's not that the roster is dominated by UConn players. It's that the roster has been dominated by the same players for a long time. Whalen & Augustus would be two non-UConn examples. I wish some of them would retire from international play though they should by no means feel obliged to.

Bird and Taurasi are legitimate living legends but if they are on the team again in 2020...

I feel like we're getting to a point where a whole generation of guards has been completely blocked from the national team. You could say it's up to them to be better and force their way into the team. But Vandersloot has been better (statistically, at least) than Whalen and Bird in recent seasons and eventually saw the writing on the wall and started playing for Hungary. Diggins didn't get picked for 2014 worlds after an all-WNBA season

It's a lot harder to get a spot on the team than to keep it. It seems like favoritism hiding behind the guise of "experience".
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Hmmm. Worth contemplating....
 
CocoHusky said:
What is ridiculous and insane is how you suddenly jumped right to a pool of 200. The current pool of players for the World Cup is set at 29. 15 random ping pong balls chosen from a pool of 29 would be entirely practical & might remove some of the subjectivity.
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Perhaps, but the post I responded to was advocating for random selection with no basis on a selection process because it was argued that metrics are inconsequential. Isn't the pool of players for the World Cup based on some selection process? It seemed to me that the post I responded to advocated throwing out the selection process completely, so you can't have it at one stage but not another, because there would be some bias or subjectivity that went into picking those 29 players. So, whether your total pool is 200, 100 or 29, there's still no way you've selected the best possible team if you just draw numbers out of a hat.

Randomly selecting a different set of 15 players every four years is like handing out participation trophies in non-competitive youth sports leagues.
 
Best Players that Form the Best Team Should be on the Olympic Team. If the best player is 50 years old he/she should be on the team.

Can you imagine the Media/Fan's Outcry if the USA lost an Olympic Game and didn't win the Gold Medal. The first reaction would be, it wouldn't happen if player(s) were on the team and not excluded because of Term Limits. The Elite Basketball players play in the NBA/WNBA for 12 years, then why shouldn't they be on the Olympic Team if they're still one of the Elite Players.

Yes, Sue Favor Bleeds Orange as she is a Lady Vol fan and doesn't like Geno and UConn.
 
If you are changing things to right this egregious practice of taking the best team players, why decide to arbitrarily allow a player to go to two Olympics?

One and done in every sport, not just WBB, so every man and woman can have a chance to participate.

No gold, silver or bronze medals. Plastic for everyone.
 
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Alydar said:
But the best athletes should be in the Olympics, and if they all live in Mongolia then let them all compete.
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Tell that to Phil Mickelson and dozens of other US golfers ranked in the top 50 in the world who couldn't play in Rio because they limited the US to 4 golfers. Mickelson was, I believe, ranked 19 in the world at the time and had to watch golfers play from Indonesia or some such place ranked 500th or worse.
 
ndmb said:
A) Players are objectively better or worse than each other. If we could do a statistically large sample of games, you could identify the best combination of players.
B) Obviously, in a real life case, there's no way to do that. But, as long as the estimation of the selection committee of what is best for both the short and long term success of the Olympic team is even slightly better than chance, then taking turns will come at a deficit to performance.
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Sorry, but I blanch at the "objectivity" label. It's useful, of course for the 100 yard dash et al, but less so for team sports.
Look, I'm as much a homer as the next chap and love to see UConn players in the Olympics.
I have no problem with the article, until the overly large consideration of a ton of college players. They must be used sparingly.

But it is just not accurate to see specific players etched in stone. Now you write of a formula to identify "best players", but then you speak of combos. That's a different dimension. So, e.g, Candace Parker is a "best player', and she contributes for gold medals, Then she doesn't, and the team is successful nonetheless
Decision: CP=Best Player; but not in combo.

Now Dawn comes along to put her stamp on. Who will predict what she sees?
 
CocoHusky said:
What is ridiculous and insane is how you suddenly jumped right to a pool of 200. The current pool of players for the World Cup is set at 29. 15 random ping pong balls chosen from a pool of 29 would be entirely practical & might remove some of the subjectivity.
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What UConnNick suggested and what you suggested are exactly the same, you just draw the line at different parts of the bell curve. What he posted is a logical extreme of the flawed reasoning that choosing players by chance would somehow lead to teams that were as good as teams where the selection committee made attempt to determine the best players.
 
I can see an argument that it's better for the future to get some younger players some international experience in lower-stakes tournaments, but this author's argument that others simply deserve a turn shouldn't be used when talking about grownups.
 
ladies and gents, we need to have a moment of brutal honesty. TEAM USA has always been political and is even more so now. coaches need to rotate and term limits need to happen.
 
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LadyVols9 said:
ladies and gents, we need to have a moment of brutal honesty. (1) TEAM USA has always been political and is even more so now. (2) coaches need to rotate and (3) term limits need to happen.
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1-- Okay.
2-- Sure.
3-- Okay- Sure - here is some brutal honesty for you. Term limit for players? Laughable. It's so laughable that it forces one to have a 2nd thought regarding the author's points of 1 and 2. How about pettiness and jealousy for those that suggest term limits? OFC not all that suggest. It's just so silly it's not worthy of a split second mention. Instead of dealing with the political situation or coach situation -- you penalize the players because "they've been too good and won too much?" I can't stop laughing at the complete absurdity.
 
I don't watch Olympic coverage much, but I generally watch the women's basketball, at least a little. Count me among those who think this is a wonderful idea. There are only a dozen or so spots on the roster, and whenever a team is "picked," we all can predict, with near certainty, the vast majority of players who will be on it. So here's what happens: For all but maybe 16 players or so, there is absolutely zero chance or making the team, and for three or four others, you can make it only if you manage to beat out a superstar (hoping, all the while, that she's gotten past her prime and you can out-quick her). Maybe that's the way it's supposed to be, but I'm not so sure.

What if he accepted way of doing things would be two-and-done? Those completing their second Olympics would retire gracefully, with all the honors from fans of a grateful nation. Each time a team was chosen, there would be lots of strong competition for however many spots were open, so a stronger, more motivated bench would be available.

I am not saying this would make for a higher quality team. I am all but certain it would not. But it would put a lot of new faces in front of Olympic fans and would probably make coaching this new combination of players more challenging. The downside is that for some other countries that now can field a really good first-string team, retiring their stars would deplete the ranks.

Please note that this idea has nothing to do with politics or giving players a turn (really?) or feeling that there are too many players from one team on the roster (I'm a UConn fan. How could I think that?). It probably stems from the fact that I am one of those dinosaurs who believe that when it comes to basketball and hockey and yes, any other sport where professional players are allowed to represent their country in Olympic competition, it was far better when only amateurs were allowed. Was the quality of play as good? Mostly no. Was the competition better? I for one think so. Was it more interesting? Go back to the "Miracle on Ice" days and tell me all those great back-stories about all the players weren't fascinating. They were people no one had heard of, and partly because they were unknown, they became real heroes. Diana Taurasi, say, may excel in the Olympics, but I don't think many people would consider her level of excellence to be heroic.

However, I do sort of like the Holiday Inn Express idea. :rolleyes:
 
it was far better when only amateurs were allowed.

Would welcome your definition of "amateurs" re: the Olympics.
 
LadyVols9 said:
Yes, term limits. I don't care if it's a LV or a UCONN player. we have enough talent for limits. more than a select group of players should be able to represent our country. there is enough talent and gold to go around.
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Communist sports?! Did you notice when communist USSR dominated the Olympics they sent the same WINNERS time and time again. Heck, they didn't even follow your communist approach to USA basketball.
 
ThisJustIn said:
it was far better when only amateurs were allowed.

Would welcome your definition of "amateurs" re: the Olympics.
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Point taken, but we could start with "not people making six or seven figure salaries a year playing their Olympic sport," or something like that." Were things far from perfect back then, Hell, yes. So now we see which professional players, when tossed together as a team, can beat which other professional players. That may be interesting, at least to some folks, but I suspect it's nothing like what the Olympics are supposed to be. Or, at least, WERE supposed to be.
 
LadyVols9 said:
ladies and gents, we need to have a moment of brutal honesty. TEAM USA has always been political and is even more so now. coaches need to rotate and term limits need to happen.
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Yeah! It was pure politics selecting Taurasi, Bird, Catchings, Augustus, Moore, Fowles, McCoughtry, Charles, Whalen, Stewart, Delle Donne, and Griner. These are the winningest of the winners and you want to give some poor college kid a shot just because it is their turn. Poor babies! If they can play like Stewart, I'm all for it. You do understand how good she is ... don't you? Why not go back to the USA only sends amateurs to the Olympics and enjoy watching the USA teams lose to the other nations' professionals? Yeah, the USA men's Dream Team should have never happened. Should have send all college kids. Heck, the Dream Team's opponents could not wait to lose so they get their picture taken with the Dream Team. So they could show people these are the giants of basketball that kicked our collective behinds and we loved every moment of it. AND we got our picture taken with them! Autographed no doubt. Reread the aforementioned names. Yeah, the giants of women's basketball. "But we don't care. Their turn is up." It is up when they are beat out for their position. If a young player can do this, put them on the team, post haste.

Is USA Basketball perfect? No, nothing is perfect. Is the world unfair? Yep, sure is. Perhaps these kids need to learn this lesson early in life. Have a good cry or two or three and move on with life and learn how to deal with it. Such as practicing to become as good as the aforementioned players so they can EARN a place on the USA Olympic and World Championship teams.
 
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