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Council for a Legit National Games

Tuesday, 27th October 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)

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Ok, there is no such organization, but there should be. First, there was the diving coach who quit over believable but unproven allegations that aquatics commission deputy director Zhou Jihong runs the competition like a puppeteer (Corruption scandal hits Chinese diving). Then, there was news of three cases of doping. Performance-enhancing drugs are a problem across the sports world, but China's national games officials made a joke of the event's drug policing practices by requiring athletes to take a written drug test. There are actual, drug tests as well, though, and they netted the following:

Guo Linna, a rower from Henan, was the first to fail a drug test at the games. Her positive result led to the withdrawal of her team from competition. (Reuters: Chinese rower fails doping test at National Games)

Wang Jing, a sprinter from Fujian province, was stripped of her 100 meter gold after a positive drug test. She's also been banned from the sport for life.

Li Jie, a pistol shooter from Inner Mongolia, tested positive for propranolol, a beta blocker used to prevent trembling (China Daily: Inner Mongolia stay despite positive test in National Games)

The diving allegations may be false, and the testing may have caught all the cheats (both unlikely, though), but there's another element that skews the results of the national games. Two teams--the host province and the People's Liberation Army team--get a leg up on the competition because they are free to recruit athletes nationally, instead of being limited to one province. With all but a few medals awarded, Shandong is on top in both golds (63) and overall medals (148). The PLA is in second place, with 49 golds and 120 overall. I'm not sure how long the host cities have enjoyed this privilege, but hosts have now topped the final gold medal count four times in a row.

China.org.cn: Doping, match fixing challenge China's efforts to ensure clean National Games

Tags: cheating, doping, national games, PLA, Zhou Jihong

Comings and Goings: Rugby and Baseball

Tuesday, 27th October 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)

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Tonight's Chinese national games gold medal baseball game (6:00 pm Beijing time, Guangdong vs. People's Liberation Army) will probably be the most important baseball game in China for some time to come. Now that it's officially out of the Olympics, baseball will likely be dropped from the next national games and generally given a lot less attention by China's sports authorities. The Olympic baseball stadium is gone from Beijing's Wukesong sports center, and it would be a surprise to see the national professional league return next year. While baseball's China denouement (for now, at least) plays out quietly in Jinan, a sport that just joined the Olympic club has its own athletes in town (Coincidence? Probably not) for a rugby sevens tournament. By the 2013 National Games in Liaoning, those rugby players will be competing for medals and spots on the 2016 Olympic team.

But Americans have not given up on bringing their national pastime to the masses here—Major League Baseball recently launched a new site for the mainland (MLB.cn), opened a baseball academy in Wuxi, and still has staff in Beijing.
Guangdong's Liu Kai, no longer a Yankee minor leaguer, pitched his team to a victory over Beijing Saturday.
Guangdong's Liu Kai, no longer a Yankee minor leaguer, pitched his team to a victory over Beijing Saturday.
Seattle Mariners scouts made the trip to Jinan to keep an eye on a Beijing catcher and first baseman who are in the Mariners system. And Huang Jianhua (Kenny Huang)--the Chinese-born, U.S.-based businessman who's working on team ownership deals in both the NBA (Cleveland Cavaliers) and the CBA (Jilin Northeast Tigers)--supposedly has all kinds of plans for baseball in China.

In the meantime, though, there are a whole bunch of out-of-work guys who can swing a bat or throw a baseball 60 or 70 miles per hour--maybe some of the heavy hitters can get absorbed by the now-Olympic-happy Chinese golf world somehow, a la Happy Gilmore.
And the women who play softball are even worse off, as no one's likely to come to the rescue soon with a softball academy or professional league.

Tags: baseball, Liu Kai, National games, rugby, 刘凯