SALT LAKE CITY — After a week of watching a lot of the Olympics in London, here are a few bests, worsts, mosts and dumbests . . .
MOST INTERESTING EVENTS I'VE NEVER PAID ATTENTION TO BEFORE: Trampoline, synchronized diving and archery. I can't tell you who won these events, but they were fascinating to watch — the trampoline because of how high they go, the diving because of how they can replicate each other's moves so well and the archery because of the way you can see the arrows fly through the air to the target.
EVENTS I CAN DO WITHOUT: Whitewater kayaking, equestrian and field hockey. Sorry if you like these, but I just couldn't get into them. The field hockey wasn't bad, but I couldn't handle the blue carpet they played on, reminding me of watching Boise State football games.
MOST SURPRISING NUMBER: As one old enough to remember Bob Beamon's incredible long jump (29 feet 2 inches) at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, I was shocked to learn that the winning jump of Great Britain's Greg Rutherford Saturday night was a mere 27 feet, 3 inches, the shortest winning Olympic long jump in 48 years.
I guess Olympic athletes are faster and stronger and go higher, but they just can't go farther.
SHADES OF '72: Many remember the 1972 Olympics when the USSR basketball team was given two "do-overs" in the final three seconds in the gold-medal game against the U.S. and on the third, they scored off a length-of-the-court pass and basket to beat the U.S. by one point and claim the gold medal.
South Korea's Shin A Lam can relate. She thought she had beaten Germany's Britta Heidermann in a semifinal fencing match. But one second was put back on the clock and Heidermann scored a do-or-die hit in that second to win the match and advance to the gold medal. This was the match where Shin sat on the floor and cried for an hour while the South Koreans protested to no avail.
BIGGEST SCANDAL OF WEEK 1: Eight women's badminton players from China, South Korea and Indonesia getting kicked out of the Olympics for tanking matches in the round robin portion of the tournament in order to get a more favorable draw in the quarterfinals.
The tanking was so obvious, with players deliberately hitting shots into the net or wide, that the fans were booing the competitors throughout the match and chanting "Off, off, off."
JUST ANOTHER BOXING SCANDAL: It wouldn't be an Olympics without some fishy stuff going on in the boxing ring.
A boxer from Azerbaijan, who was knocked down five times in one round and assessed a two-point penalty to boot, was somehow awarded a decision over Japan's Satoshi Shimizu in a bantamweight bout.
Then there was American Errol Spence, who dominated a bout with India's Krishan Vikas, only to lose a decision.
Thankfully, both decisions were overturned and one of the referees was sent home and the other might be.
BEST EXCUSE FOR THE MARGIN OF USA'S 83-POINT MEN'S BASKETBALL WIN OVER NIGERIA: They didn't want to be accused of not trying their best, which is what got all those women's badminton players chucked out of the Olympics.
DUMBEST RULE: That only two contestants per country can make the gymnastics all-around finals.
Because of that, one of the best gymnasts in the world, the USA's Jordyn Wieber, who had one of the five best scores in the preliminaries, didn't get to compete among the 24 gymnasts in the finals
Wieber may never have beaten teammate Gabby Douglas, who was sensational in winning the gold, but she should have had a chance to compete for a medal.
FEEL-GOOD STORY OF THE WEEK: You could say it was Great Britain's Jessica Ennis handily winning the women's heptathlon in front of a delirious home crowd.
But how about Britain's Andy Murray winning the men's tennis gold medal, handily defeating Roger Federer in the finals. It may not have been Wimbledon, although it happened at Wimbledon's Centre Court, but it came less than a month after Murray cried at the same spot after losing to Federer in the Wimbledon finals.
BIGGEST ADO ABOUT NOTHING: People worried that South African 400-meter runner Oscar Pistorius has an advantage as a double amputee running on prosthetics.
C'mon, can't we just celebrate the fact that this guy has come as far as he has and is competing in the Olympics alongside runners blessed with two legs? Pistorius' feel-good story came to an end as he didn't advance to the finals, finishing last in his heat of the semifinals.
BEST TV GRAPHIC INNOVATION: Putting the flags and names of the swimming leaders at the end of each lap and the three medal-winners at the end of each race. Also the world-record line that moves across the screen in each race.
WORST GRAPHIC MISTAKE: Why can't NBC put a small graphic in one of the upper corners of the TV screen, telling us what event is going on? Not everyone is sitting for hours watching every event, so it's especially frustrating in the swimming events when you look up to see a race starting and not know which event it was and how long it was going to go and whether it was a final or not. It would be very simple to put a graphic in the left-hand top corner, saying, "Men's 400 freestyle semifinal."
If it's too much clutter, how about just replacing the NBC graphic in the right-hand top corner?
DUMBEST MOVE BY THE IOC: Eliminating baseball and softball from the competition this year.
Although the IOC gave some lame reasons for getting rid of the sports, some wonder if the fact that they were U.S.-invented sports, usually dominated by the U.S. was a key factor.
However, the United States has won just one of five baseball gold medals – Cuba won three and South Korea the other. In softball, the U.S. did win three of the four gold medals contested since 1996 with Japan winning the other, but China and Australia also had strong programs and other countries were starting to challenge.
Those sports have also been ruled out for 2016, but at least we'll still have equestrian, rifle shooting and rhythmic gymnastics to get excited about.
email: sor@desnews.com