Here’s an out there idea from The Balance Beam Situation:
… I propose that we consider turning Sunday from an event final into a true all-star game. This isn’t a new idea, and there are certainly pros and cons to it, but it is worth discussing.
The competition would be conducted in the format of a normal quad meet, but the teams would represent the conferences. We would have an SEC team, a Pac-12 team, a Big Ten team, and a Best of the Rest team all going head-to-head. …
As is done for all-star games in professional sports, the six-gymnast lineups on each event should be a mixture of a fan vote and coaches’ decisions. For each of the four teams, fans could vote online for three competitors on each event, and the team coach could choose the other three. …
Imagine an SEC vault lineup of Hunter, King, Sloan, Courville, Williams, and Milliner going up against a Pac-12 lineup of Zamarripa, Wilson, Dayton, Blalock, Courtney, and Dabritz …
While it’s true that the Individual Apparatus Finals on Sunday are normally a letdown. An afterthought. I’m not convinced that an All-Star final would be an improvement.
Better would be to automatically qualify the top 3 by RQS on each event to the final, as FIG does at the World Championships prior to the Olympics.
I was sitting with LSU during Floor finals. It’s poor marketing to have Lloimincia Hall sitting in the stands watching Floor when her routine was the most talked about all season. Many fans were disappointed that she didn’t qualify to the Final.
There should be more reward for being one of the top ranked over the season.
Click PLAY or watch her FX at Missouri on Gymnastike.
http://www.gymnastike.org/embed/NDQ3NjkzMjU1?related=1&autoplay=false
Watch more video of Louisiana State University Gymnastics 2013 on gymnastike.org
P.S.
If a sponsor could be found, I’d love to see a televised team All-Star final held some weekend AFTER NCAA Championships.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 