I stopped watching after I realized that Cheng Fei got a higer score than Sacramone.  In what other sport can you not even complete your task and finish better than (almost) everyone else that does?

If falling down gets you Olympic medals, I'm off to London in 2012 so I can break Michael Phelps' record.

And the North Korean girl didn't even stay in-bounds. What's the point of even having an out-of-bounds area if you still can win the gold?

I know we're not gymnastics experts here, but this sounds idiotic if you put it into the context of other sports. It would be like if you got a triple for launching a foul ball 50 feet to the left of the left field foul pole.

Perhaps Cheng Fei scored higher than Sacramone because even failed difficulty is better than accomplished mediocrity?

Unfortunately, Hong from North Korea simply got lucky tonight.

Do they give a Nobel Prize for attempted chemistry?

It makes sense that if you do a harder vault, you get a higher score - but you should actually have to do it correctly. As it is, it seems like you can attempt the hardest vault in the world & fall down while doing it and still win. This is the Beijing Olympics, not the Special Olympics - you shouldn't get a medal just for trying.

I am curious to see if the US will contest not only the age of the Chinese girls, but the scoring in general. According to typical penalty accessments, there should have been a minimum of 1.6 deducted from Fei, which of course was not.

Granted, Sacramone had a horrible showing at this years Olympics, but I am not thinking that even she should have been screwed out of the bronze medal as her vault was much more technically sound, even if less difficult, than the Chinese.

Ok for all of you who are blaming china for another US failure, i think you're honestly forgetting something: a contender's score is the average of TWO vaults. And if you recall, Cheng Fei's first vault was nearly perfect, and was an extremely high score. In her second vault, besides the failed landing, there erally wasnt much for the Judges to deduct. THerefore an average of her scores still allowed cheng fei an advantage over Alicia Sacramone.

And one more thing: pretending IF cheng fei in fact should have gotten higher deductions, you are all making it sound like china cheated. there are no more chinese judges than judges from any other country, therefore no one should be blaming the chinese at all.

Please stop getting your sympathetic feelings in the way of reality. The scoring WAS fair. Sacramone deserved bronze but she really didn't earn it...tough.

the new scoring for gymanstics gives more points for higher difficulty levels. So if you want to blame someone why not blame the entire gymnastics judging committee?

you're forgetting its an average of TWO vaults. Cheng Fei scored MUCH higher than sacrmone on her first vault which managed to compensate for her loss on the 2nd vault.

there are two attempts for vaults and Fei scored over 16 for her first attempt.
blaming china or rest of world for another US failure, another example is that the so-called protest from america on women's 100 sprint with that so-called false start after Jamaica finished 1, 2, 3

the other way around, everyone was cheering on Paul Hamm in the all-around in Athens, nobody even care about the fair treatment and mis-judge (yea, the real-misjudge) to the poor Korean guy.

thank you soo much.
USA is one of the most biased sports contenders ever...

i agree with mdaren. i am not Chinese, i'm an American.
it's very wrong for U.S.A. to blame all of china. There were no more judges from china then any of the judges from the whole world. if you should blame anyone, blame all the judges.

As I was reading it seemed as if people were blaiming the inconsistancies of the sport. Not China. If you are going to attack American prejudice then you must realize we are all proud of our country so we will be biased just like any fan of any sport. But notice we are NOT complaining about track and field. If you are going to call us out at being the most bias then make sure we do it all the time. If you dont see something wrong in that then you are either an idiot or blind. You dont get a TD for trying. Or even a few yards for trying the most difficult play ever without actually completing its execution.

And also, gymnastics shouldnt be in the olympics, it's a biased "sport"

I don't believe the majority is blaming China here.  True, Fei's first vault was great, but her second fell short.  It's not an issue of poor averaging, U.S. bias, or anything else, the argument is that her second vault was simply not penalized enough.  As stated above, when an expert like Bela Karolyi is STUNNED, a man who does not tend towards bias, doesn't that raise some eyebrows?

As said, Fei is an amazing athlete, she should be recognized for that.  That doesn't change the fact that she failed in her second vault - she was supposedly penalized for both her approach and her landing, yet she still garners a Bronze?  Even with her almost perfect first vault, how does that beat another who lands both her vaults with a hop or two?  It's like arguing that a 4 and a 10 beat out two 8s, it doesn't make sense. 

People get wrapped up in yelling Bias - Obviously it is not China's fault, but in this instance, it just so happens the athlete in question was Chinese.  I would be saying the same thing if she were another American - I feel Sacramone was robbed - is it wrong to support my country's team? 

Just to note - Fei wasn't just penalized on her landing in her second vault, they specifically noted that how her hands were unevenly placed was another penalty, (another 8/10) resulting in almost 1.5 points in penalties -with her score of approximately 15.052 (I don't remember exactly) you'd be arguing that her vault would've scored 16.500 - 16.600, an AMAZINGLY high score - that's pushing it...

exactly I'm more sick and tired of these "U.S. is just bias" sayers than I am of Brett Favre. It is an easy excuse to try to void our questioning. Key word is try. If she was German or Italian or American I'd say the same thing. And I think most of the people here would too.

Another point - since Fei never completed the last rotation on her missed vault points probably should have been deducted from her start value because she didn't complete her last flip.

The scoring in gymnastics still needs improvement.  As a contrast to the vault, look at the pommel horse.  Artemev's 2-minute-plus routine was outstanding, but at one point he stepped (not actually fell) off the apparatus.  He returned to the side horse and completed the routine beautifully.  Now, despite his high start value and the perfection of 98% of his routine, once he stepped on the floor all the commentators acknowledged that his chances for a medal were gone, even though most of his performance and SV were superior to the other competitors. Now compare that to Fei landing on her knees and the PRK girl stepping out on her vaults - how could they even remain in contention with those flaws?

In my opinion they cant remain. The knee landing should have been an instant loss of any chance at the metal. Stepping out of bounds should also result in that. Like I said you cant get a runner out by trying to catch it in the outfield. Or you dont get a point in volleyball for trying a harder serve. I can go all day with any sport. Gymnastics should be closer to perfect and I dont think this new point system is the answer. You can get 6.5 points without even running it. If I land on my knee's I can get a bronze!

As for the comment about the "so-called" false start in the women's 100m dash, one runner did move out of her set position before the gun.  That is a false start - no ifs, ands, buts, or so-called.  The officials missed it. Especially in a sprint like the 100, a false start can affect the outcome. It was another example of the Olympic officials not being up to the level of the athletes.

the second vault:
Fei's A value is 6.5 + 8.550
Alicia's A value is 5.8 + 9.525

The point that is being made here is not that there are a multitude of Chinese judges cheating, but that there are HUGE issues with how the judges are, well judging. Take a look at your scoring-The most Fei could have recieve was a 16.5, correct? Now, she had TWO HUGE errors with her vault-the huge OBVIOUS misplacement of her hands on the vault and eating her crap at he end of her vault, both typically yielding a 1.6+ deduction value, which TECHNICALLY should have lowered her score from a 16.5 to a 14.9-------------Hmmmmmmmm, now we are assuming the rest of her vault was PERFECT, when in fact it was not.

Do you still not see an issue with this? Honestly, do you honestly think that this is merely American's "being" bias?

who was blaming China? I believe the issue was with the poor judging, not China in general.

the judge panel in olympics game is composed by multitude of Chinese judges, u must be kidding??? all from former soviet union maybe!  And the deductions, since you and I are not the expert, show the proof why the judge should deduct 1.8+ (gymnastics judge book 101 somewhere maybe).

Hello---I did not say that the panel is composed of mostly Chinese judges; I believe what I said was that the issue is not that there are a multitude of Chinese judges -PLEASE READ THE STATEMENT CAREFULLY!

And, on the Olympic stage, if the judging guidelines dictate what you should deduct for certain penalites, then one must deduct that for those penalties. I would understand if these were small errors that were not visible to the judges, but are you kidding me? They were obvious even to some half blind 90 year old man sitting in the nose bleeds of the arena.

So - her second vault did ultimately = 15.050, correct? [I think I'm working this correctly]
so with approx. 1.5 in penalties, that's about 16.550?  That's only judging the penalties for her displaced hands, and her landing - and, as mentioned above, who knows what penalties may have existed while she was in the air, since it is very possible there were other issues due to the skewed nature of her entire vault.  Obviously, none of us can know, but even so, it still looks as if she scored high for her second vault - and since Fei beat Sacramone by .025, that would have made all the difference...

yea, after you edited your post a couple of times: change from 1.8 to 1.6, 14.9 to 14.7, ......, etc.

Oh Lord.........I merely edited the penalty error as I posted it wrong.

only Lord knows what you edited exactly, lol

Here is a fresh off the press news article from the LA Times regarding the women's uneven bars event. Both Nastia and the 13 year old from China tied in the final-do you even need to guess who the tie went to?

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-olygym19-2008aug19,0,2347658.story

the execution score break the tie (see I do know the scoring system better than you:-), do you even think the judge panel can fool the rest of world with that, lol

Quote: >>>If that sounds complicated, former U.S. national coach Bela Karolyi didn't understand how the tiebreak process worked. He thought the scores from qualifying were used, and that would have given Liukin the gold medal.
<<<
Does he even know how the scoring system works nowadays before making any comments, former Romanian, now US citizen (I guess), with broken english, poor old guy just trying to make a living, lol

The process changed over time, which is exemplified by Bela's belief on how the tie breaking system would have worked in his mind.  Even Nastia thought they were tied, making it obvious that the tie-breaking system is at best, obscure.

Besides, one way or another, this man knows more about gymnastics than anyone here (on this board, I mean)- and he explained his understanding of the current scoring system when commenting on the Vault event.  As stated, this man is well-known to be critical and honest, so when he believes a complete error has occurred, it likely has. 

The use of Bela as an example here, was simply to show how confusing the process is - again, showing that he is revered as an expert.  Grasping at straws, in my opinion...

Quote: >>>But Grandi said that after 1996, the International Olympic Committee decided judged sports needed a tiebreak procedure, and Monday night it was used to decide two gold medals. In the men's vault, Poland's Leszek Blanik won gold over France's Thomas Bouhail in a tiebreak after both had an average of 16.537 for their two vaults. <<<

The tie-breaking already happened in men's vault before women's uneven bar, simply because there's no American athlete in men's vault, Bela happened to forget to comment on that or mention that in his comment on women's uneven bar, lol. Yea, of course, he's an expert, no doubt about it, but his comment obviously based on his 'passion' for team USA and his outdated knowledge on scoring system

You missed my point, entirely.   You attempted to attack Bela's credibility as a commentator -

"Does he even know how the scoring system works nowadays before making any comments, former Romanian, now US citizen (I guess), with broken english, poor old guy just trying to make a living, lol" 

All I said was the process was obscure, and the use of Bela as an example just shows that he is revered as an expert.  The tie breaking process works as it works, I'm not complaining about Nastia's results - I'm on this board concerning the Vault and Sacramone's results - I used Bela as an example to show that even experts, which you admit he is, believe she was robbed.  Yes, this man is passionate over the U.S. team, but he has also been critical in the past.  You didn't see him cry when Johnson lost the gold on the floor, did you?  He's honest, and an expert - all my point is.

First and foremost-the vault competition was not scored properly-mathmatically proven to be incorrect if ALL fo the competitors were scored/judged properly.

As for the uneven bars-before the LA Times updated the article, early this morning there was no definitive answer as to why the tie break went to He.

Both executed the same difficulty score of 7.7, both received  the same execution score of 9.025. You say the execution score breaks the tie? Did they both NOT receive the same execution score? And while He did not stick her landing, Nastia did.

I think  most of the points here-Again, is with respect to the overall judging. Regardless of the tie break process (which is a joke), the fact is the judging is not being done correctly and in an unbias manner. In fact, I will even have to say the Russians were not judged properly either thus screwing them out of medals.

I did see his passion, he cried because Johnson lost (trust me, I wish Johnson had won the all around, she IS one of the best gymnasts, she smiles like an angel, and her maturity to handle the tough competition is amazing). In fact, I'd attack Bela rather than anybody on this board, because he is supposed to be the expert, his task is to translate the sport in an impartial way to the audience, not stir the emtions.

Quote: >>> He, 16, and Liukin, 18, both scored 16.725 on their routines but according to the tiebreak formula, He won the gold because of a lower average of form deductions from the three judges who gave each gymnast their lowest scores. <<<

Lol, well then you and I watched 2 different things, b/c when he commented immediately following the floor, he said that the best 3 performers of the night received medals, and he was happy with the results. 

Anyways - the tangents in this conversation are all over the place - only reason I commented was b/c I thought Sacramone got robbed - that's it, that's all.  I think I've said my peace on it, agree to disagree, whatever, I really need to stop refreshing this page and get back to work :).

We will have to agree to disagree on this one as the issue was how incorrect and unfair the judging is. If the judging was done correctly, the vault finals would have been way different and the uneven bars would not have resulted in a tie.

I think the anchorman intended to ask whether the order of result is fair (Johnson lost to Romanian), but Bela answered to a different thing.  There is no doubt for the Romanian to get the gold: she stuck to all the landings and executed perfectly beautiful.

Yea, I guess my point is that Bela is biased and 'passionate', lol, and the scoring system is not perfect, but if it is on the paper, then the judges have to follow the rules.

And as to the zero for the Russian, the first false start is charged to the field in 100m sprint, do you think it's fair to other athletes? otherwise, everyone can have another warm-up exercise as long as he/she attempts before the green light. Rule is rule.

What? If that response was intended for me, I was not referring to her starting before the green light, I was referring to the overall poor judging of the Russians in general.

But, for shear argument sake, if a rule is a rule, then shouldn't the 13 and 14 year old girls from China be disqualified for not reaching the age of 16 this year, thus losing any medals that came about their competing in these Olympics? Those are the rules, yes?

yahoo news: http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/gymnastics/news?slug=ap-gym-unevenbarsfinal&prov=ap&type=lgns

>>>

Both scored 16.725, but He got the nod because her execution marks were closer to a perfect 10 than Liukin’s.

Liukin would not criticize the scoring system that does not award dual gold medals.

“It’s nothing I can control, and honestly, I can say it has been very fair to me, and I got the biggest gold medal of them all,” said Liukin, winner of the women’s all-around gymnastics gold.

He, at the center of an age-eligibility controversy throughout the games, was fast and furious on the bars. Her twists and flips went by in the blink of an eye, and she won by about that short a margin.

<<<
Alicia Sacramone is a great athlete, there's no doubt about it. Challenge the scoring system if you think it's not perfect before the competition, but if that's the rule at the time of competition, then the judges should follow it, and the athlete and audience should respect that.

I don't defend the age issue for Chinese women's team, but you have to find solid evidence before the accusing (not guilty until proven, isn't the great jury rule in the states), just like people can cast doubt on Michael Phelps of doping, just because he won 8 gold medals in a single olympics game and he's the greatest athlete of all time.

btw, for those ever dated asian chicks, you should notice the physical difference between girls in east and west: they are physically smaller (boobs and overall:-D, no offense), and definitely look younger at the same age, in general.

Yet again man, I think you have it twisted - I don't think many people here are arguing much against the scoring system itself - at least I'm not - I'm saying the judge's did a poor job of scoring Sacramone's vault vs. Fei's vault.  Fei, despite her higher level of difficulty, was still given a high score due to the mistakes in her second vault.  I think the judge's made poor use of the scoring system, not that the system itself is terrible. 

Sacramone was robbed of a medal.  It is a travesy if the US doesn't contest what has happened thus far in the scoring of the gymnasts.  I believe the only judges the knew what they were doing were the floor exercise judges!

I can tell you I disagree with the scoring system. Why reward someone for something they havent attempted yet. I can have a 7 off the bat by just telling them i'm doing the hardest thing possible. I think difficulty should play a role but only if they  execute. Let's look at the dunk contest. Sometimes a little misjudged but they base it on execution and perhaps creativity AFTER execution. If you cant hit the d unk you dont get points for it! That makes sense. Just like you dont get a point in baseball if 3 guys are left on.

(duplicate post-sorry)

I will admit that I did not see any of this.      There appear to be good arguements here both in supporting the judges, as well as not.

My question is this - if this 'injustice' happened to another gymnast other than Sacramone (given her struggles in the team competition), would this discussion be so 'passionate' ???      Are we just so hopeful that she could get at least a medal ?     

(maybe we are, and maybe that's a good thing......)

I would say that this conversation would be happening just not as public. People would think it and a lot would comment but I cant say as many people would be commenting. I am commenting because I saw it so I got pretty upset about the score. At first I didnt see Alicia's vaults, instead I tuned in when Fei went. Her first was great but then her second came and I said "well she's out of the medal race." And well... she wasnt... so it rose my eyebrows and then the replays came with Alicia's and I was disgusted about that. Thats just me. I can agree with your logic though.

Respect a painfully flawed system? If we respect it then it will stay. If we call shenanegins then it'll get worked out to a better system (hopefully). This is a new concept not an old one. Respect has not been earned yet and i'm pretty sure it wont be earned either.

"Painfully flawed system" from your amateurish eyes, do you think the international gymnastics committee members are bunch of goons and thugs, fooling the world audience and athletes around.

"He won the gold because of a lower average of form deductions from the three judges who gave each gymnast their lowest scores." Can you think of a better way to break the tie.

And I definitely think "difficulty + execution" is a better scoring system than the old one. But maybe they can enforce more strict deduction rules on the knees-down, but how can you draw a simple line between success and failure on the execution: a little jump, big jump, out of bounds, knees-down, fall-off etc. You can even get a score when you fall from the bar, pommel horse, still ring, yet still not a ZERO.

From my amateruish eyes? You ought to be ashamed of yourself sir. So youre saying that someone trying to perform a level 7 stunt automatically deserves a 7 before they even compete? In the world of sports that does not make sense. Being a winner should take execution of your field. Not just 'trying' Are we in preschool? Trying not to hurt their feelings? It's pathetic and for someone to even medal who LANDED ON THEIR KNEEs beating out someone who had a few little hops its outragous. Sports that are judged like so have no business being in the olympics. Why dont we get Olympic Idol in there so we can have a sing off?

I have to admit though the point system look good on paper but when you look at situations like this then it definately wont work. It is incredibly flawed and for you to say other wise is ridiculous. This single subject got 57 now 58 posts on this argument. Maybe when Brett Favre throws an INT we should reward him 3 points for trying

don't take it personal. I am not an expert either and my comments are amateurish too. Unless someday you are qualified/certified as a gymnastics judge or committee member, you can throw around words like "pathetic" to the judging job.  They have strict scoring system on the difficulty, that's why some can attempt for higher difficulty, some can not. My conversation usually ends when the discussion leads to unpleasant attacks. Good luck, team USA.

Lets face it gymnastics is rigged - take it for what is is worth - when the Americans went Gold - Silver you didn't thing the staus quo would let that go did you...

While it's true the Alicia Sacramone had some problems early on in her gymnastic disciplines, she was absolutely robbed in the vault when the Chinese competitor actually fell to her knee's on her landing,  yet was given relatively extremely high marks. This has happened more than once where the judging has been more than suspect and in favor of the Chinese athletes. It also happened in the Synchronized Swimming event, where the American team absolutely nailed a spot on and very difficult routine, given good marks accordingly and yet the Chinese swimmers, who made two obvious mistakes on a very mundane routine, were given almost perfect scores and  thus passed the Americans for the Gold. When you see this, and then hearing the announcers who were once competitors in the same discipline's in previous Olympic games also are calling those scores into question and why, it's very obvious that the judging is more than biased towards the Chinese.

I didn't think that giving China the Olympic games was good idea when it was announced, and after seeing some of the horrible judging that's taking place, I feel that way more than ever. Also don't forget, that most of the world felt the same way when Nazi Germany  was given the 1936 Summer Olympics, and their fears were born out when the Germans were given higher marks for lesser talented performances, with the exception of Jesse Owens, who made sure that there was no doubt as to was the better athlete when he competed.

Am I saying that the judging is as blatant towards the host country in the case of these games? No, I'm not, but it's without argument that there is some "shenanigans" going on, no doubt about it. There are also calls for explanations as to why the majority of tickets handed out to party officials were held back to purposely not allow large groups of Chinese citizens to gather in one spot (for reason's which are obvious), and in the process, many of the American athletes family members have been unable to attend the disciplines of which their kids are competing in. Of course these Chinese officials (who are also in charge of the day to day of these Olympic games) are keeping quiet about the whole thing and no explanations, nor accommodations, are being given to those American families and is so wrong on myriad levels.

I'm hoping that with the way the judging has gone in certain cases already, that this is a wake up call to the IOC and to where that China doesn't get a sniff at the games for at least the next 20 to 30 years, if not longer, and hopefully that will serve notice to other less open and democratic countries that the Olympics should be the utmost in fair and balanced competition, and above reproach in the way they are judged, regardless of how said home country looks to it's own people, or in the case of China, it's power structure is looked upon in the eyes of the rest of the world.

Of course, these are all my own opinions and I welcome thoughtful and reasoned discourse of them.

Cheers!!!

Ps. -- As I write this, a baseball game between the American and the Chinese teams is in progress with the American team up 4 - 0 in the 6th inning. An American player, Nate Schierholtz, was coming home after tagging up at third on a fly out, and as the ball was thrown into the Chinese catcher, who was blocking the plate incidentally, Schierholtz drilled said Chinese catcher and was called safe after the ball was dislodged in the contact making the score now 5 - 0. (Evidently they play Little League rules with the so called "10 run rule" in effect, otherwise known in the Olympics as the "mercy rule". In my opinion, this takes away the very essence of the competitive nature and meaning of the Olympics in the first place. How sad...)

Once again, the Chinese spectators, who make up the majority of the crowd, have thrown out all decorum and are going completely nuts, booing and screaming for retribution in the American being thrown out, but the umpires were right on the play and it was deemed a clean play at the plate. Anyone who knows baseball knows that if the catcher is going to stand directly in front of the plate and there is a play at home, there will be contact from the runner in hopes of dislodging the ball, as was the case here. It's been that way since official rules were drawn up in the game.

Of course, one of the announcers is trying to be as unoffensive as possible by saying that the American player went out of his way to hit the catcher. He did not, as many replays have obviously shown. Also, this same announcer is conveniently trying to leave out the fact that American batters have been hit five times by Chinese pitches, with Shierholts being hit three of those five times, and is not succeeding but is also not calling out the Chinese pitcher for what could be easily considered intentionally hitting our batters as he is saying that the catcher was needlessly drilled in the play at the plate.

While the Americans have played this game with the utmost in decorum by not retaliating for being repeatedly hit by pitches, a case could be made that this particular player was doing so by the severity of contact with the catcher, but it's still a legal play regardless of the reasons or the reason it's being played, being that this is the Olympics.

UPDATE: A sixth American batter was just beaned by the same Chinese pitcher, this time the batter was hit in the HEAD (upon replay, it looked intentional) and is still down. And of course the Chinese fans are CHEERING this abhorrent and obvious retaliation of their catcher being mowed down, again, in a very legal play. Thankfully, the umpire has now tossed the Chinese pitcher, much to the even louder chagrin of the Chinese fans.

Hopefully this game will not get out of hand any more than it already is, and cooler heads will prevail.

So goes for boxing! I believe one of the boxers coaches was furious at the outcome of his fighters match, especially after the replay showed 8 obvious points his boxers should have received and did not, and that was only at the 3rd or 4th round I believe. The coach said they would continue to review the tape in its entirety and then protest the match when ALL points had been added up.

I have zero issues with losing, I do not like it, but if one loses "fair-and-square" and all played by the RULES, then there are zero issues. When it is blatantly obvious that rules are broken and scores or marks are skewed to the point of ridiculous, then we have issues.

Well said!

I absolutely agree, although you were far less "wordy" than I was!!

Cheers!!

"Alicia Sacramone"

I'm guessing this garnered 10,000,000 hits.  She's the biggest 'net sensation since the freaking 'Hoff.  She deserves about 10,000,000 more, because at least she has talent.  Bless her heart, but the girl's still got game.

test

I will meet that challenge (better way to break tie)...

have a xxx-off (I am sure someone can come up with a good name) for the event.  In this case, one more performance between the 2 who tied.  just like how they had swim-offs for the last spot a few times when someone tied for 8th in the combined-semi's..

add some drama,  give them another chance to settle it on the field/mat, and have a system people can understand easier.

of course, I believe there should be NO tie-breaker and both should have gotten gold..  but if you must break a tie, do it in some form of an over-time.

He is 14, not 16. China and all their apologists can claim all the indignance they want to, but the fact remains, and found through the hard work and effort of a hacker (I call him that because I can't remember his name and I'm too tired to look it up right now), that He Kexin is 14 and that the Chinese government tried to cover that fact up.

Great comments though. I enjoy reading them. Keep up the great work!

Cheers!!

Something else to think about here. When the judges know how the tie breaking system works, it's not a stretch to think that the biased judges would score overall accordingly to make sure that He would be the one with the gold, doesn't it?

A question that needs to be thought about and one that begs discussion.

So discuss already!

Cheers!!