Fun little food for thought: USA 2016 Quals
What we know: Aly came in 2nd and Laurie came in 3rd at Nationals, Gabby came in 4th. Laurie came in 2nd and Aly came in 3rd at Trials, Gabby came in 7th. Gabby (controversially to some), Aly and Laurie made the team and we’re all fighting for the three AA spots at camp and in training. USAG released a statement saying Laurie would not be competing on bars in quals due to a pulled abdominal muscle, conveniently allowing the pro gymnasts/past Olympic champions/household names to get the spots, which just so happens to make for better headlines/ratings. I remember reading somewhere Maggie Haney said her heart was broken for Laurie and she cried when she found out that Laurie would not be fighting for an AA spot in quals (suggesting that she might not have been injured).
We know that USAG has a history of choosing people who are more marketable to the general public to bring in cash (i.e. USOC/Steve Penny[?] demanding that McKayla be named to the 2012 team, allowing Nastia to compete in Trials in 2012, wanting to sub McKayla in the 2013 AA instead of Kyla, excluding Maggie Nichols from AA quals in 2015 in favor of two Olympic veterans meanwhile she posted a higher AA total in Team Finals than they did in quals, etc.) and they also have a history of covering up injuries rather than publicizing it (Jordyn’s stress fracture in 2012, McKayla’s broken toe 2012), so why publicize this one.
We also now know that Haney has been an awful coach to her gymnasts, forcing them to compete through injury, abusing them verbally/emotionally, etc. So it’s quite possible that she was sad that they wouldn’t allow her to compete through her injury.
For funsies, I figured out that Laurie would have needed a 15.241 to tie Aly, who as we all know got the 2nd AA spot. With the bars scoring being as cracky as it was in that sub w Aly scoring a 14.733, Simone scoring 15, Gabby scoring 15.766 and Madison scoring a 15.866 (which honestly makes domestic scoring look fair — those were all ridiculous), it’s not all that crazy to think that Laurie could’ve achieved a higher score than that (especially when she was already scoring around that domestically with a hit routine).
This is all speculation, and we may never know the truth, and I am happy with how the AA turned out and Aly getting her AA medal, and Aly still could’ve beat her out with her AA score, but I just can’t help but feel like this wasn’t totally fair for Laurie.
Yes it’s been 4 years, idk what made me think of it, but I’m interested to hear what some of you guys have to say on the matter? Do you think the right decision was made? If you think Laurie should’ve competed AA in quals, how do you rework the roster? Simone was doing AA no matter what and Madison was literally brought JUST for bars (with a backup AA set just in case), leaving two spots left open. Do you take Gabby out of quals and throw her in tf (a la Maggie), or just not put her in at all (which would kinda negate bringing her at all since she was brought as a good AAer with a good bars set), do you not put up Aly with the lowest bars score and then take away her potential to score a higher AA score?
Gabby qualified in third place to the bars final. It doesn’t make sense to pull her from bars just to give 3 people the chance to compete AA when only 2 could qualify.
Simone, Madison, and Gabby were always going to compete bars in QF since Madison & Gabby were the only ones to have a shot at the bar final and Simone was certainly going to compete AA. Madison wasn’t going to do floor, vault or beam so Gabby was also going to do all of those events and she did quite well. Laurie was also starting to struggle on bars and IIRC that was pretty evident during podium training. In the end, only one of Aly or Laurie could do the AA. Aly got the shot and got the silver medal, plus Laurie recently talked about her ab injury. It was definitely the right decision considering Aly came home with the silver AA medal!
Regarding Maggie, if Brenna didn’t have her meltdown in QF I don’t think she would have done AA in TF. I find a lot of people’s conspiracy theories about Maggie to be ridiculous and really don’t think she was prevented from doing AA to ensure Gabby or Aly qualified.
