Columnist Dean Juipe: Some sports just don’t need a judge

Dean Juipe

Monday, Feb. 11, 2002 | 9:38 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4084.

Down the hill they raced, soaring off a jump before racing some more through an assortment of icy mounds and toward a finish line that was upon them within seconds.

It was steep, it was harrowing and it was swift.

It was also scored not only by the clock but by a largely unnecessary panel of judges, which gave the Nordic combined the feel of a macho day on the slopes that lost some of its appeal when the boys' moms decided to get involved.

Three days into the Winter Olympics from Salt Lake City and I'm reminded that I'm really an old stick and ball guy. From this perspective, the best sports are those that are won or lost almost entirely by the participants.

Not that I didn't enjoy the Nordic combined, which culminated Sunday with a 15-kilometer sprint through the backwoods of Utah. But, I wondered throughout the first stage of the event as the skiers pirouetted and posed for the judges as they came off that initial speed-inducing ramp, why do style points need to be awarded along the way?

Why not -- as is the case with Alpine skiing -- award the gold medal to the first one back to the lodge and leave the extraneous artistry and the faults of a double-digit panel of judges out of it?

Look at the expense of transporting, housing and feeding this army of Olympic officials, if nothing else. For every athlete we saw (or that NBC allowed us to see when it wasn't in the midst of commercials) in the parade of nations that highlighted the opening ceremonies, it appears as if each may have had a corresponding judge.

I'm more inclined to favor sports where the ratio of athlete-to-umpire closer approximates what we have in baseball, football, basketball or hockey. As such, I'm not so much a traditionalist as I am a proponent of allowing the athlete -- and only the athlete whenever it's possible -- to determine the outcome of an event.

This idealism is regularly tested, of course, by the bumbling of officials even in the stick and ball games. For instance, the New England Patriots would not have advanced to last week's Super Bowl (let alone won it) without the 11th-hour aid of a bad call by the referee and his replay helper in the Snow Bowl playoff game with the Oakland Raiders.

But, generally, the mainstream sports are almost always won by those who are most deserving and by those who score the most goals, sink the most baskets or cross the goal line the most times. The rules are easily understood.

This isn't always the case when judges are involved, although, obviously, events such as figure skating require a scored expertise. (Boxing does too, but every fighter who's unhappy with a losing decision has only himself to blame for not knocking out his opponent while he had the chance.)

When the biases of judges comes into play, everything from skating to the Nordic combined loses a fraction of its luster.

Given that the event itself would have been just as thrilling, what would have been lost by eliminating the judges in the Nordic combined?

The answer: A couple dozen aristocrats and elitists would have missed out on an expense-paid vacation that their minions dutifully provide.