Perhaps the pressure of being in the lead has gotten to Cornballers manager Ellis Kunka. The Dutch speed skater Sven Kramer, heavily favored to win the gold in the 10,000, finished the race in first and set the Olympic record. Then the word came: Kramer had been disqualified. His coach had incorrectly told him to change lanes.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports:Kramer blamed his coach Gerard Kemkers* for giving him the wrong information.
*Ellis Kunka pseudonym
"Usually, I don't want to blame anyone else, but this time I can't do anything else. I wanted to go on the outer lane then just before the cone Gerard shouted 'inner lane,' I thought he's probably right and went to the inner lane," he said.
"At first I thought my skates passed the cone on the wrong side, I will be disqualified. Then I noticed in the stadium something was wrong.
"You have to decide in a split second. Afterwards I should have gone with my own thoughts, but I was brought into doubt. This really sucks. This is a real expensive mistake."
The DQ gave the gold to Korean skater Lee Seung Hoon (Brittany B./Buck-Toothed Rabbit Bitches). It was a costly mistake by a manager who has never really gotten the better of his nerves, even after moving into first place.
For this observer, Kunka's move brought back memories of former Eagles coach Rich Kotite, blaming the rain as he struggled to justify a clearly erroneous conversion/extra point decision. Only in a more speed skating/fantasy Olympic context.
In any event, this disqualification does not look good coming on the heels of American skier Bode Miller's DNF in Giant Slalom.
"This is the Olympic gods looking down and realizing that Ellis is the New York Yankees of Fantasy Winter Olympics," said Da Nang Dynamos manager John Binz.
Hopefully for Binz, he's more '79 Yankees than '78.
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