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Cedric Chin
@ejames_c
Had to wait a couple of hours for the update, but, heh — a few minutes ago, judo legend Shohei Ono just won the -73kg gold, with a beautiful throw. The kicker: he was totally playing the harder game.
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Cedric Chin
@ejames_c
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Two days ago, in the 60kg men’s category for Judo, Naohisa Takato fought Yang Yung-wei in the finals and won Japan’s first gold of the Tokyo Olympics. He won with zero scores. Yang simply had more penalties than he did. My old coach was disappointed. But I wasn’t.
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Cedric Chin
@ejames_c
But Ono is a generational talent. Most top Judo players have 3-5 techniques they can use at the top level. This means that you can deny them usable grips (which is what Takato did to Yang in the 60kg mens final) to render them ineffective.
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Cedric Chin
@ejames_c
Of course, with experience, I think Takato played a smart game. (And to be fair I’m sure my old coach knows this as well). For the majority of the final, he denied his opponent a usable grip. He effectively cut Yang’s technique set down to 0.
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Cedric Chin
@ejames_c
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@ejames_c
(This is the last Judo thread I'm posting for a bit. Unless, urm, Teddy Riner wins the +100kg category. In which case you're going to get an earful from me, because that's absolutely unbelievable. (Riner is older, and he's been defeated only once in his entire career.))
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