If Jordan Chiles does in fact lose her bronze medal as a result of the ongoing Olympics controversy, Flavor Flav is going to make it right. The officially hype man of the United States will commission a different award that only she will receive.
It won’t quite live up to the real thing, but it will be an awesome consolation prize.
Chiles, 23, initially finished in fourth place during the individual floor competition in Paris. However, as Romanian gymnast Ana Barbosu celebrated what she thought was a third-place result, Team USA filed an appeal that sent shockwaves across the athletics world.
Appeals of this nature are not uncommon in gymnastics but they rarely change the outcome. This time was different. Judges recalculated Chiles’ difficulty score, which bumped her from a 13.666 to a 13.766 and jumped Barbosu’s score of 13.700.
The bronze medal was revoked from Barbosu and awarded to Chiles.
As if that sequence of events wasn’t wild enough, the craziness continued over the last few days. The Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled over the weekend that Team USA made its appeal one minute and four seconds after the initial result was announced. That was, by rule, four seconds too late.
The ruling required Chiles to give her bronze medal back to Barbosu— who recently broke her silence on the matter to show empathy toward the American.
However, this sequence of events is going to get litigious. USA Gymnastics claims to have evidence that its appeal was filed on time, which would award the bronze medal back to Chiles instead of Barbosu.
Both countries agreed to share the medal but the International Olympic Committee is only allowing one to stand as of right now. That still could change.
Either way, Jordan Chiles will have bronze around her neck.
If not a bronze medal, Chiles is going to receive a bronze clock.
William Jonathan Drayton Jr., better known as Flavor Flav, was in Paris for the Olympics as the official hype man for United States Water Polo. He even got to shred a 100-year-old piano while there!
It was one of the most unexpected crossovers in recent history and the founding member of Public Enemy randomly popped up at various sporting events throughout the Games, mostly to support the women.
Flavor Flav famously wears a clock around his neck. He is going to commission a similar pendant for Jordan Chiles if she does not get the bronze medal back like she deserves.
Regardless of what plays out over the next few days, weeks and months, the American will be getting bronze. Either a medal or a clock. She would definitely prefer the former, but the latter is still pretty cool.
It would serve as a reminder that Chiles did win a bronze medal in floor exercise even if she doesn’t!