Quote:
Originally Posted by Gray Adams
I want to echo this point. By the mentor's own admission, he used the attack, but why should we believe his admission of guilt isn't the full story from his perspective? Every single one of us has been looking for someone or something to blame for what happened on Einstein. The full report has brought up a multitude of points of failure during the finals, and its really not hard to believe the answer to all of this is not as simple as blaming this all on one mentor. As soon as news broke that there was an attack during play, all of the failures on the field were attributed to that. But things just aren't that simple, and we discovered how many root causes for all the different problems there really were. But I firmly believe we still know far too little to place all of the blame on this one attacker. With thousands of incredibly smart people in the dome, its entirely possible that someone else used this attack, whether or not their team was on einstein, and whether or not they were fully aware of their actions.
We've heard 2 sides of the story so far, and unless someone would like to point out something I missed that puts them in direct conflict, I think it's only fair to evaluate this based on what we know.
Everyone was feeling a lot of emotions at the moment, and the attack in response could have been from a moment of desperation. I'm not condoning what happened, but I am trying to understand it.
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I think part of the story happen before St. Loius. At MSC the finals were 469, 67 and 830 against 2054, 548 and 245. The red alliance won the first match, but the second match ended in a most unusual note. 2054, 548 and 245 were attempting a tripple balance. A little before that, 67 was in the blue alley and died about two feet in front of the blue bridge. The blue alliance charlie browned the bridge and contact was made with 67 a few times. At the end of the match, the blue bridge was level, but one robot, on the blue alliance side was half on the bridge and the floor. The referees looked it over and huddled up. I believe they call a few 3 point penaties during the match for contact in the alley. The final score was close enough that a blue bridge balance would have given them the match win and force a thrid final match. I can only assume the referees were discussing if there was a bridge balancing interference. As they discussed the issue, the winning teams were call to the floor to cut down the nets. Referees still discussing. Some of the nets have now been cut down. One referee leaves the huddle, removes his striped shirt within a couple steps and is clearly not happy. The rest of the nets are cut down. I can not remember exactly when the referee huddle ended, but at some point the MC them explains that the balanced blue bridge did not count because of the one robot half on the bridge and the floor. No mention of the possible bridge balancing interference. Myself and many others believe that the bridge balance was interfered with, OK, not deliberately, but just the same. That's not how the referees called it. 2054, 548 and 245 could have been denied a chance to win the tournament because of that call. Referees are human and they do the best they can, do not blame them unless you want to fill their shoes.
I was really suprised that the referee huddle was still in progress when they began the ending ceremonies. That really dampened the mode for everyone there.