TITLE FARCE Thoughts on Kelly's almost-but-not-quite championship By Steve Shearer

Published: November 6, 2011

November 6, 2011 Views: 3,982







TITLE FARCE Catching up with ASP's Brodie Carr and Kelly on the world title debacle.

How do you spell brand damage?

Tahiti was a major turning point and from that point the ASP began to salvage some positive momentum as they stared down public criticism of the mid-year cut and the new breed produced incendiary performances in New York, France and Portugal. Slater's 11th saw a massive wave of goodwill which should have been enough to see the ASP end 2011 on a high note and ride into a Cloudbreak-fueled 2012 on the ascendancy.



Could there be a stronger de-legitimizing event than this public farce of "title-gate" which saw a man named "Mark" act as pro surfing's deep-throat and alert Slater to the fact that while he had been publicly crowned and adored he hadn't actually won yet? (That's a rhetorical question by the way.)



Christ, how do you screw that one up?



The ASP, in a press release, promised accountability so I decided to track down the CEO of the ASP, Brodie Carr, to find out what that might entail.



I sent him an email and he agreed to an interview immediately. He was en route to San Francisco and needed a briefing. He agreed a second time (just after midnight PDT) to talk to me in the morning (PDT). Saturday morning, though, he seemed to have gone cold on the idea. He now asked me to send some questions; said he was too busy and might have to pass on the interview. I pressed harder for some face-time but was politely but firmly fobbed off.



I sent the following questions to Brodie and received a written response:



How did the mistake occur?



What steps is the ASP putting in place to prevent it from happening again?



What kind of damage do you think this does to surfing as a sport?



The ASP said it would "be accountable" for the mistake. What does that mean in terms of action?



How will the ASP gain credibility with its fans again after accusations of incompetence?



The ASP has been in the ascendancy since Tahiti, what does this blunder do in terms of the momentum of the sport?



Is there any intention to change the mid-year cut?



You've alluded to announcements of changes in the sport, could you give an indication of what these might be?



What message would you give to surf fans as CEO of the ASP after this incident?



Brodie Carr:



"ASP is in the process of migrating its data and rankings systems to an automated server. This server, when tabulating the ASP World Title Rankings scenarios is programmed to break ties based on seed points. When we ran the scenarios on best nine results, Kelly and Owen tied. The server then ran the tabulation off of best eight results, but gave the tie-break to Kelly as he had more base seed points than Owen. Our scenarios were then run off this formula. Unfortunately, our officials didn't track this aberration and we ended up in this situation. At the end of the day, this is our mistake and we are responsible.



"We have updated our timeline for completion to this automated rankings system. Once fully operational, this will take out the potential for human error.



"We cannot reverse the outcome of what has happened the last several days. For this, we apologize to our fans, event supporters and surfers. They deserve better. They will receive better."



Regards, B



I'd spent the previous morning trying to contact Kelly by phone and e-mail to get his thoughts on the farce. When I spoke to him his tone was conciliatory. He said he didn't want to comment, that the situation was "unfortunate" and that he didn't want to make it anymore of a "joke" than it already was.



By email he continued the soft-pedal regarding the mistake as "not unthinkable when you realize how it was made." He also said: "I should have known the numbers better myself and known ahead of time also. In that way, both myself and Owen would be to blame considering it's our profession."



In sporting terms or political speak this incident might be what is known as a game-changer.

In this hyper-aware media landscape the ASP is under the magnifying glass and the world is watching.



P.S. For the record, I've witnessed a lot of Kelly's heats in person this year, and the rest live on Webcast. His dominance is real and there should be no question mark by sane people about the worthiness of his eleventh Title.

How about turning the crowning of an eleven-time world champ for the first time on American soil, on the anniversary of his greatest rival's passing, into a total screw-up?I wrote, in March, after Dane no-showed and Kelly cantered to victory in Gold Coast wind-slop that the Tour was in danger of descending into low farce. Dane's continuing absence, the byzantine judging of Rio that produced "floater-gate," Kelly brushing off an abysmal J-Bay forecast to surf pumping Fiji were all grist for the farcical mill.