VR46 MotoGP

moto vudu said:

I don't expect everyone to like Rossi and I don't expect to change the minds of those that don't like him. That said, if I constantly made threads and posts criticizing Marquez, I would expect some opposing views and even welcome them.

What I notice here is when there is a string of anti-Rossi threads or posts, if anyone has a different opinion or defends Rossi it causes a lot of anger from certain people. Some people here have more PTSD from Rossi than his past rivals such as Biaggi or Gibernau.

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So you prove by your own words that any bias is at the very least bilateral.

That Biaggi and Gibernau were .......ised is an example of my issue with Valentino. I actually agree with your take that most top sportsmen are narcissists and that this is an aid to success, but Valentino was afforded the opportunity to take it further than most such sportsmen and very much exercised that opportunity.

michaelm said:

So you prove by your own words that any bias is at the very least bilateral.

That Biaggi and Gibernau were .......ised is an example of my issue with Valentino. I actually agree with your take that most top sportsmen are narcissists and that this is an aid to success, but Valentino was afforded the opportunity to take it further than most such sportsmen and very much exercised that opportunity.

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Many fans will say a lot of negative things about their fav rider's rival(s). That didn't start with Valentino. Larry Bird fans hated Magic Johnson! Michael Jordan reached a level where he had a ton of influence over the Chicago Bulls and the NBA. IMO, it's all part of the drama of sports. I've been paying more attention to F1 lately and it seems a lot of Verstappen fans have nothing but hate for Hamilton! What did Hamilton do to deserve the hate besides win? Again, it's all part of fans, rivalries, and sports drama.

moto vudu said:

Many fans will say a lot of negative things about their fav rider's rival(s). That didn't start with Valentino. Larry Bird fans hated Magic Johnson! Michael Jordan reached a level where he had a ton of influence over the Chicago Bulls and the NBA. IMO, it's all part of the drama of sports. I've been paying more attention to F1 lately and it seems a lot of Verstappen fans have nothing but hate for Hamilton! What did Hamilton do to deserve the hate besides win? Again, it's all part of fans, rivalries, and sports drama.

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Not many top sportsmen have actually orchestrated campaigns of hatred against their rivals though. Ali with Frazier is the main other example people came up with the last time we discussed the issue.

michaelm said:

Not many top sportsmen have actually orchestrated campaigns of hatred against their rivals though. Ali with Frazier is the main other example people came up with the last time we discussed the issue.

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Many believe Michael Jordan used his influence to prevent Isiah Thomas from being part of the Dream Team.

moto vudu said:

Many believe Michael Jordan used his influence to prevent Isiah Thomas from being part of the Dream Team.

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Didn't try to orchestrate his fandom against him afaik though.

If MJ did succeed in any such endeavour against Isaiah Thomas, the PG who was his contemporary (I doubt he cared much about Isiah Thomas, the more recent ex-Celtics PG) he was rather more successful than Valentino has been in impacting MM's success in any way. MM thrives on the hatred of Rossi fans.

moto vudu said:

Many believe Michael Jordan used his influence to prevent Isiah Thomas from being part of the Dream Team.

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That had a lot to do with what happened when the Bulls demolished the Pistons in the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals and Isiah orchestrated that whole walking off the court thing with the rest of the Pistons rather than congratulate the Bulls. Thomas shouldn't have done it, it was guess what? Bad sportsmanship...sort of like what a certain rider in question is notorious for doing. Be gracious in defeat no matter how much it sucks, something Thomas didn't understand at the time, and neither did Valentino ever at any point in his career.

JPSLotus said:

That had a lot to do with what happened when the Bulls demolished the Pistons in the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals and Isiah orchestrated that whole walking off the court thing with the rest of the Pistons rather than congratulate the Bulls. Thomas shouldn't have done it, it was guess what? Bad sportsmanship...sort of like what a certain rider in question is notorious for doing. Be gracious in defeat no matter how much it sucks, something Thomas didn't understand at the time, and neither did Valentino ever at any point in his career.

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I don't recall Valentino showing bad sportsmanship in '06 after he lost the championship. He shook Nicky's hand and they hugged after the race. He became friends with Nicky and they used to race each other at his ranch.

There's just certain people he can't stand.

moto vudu said:

I don't recall Valentino showing bad sportsmanship in '06 after he lost the championship. He shook Nicky's hand and they hugged after the race. He became friends with Nicky and they used to race each other at his ranch.

There's just certain people he can't stand.

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You mean there are certain people he tolerates and/or likes.

320Dave said:

You mean there are certain people he tolerates and/or likes.

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There are certain people he feels have crossed him and he's not the type to just let it go.

Such as who? I ask because he pretty much bested every rider he ever disliked, except the ones who were more talented and won championships. I think with Nicky, it would have been not a big stretch for him to be friendly with him. As great a guy as Nicky was, there seemed little likelihood of his winning further championships. Stoner, Lorenzo and Marquez would seem to be the three for whom Rossi reserved his animosity and none of them ever did him wrong. They just beat him fair and square. Being truly gracious to them would have been the act of a good sportsman.

moto vudu said:

I don't recall Valentino showing bad sportsmanship in '06 after he lost the championship. He shook Nicky's hand and they hugged after the race. He became friends with Nicky and they used to race each other at his ranch.

There's just certain people he can't stand.

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He has said in a relatively recent interview that he gave one championship away and that another was stolen from him. I wonder which years he was referring to ?.

michaelm said:

He has said in a relatively recent interview that he gave one championship away and that another was stolen from him. I wonder which years he was referring to ?.

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Probably 2006 when he crashed in Valencia after going into the last round with a slight lead, then was unable to get enough positions to get the points he needed to beat Hayden after he rejoined the race. From the first round, luck was not on Rossi's side that year. Then 2015, with the Marquez and Lorenzo thing.

Keshav said:

Such as who? I ask because he pretty much bested every rider he ever disliked, except the ones who were more talented and won championships. I think with Nicky, it would have been not a big stretch for him to be friendly with him. As great a guy as Nicky was, there seemed little likelihood of his winning further championships. Stoner, Lorenzo and Marquez would seem to be the three for whom Rossi reserved his animosity and none of them ever did him wrong. They just beat him fair and square. Being truly gracious to them would have been the act of a good sportsman.

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This, over and over. It’s a pattern. He likes somebody, until that person gets uppity and beats him. I wonder how the relationship with Franky will evolve this year. If I were a betting man I know where I’d put my money.

There must not be any racing going on for this to run to 12 pages. Bring on Le Mans!

mjpartyboy said:

Probably 2006 when he crashed in Valencia after going into the last round with a slight lead, then was unable to get enough positions to get the points he needed to beat Hayden after he rejoined the race. From the first round, luck was not on Rossi's side that year. Then 2015, with the Marquez and Lorenzo thing.

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It wasn’t good or bad luck, he caved under the pressure and wilted like a hothouse flower.

Bern1 said:

It wasn’t good or bad luck, he caved under the pressure and wilted like a hothouse flower.

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As a non-cult-follower, I still have to say, he simply crashed. Possibly over confidence or possibly the opposite was the culprit, but caved under pressure implies you were in his skull that day.

Keshav said:

As a non-cult-follower, I still have to say, he simply crashed. Possibly over confidence or possibly the opposite was the culprit, but caved under pressure implies you were in his skull that day.

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I agree, and there were rumours of a faulty set of Michelins, which is not impossible either. Valencia has not been a happy hunting ground for him in general though, hence why he so wanted a points lead which Lorenzo couldn't surmount just by beating him there in the last race of the 2015 season.

I don't go for the Rossi only won because of advantages thing in general, but rather agree with what it was J4rn0 iirc contended, that he had the advantages that his predecessors as the top rider such as Doohan had as the top rider and arguably earned by being the top rider, and also give credence to another contention (Babelfish's, again iirc) that the SNS tires were pretty much a control tire for all the teams/riders who were competitive, with the caveat that there was an element of catch 22 in that you pretty much had to have the SNS tires to be competitive.

I do take exception to Hayden's title being detracted from, which that element of his fans did back in the day, and which he himself has now done imo twice, in the interview recently posted and in a similar vein in another interview a year or two back. I could argue if Stoner had been more focused in 2012 he could have won the title that year but he wasn't and didn't, and hasn't claimed that or any other title he didn't win to my knowledge.

There were certainly a number of things that didn't go Valentino's way in 2006, Elias getting the SNS tires for that one race among them, and it was a year of close to the most equal equipment through the field ever up to that time and for many years subsequently, which makes Nicky's win more meritorious imo, akin to KRJR winning in 2000, with Ducati having a competitive bike, 7 individual race winners and nearly another by KRJR who miscounted the laps, and Hayden who was an excellent superbike rider riding a great season that year on a bike and under a formula which suited him. Much though I liked seeing Bayliss win, Hayden may well have been able to win that last race had he needed to win it. Along with all this while Valentino had a team-mate with a very defined role ie to help Valentino Nicky had a team mate who was actively working against him and it appeared less than full support from his own team, cf Pedrosa taking him out absent which Valentino wouldn't have been in a position to 'give away' the title at Valencia. As has been alluded to if you re-watch that Estoril race Edwards was blocking Valentino's competitors as hard as he could.

mjpartyboy said:

Probably 2006 when he crashed in Valencia after going into the last round with a slight lead, then was unable to get enough positions to get the points he needed to beat Hayden after he rejoined the race. From the first round, luck was not on Rossi's side that year. Then 2015, with the Marquez and Lorenzo thing.

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He needed those 5 points Toni Elias "stole" from him in that first race :spin:

320Dave said:

He needed those 5 points Toni Elias "stole" from him in that first race :spin:

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Rossi's run of success seems to have rendered him incapable of accepting not winning a championship without downplaying his contributions to his failure while bringing into sharp focus how others contributed in a negative way to his problems/mishaps or how fast the bike of the winner was.

IMO, he become an addict to the thrill of competing and especially winning. Success has been like a narcotic with the adulation by fans and admiration by many in the paddock, his race engineers and Yamaha, only strengthening his self-belief to the point where he could only see from a self-centred perspective. 2015 was the epitome of this mentality, with his larger than life image of himself, as well as his hunger to win AND the disappointment with not winning, culminating in his behaviour and POV's expressed during and after the season.

It's sad in a way to see him in this current mode, but this is the other side of the phenomenon that he is. I see him as a phenomenon. The GOAT? In some ways, but like Schumacher, his character leaves a lot in question. But he certainly displayed a remarkable degree of motivation, adaptability and skill throughout his formative years.

misfit said:

Rossi's run of success seems to have rendered him incapable of accepting not winning a championship without downplaying his contributions to his failure while bringing into sharp focus how others contributed in a negative way to his problems/mishaps or how fast the bike of the winner was.

IMO, he become an addict to the thrill of competing and especially winning. Success has been like a narcotic with the adulation by fans and admiration by many in the paddock, his race engineers and Yamaha, only strengthening his self-belief to the point where he could only see from a self-centred perspective. 2015 was the epitome of this mentality, with his larger than life image of himself, as well as his hunger to win AND the disappointment with not winning, culminating in his behaviour and POV's expressed during and after the season.

It's sad in a way to see him in this current mode, but this is the other side of the phenomenon that he is. I see him as a phenomenon. The GOAT? In some ways, but like Schumacher, his character leaves a lot in question. But he certainly displayed a remarkable degree of motivation, adaptability and skill throughout his formative years.

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I mostly agree with this assessment. Phenomenon is a good descriptor. GOAT? Most definitely not. I reserve the GOAT designation in motor sports for those who not only rose to the top, but did so without any clouds hovering over their reputations regarding honor and sportsmanship. This disqualifies Rossi, Senna and Schumacher, among others. Left standing are people like Eddie Lawson, Juan Fangio and Jackie Stewart, along with a few other select names.