I agree. I seem to be missing something in all of this. He (or one of them) pulled a poster down off a wall. The poster was an advertisement. Should he have done that? No. Is that even $50 worth of damage? The company will just put another ad up.

And everyone is OK with them being stopped at gunpoint by a civilian? Not a police officer. So yeah, he did something stupid. He was drunk, partying, not the brightest bulb to begin with. But I'm on his side. You don't get to pull a gun on someone for that, especially as they were in the taxi already, leaving.

And Matt Lauer is a douche. That interview was complete shit. Lauer said they were "negotiating" reparations for the damage. Hey Matt - it's not a negotiation if one person is holding a gut to the others.

Speedo dropped him because he's probably done and this is a great way to get out of their contract. I don't see him making the team in Tokyo.

Tl;dr - They ripped an advertisement off a wall at a gas station, attendant pulled a gun and demanded money. The gun seems to be by far the bigger deal.

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--Chris

It isn't unfortunate for Ryan... its called a repercussion to his irresponsible behavior and statements. He damaged his own reputation... which seems to point to him being a "bad boy" on a less international scale but one nonetheless. He poured a little gas on that in Rio.. IMO.

He has no one but himself to blame at the root of it. He goes to Rio, swims and doesn't act irresponsibly... we aren't even discussing him and he has his sponsors.

Not since Michael Vick and the dog fighting fiasco has an athlete so torched his chances for sponsorship riches.

If I am in a foreign country I am not going to do something as stupid as he did, even if I am drunk. And if I can pay $50 to a gun wielding qasi-security guard to walk on down the road and not end up at the police station because of my immaturity and stupidity, I am going to do it.

I don't feel bad at all that Lochte's chosen actions have had and are going to continue to have some serious consequences.

The level of revenge that some seem to want is beyond my comprehension.

He got caught in a lie or rather boast, he told his mother and then was stuck trying to defend it.
Is he at the Peter Kent(Scud Stud), Bill Clinton, Rob Ford (who?) Lance Armstrong, Richard Nixon levels.
Not really...he's just an idiot.

AS for his future earning power, that will take five minutes for any half arsed PR company to fix.

And I have dropped Speedo. No more speedo products for me.

Yes, Ryan made a big mistake. How many other athletes have done worse things? It would take days to list them all.

And Ryan has, indirectly, brought in a decent amount of money for Speedo.

This is exactly how it works. A gold medal in the wrong sport or a gold medal with the wrong personality = no endorsements. You don't even have to screw up like Lochte did. Carl Lewis only scored about 1/10th the expected endorsements after his 4 golds in 1984 due to his arrogance. But he learned his lesson and was much more personable, and thus marketable, in 1988. By 1996 when he 4-peated in the long jump he was practically beloved. If you are popular enough to have a major endorsement contract then you had better be professional enough to keep it.

all he had to do was to NOT CONTINUE to lie. He dug the hole by CONTINUING to lie. If he would have initially just said, "I was intoxicated and vandalized a sign and peed in the bushes. It was stupid and immature and I apologize. But I don't think it was right for the security guards to pull guns on us"

How difficult would that have been? Apparently pretty much impossible for him. People would be far more forgiving if he didn't continue to lie and say "I over exaggerated" NO. YOU LIED. Saying things like that means you think the rest of us are morons who don't know that you're lying.

Although, as USA today is reporting, Lochte and the other swimmers never vandalized any bathroom. They only thing he messed with was a sign. He exaggerated his story a bit, but so did the "cops"/security.

He's a dumbass and put himself in a bat situation, but the bottom line is that there were people pointing guns at them demanding money or they wouldn't be allowed to go on their merry way. Perhaps this happens all the time in Rio, but if it happened in the United states, what would you call it?

I'd like to see Matt Lauer go after Hillary Clinton with as much gusto about all her lying she's done over the years. Lauer is a douche of the highest order.

Correct, he never profited off his celebrity status because he was never a celebrity**. The money he earned was because he was one of the top 5 or so swimmers in the world the last 12 years. Compare him to Phelps: Phelps makes $10 million a year, has a team managing him, a PR firm, an image consultant basically an entire "Micheal Phelps Corporation." Was Phelps 20 times the swimmer? No way. But Phelp's was able to make money "as a celebrity." And because Phelp's made so much money and has an entire team Phelps has been able to, 2 years removed from his 2nd DUI, land multi-million dollar endorsement deals. Ryan only has one avenue towards that kind of redemption (swimming) and I am not sure that he even has that.

I agree Gwen would be a better role model. I agree with the business decision to drop the sponsorship. I do not support, at all, what that bozo did in Rio. But we are only pretending that we give a crap what Lochte does in his private time. We never cared before, and Ryan certainly never made much money off it.

**I bet he got paid $100K from that stupid reality show. So maybe he made a small but not life altering sum of money from his "celebrity."

Check your TV color settings.
I saw aqua.


But then again, I saw a blue dress :-)

.

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RayGovett
Hughson CA
Be Prepared-- Strike Swiftly -- Who Dares Wins- Without warning-"it will be hard. I can do it"

Agree with all of these things, especially the Matt Lauer part. You couldn't get a more dweeby-weasel than him to conduct the interview. But anyway, yes Lochte did a really stupid childish thing, and then lied about it. But in the interview I believe (maybe I'm naive) that he was really sorry. Not the sorry because he would lose money from sponsors, but, like Jason said, he liked kids alot and always stuck around for pictures/autographs/etc, Said he never wanted to be like a former olympian who snubbed him for an autograph when he was a kid.

I was studying ALL the video clips of that night for the last week, and not sure if anyone asked this (maybe they did), and maybe this isn't the thread, but...

(1) Why did the gas station attendants take them to an area which did not have cameras (or any clear footage) to conduct "negotiations"? Just the 3 swimmers (Lochte standing up), and the attendants not in the picture (or not clearly in the picture).
(2) Did anybody capture the erased footage (some say 3 minutes, some say 10 minutes were erased)? If so, what happened during that timeframe?
(3) The stories of Bentz and Conger were pretty much the same. I know the lawyer probably wrote it, but did the IOC have any influence in building that story so the "negotiation" would seem like a paying of damages and not an extortion (as Lochte said in the interview)? That would help in not tarnishing Brazil's reputation for tourists post olympics. (I know, this may be a conspiracy theory but idk).

Maybe its nothing, but I watched and read everything else and bottom line I hope this doesn't follow him for the rest of his life. I really feel bad for him and forgive him for the ordeal. Not like it means much coming from me but oh well.

Oh, dude ... phrasing!

Speedo had already lost the contract for US National Team so keeping Lochte as one of their standard alone sponsored swimmers makes zero business sense. His reputation has taken a beating with the lies. If he keeps swimming signing with a smaller brand is his best chance. In the mean time just wear all the free Arena stuff you got in Rio plus whatever speedo stuff is left over.

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___________________________________________
http://en.wikipedia.org/...eoesophageal_fistula
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebral_palsy
2020 National Masters Champion - M40-44 - 400m IM
Canadian Record Holder 35-39M & 40-44M - 200 m Butterfly (LCM)

Speedo continues to sponsor dopers / former dopers.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

I believe Ralph Laurin also dropped him.

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Barry Dmitruk
2017: Florida 70.3 (done); Mont Tremblant 70.3 & Ironman

Lochte although handling this whole situation like a complete jack ass, has been this weeks scape goat for the media . For example , this story got six times the amount of press than the state dept admitting this week that the 400mil to iran was indead tied to the release of the hostages. I wont bother listing the other big stories to avoid stearing the thread in a different direction. But Lochtegate was absolutley used for this.

Give Lochte a break! The media is rigged! A CNN anchor was complaining that everyone's focus was on this scandal, yet the CNN was airing the gas station surveillance video all over again. Not sure who over-exaggerated it more, the media or intoxicated Lochte.

In rio alone...

Attempted rape in the Olympic village, head of the Irish (?) Olympic Committee (and IOC executive) arrested for illegally scalping tickets, why the hell was the water in the diving tank green (it apparently reeked), a couple of Australian swimmers were robbed, etc etc...

But lochte did something dumb. Crucify him!!!

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

The real shame is that Lochte has learned far too late that people do stupid things when drunk. This lesson should have been learned long before being 32 and continuing in his behavior.
Lesson learned though, time to move on.

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Team Zoot So Cal

I believe Ralph Laurin also dropped him.//

Apparently that is true, so one more to go?

Yes, there is something to be said for a commensurate and proportional response to what happened. That concept has gone out the window.

The problem Lochte faces is that this fits the white-male-privilege-ugly-American-dump-on-brown-people-the-world-just-can't-take-Americans-anymore profile. That profile is very popular among domestic progressives and international anti-americans.