BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2020

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Six nominees being announced during the day today on the BBC website.

It's going to be everyone's favourite tax exile isn't it? Unless the public finally votes for Ronnie O'Sullivan.

[Duncan Gardner]

Rashford must be in the running.

In the Ultonia section, I go for veteran GAWA defender and Crusaders stalwart Julie Nelson

[Jah Womble]

My understanding is that Rashford's not in the running, but will be given a special award during the ceremony.

[Patrick Thistle]

I'm amazed this award is still running really. It feels like a proper holdover from the 1980s when the BBC mattered and people would watch whatever was on.

[Kevin S]

It's going to be everyone's favourite tax exile isn't it?

Hopefully, yeah.

[Jah Womble]

I'm amazed this award is still running really. It feels like a proper holdover from the 1980s when the BBC mattered and people would watch whatever was on.

I don't think I've watched it 'since' those days.

I remember one year (1982, from memory) where Gary Sobers was presenting an award and took about three-quarters of an hour to introduce the winner, Daley Thompson - who then topped off the awkwardness by telling the massed gathering that he 'was feeling like sh*t'.

[longeared]

As a programme it's been sport-for-sport-haters for at least 20 years now, though they'll probably have to row back on some of the gimmickry this time. Hopefully it'll be like the old days when they'd interview someone like Greg Norman on a shaky satellite from Florida which would conclude with him wishing everyone a merry christmas.

If O'Sullivan gets nominated it'll be on career performance rather than this year specifically - he may be world champion but hasn't won anything else since March 2019. The BBC might hold back and give him lifetime achievement whenever he decides to retire. Judd Trump has been by far the best snooker player in the world for the last couple of seasons but hasn't (yet) won a major this year so won't be shortlisted.

[Jah Womble]

The BBC might hold back and give him lifetime achievement whenever he decides to retire.

Hopefully presented by Alain Robidoux.

[Sporting]

Hopefully it'll be like the old days when they'd interview someone like Greg Norman on a shaky satellite from Florida which would conclude with him wishing everyone a merry christmas.

Norman is a big Trump fan, so hopefully not him. (Has there ever been a top-name golfer who was openly left-wing?)

[elguapo4]

Lee Trevino?

[Satchmo Distel]

I don't think I've watched it 'since' those days.

I remember one year (1982, from memory) where Gary Sobers was presenting an award and took about three-quarters of an hour to introduce the winner, Daley Thompson - who then topped off the awkwardness by telling the massed gathering that he 'was feeling like sh*t'.

Yes, it was 1982 (European Championships and Commonwealth Games double IIRC). Sobers picked up the wrong trophy at one point and was very nervous (why no rehearsal?). Daley's swear was edited out of the repeat (BBC2 afternoon slot about 10 days later).

Steve Davis was given the award the fifth year he won the world title (1988) in the absence of any obvious winner.

There was sometimes a hint of racial bias in voting: Linford Christie did not make the top three in 1988, when he won Olympic silver. Fatima Whitbread (in a later interview) was furious when she lost to Mansell in 1986 "because he came second" in his sport. Mansell beat Linford Christie in 1992 (Olympic 100m champion year ffs); Michael Owen beat Denise Lewis in 1998. The fact that Frank Bruno never won it might reflect that he was never quite the best heavyweight around (unlike Lennox Lewis) but Henry Cooper won it twice despite never being truly world class. John Conteh (world champion) lost out to Brendan Foster who never won the worlds or Olympics.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Norman is a big Trump fan, so hopefully not him. (Has there ever been a top-name golfer who was openly left-wing?)

<something about Wedgwood Benn, needs work>

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Yes, it was 1982 (European Championships and Commonwealth Games double IIRC). Sobers picked up the wrong trophy at one point and was very nervous (why no rehearsal?). Daley's swear was edited out of the repeat (BBC2 afternoon slot about 10 days later).

Steve Davis was given the award the fifth year he won the world title (1988) in the absence of any obvious winner.

There was sometimes a hint of racial bias in voting: Linford Christie did not make the top three in 1988, when he won Olympic silver. Fatima Whitbread (in a later interview) was furious when she lost to Mansell in 1986 "because he came second" in his sport. Mansell beat Linford Christie in 1992 (Olympic 100m champion year ffs); Michael Owen beat Denise Lewis in 1998. The fact that Frank Bruno never won it might reflect that he was never quite the best heavyweight around (unlike Lennox Lewis) but Henry Cooper won it twice despite never being truly world class. John Conteh (world champion) lost out to Brendan Foster who never won the worlds or Olympics.

The F1 vote used to win every year - Damon Hill won the thing in 1994 despite losing the world title - until recently. Can't imagine what's different.

[Jah Womble]

Yes, it was 1982 (European Championships and Commonwealth Games double IIRC). Sobers picked up the wrong trophy at one point and was very nervous (why no rehearsal?). Daley's swear was edited out of the repeat (BBC2 afternoon slot about 10 days later).

Glad my memory has been confirmed - but I don't think they bothered with such trifles as 'rehearsals' back then. (NB Assuming that you mean athletics EC - 1982 would've been World Cup year rather than Euros.)

(Has there ever been a top-name golfer who was openly left-wing?)

Gareth Bale?

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

The F1 vote used to win every year - Damon Hill won the thing in 1994 despite losing the world title - until recently. Can't imagine what's different.

Since Hill won it in 1996, F1 has only had one winner in 23 votes, and that was Hamilton in 2014. On the all time table F1 is second (7 wins) behind Athletics (18).

That's not to say of course that Hamilton's achievements in recent years wouldn't have yielded more SPOTY wins if he was white.

[Satchmo Distel]

Gareth Bale?

Par For Scargill
Ho L In One Chi Minh
Billy Casper
Errnie Eng Els
Thomas Payne Stewart

[ursus arctos]

Oh dear

Duncanism looks to have crossed the Atlantic

[longeared]

Hamilton was expected to win it in 2008 but lost to Chris Hoy, then surprisingly won the thing in 2014 when Rory McIlroy was favourite after winning two majors and the Ryder Cup. The reduced number of F1 winners in recent years isn't helped by the fact that the sport is now behind the Sky paywall, unlike in the Hill / Mansell eras when it was a centrepiece of Sunday Grandstand.

Mansell beat Linford Christie in 1992 (Olympic 100m champion year ffs);

That was also down to Sally Gunnell winning Olympic gold which split the athletics vote - Christie finished 2nd and Gunnell 3rd IIRC.

[Satchmo Distel]

[Satchmo Distel]

Oh dear

Duncanism looks to have crossed the Atlantic

He's good on the Greens.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Rory McIlroy lost the 2014 Daily Mail vote when he announced he wanted to represent Ireland at the 2016 Olympics instead of Britain.

[ursus arctos]

I once read an account of that Castro/Che outing at the country club. It sounded like quite the hoot.

If I remember correctly, the club was turned into an adult education and arts facility.

[pebblethefish]

Steve Davis was given the award the fifth year he won the world title (1988) in the absence of any obvious winner.
.

The very strong rumour at the time was that Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards was going to win the public vote, and the BBC thought that this would make a mockery of the whole thing, so gave it to someone who was good at sport instead.

If the internet had existed then, it would have blown a fuse (or whatever internets have) with all the conspiracy theories.

[Jah Womble]

He should complain* - he was terrible and still made a lot on the back of it, even cutting an album and having a (fairly decent) motion picture made in his honour.

(*Edwards didn't complain about anything, to be fair to him. Seemed a modest-enough individual.)

[Ray de Galles]

I'm normally quite a fan of SPOTY's enjoyable nonsense but Tyson Fury's nomination is the final and most significant of many reasons to completely avoid the whole thing this year.