Seoul ’88 / Randy Harvey : In Poll of Experts, Carl Lewis Edges Jesse Owens as Best Ever

Who is the best track and field athlete of all time, Jesse Owens or Carl Lewis?

In a poll of 1,000 track and field experts by the International Athletic Foundation Council, Owens was voted the best ever in the 100 meters, one place ahead of Lewis, and Lewis was voted the best ever in the long jump, one place ahead of Owens. The tiebreaker was the 200 meters, in which Lewis was voted third behind Italy’s Pietro Mennea and the United States’ Tommie Smith, and Owens was fifth.

Only two men besides Lewis and Owens were ranked among the top 10 in three events. Czechoslovakia’s Emil Zatopek was first in the 10,000, fourth in the 5,000 and sixth in the marathon. Kenya’s Henry Rono was fourth in the steeplechase, seventh in the 5,000 and eighth in the 10,000.

Two women were ranked among the top 10 in three events. East Germany’s Marita Koch was first in the 200 and 400 and ninth in the 100. The Soviet Union’s Tatiana Kazankina was first in the 1,500, second in the 3,000 and third in the 800.

Seven men and three women from the United States were ranked first in their events. Besides Lewis and Owens, the men were Edwin Moses in the 400-meter hurdles, Renaldo Nehemiah in the 110-meter hurdles, Lee Evans in the 400, Parry O’Brien in the shotput and Al Oerter in the discus. The women were Evelyn Ashford in the 100, Mary Slaney in the 3,000 and Jackie Joyner-Kersee in the heptathlon.

Slaney also was third in the 1,500, and Ashford was eighth in the 200. No U.S. women were ranked among the top 10 in any of the field events or either of the hurdles.

U.S. men dominated several events, placing seven among the top 10 in the 100, the 110-meter hurdles, the 400-meter hurdles and the shotput and six among the top 10 in the 200 meters, the long jump and the decathlon.

After Great Britain’s Daley Thompson in the decathlon, five of the next six were from the United States (Bob Mathias, Rafer Johnson, Bruce Jenner, Jim Thorpe and Bill Toomey.) But U.S. dominance in the decathlon is history. No one from the U.S. was ranked among the top 10 in the world last year.

Lewis’ manager, Joe Douglas, said last week that negotiations have resumed to match Lewis and Canada’s Ben Johnson, the world record-holder in the 100 meters, in a series of three races this summer, two at 100 meters and one at 200 meters.

If an agreement is reached, Douglas said the sprinters probably would meet in the 100 in Paris on June 27. Possible sites for the other races are Malmo, Sweden on Aug. 8, Zurich, Switzerland on Aug. 17 and West Berlin on Aug. 26.

Promoter Al Franken, who was attempting to stage one of the races at the June 5 Pepsi Invitational at UCLA, said the fee discussed was $200,000 for each Lewis and Johnson. The money, Franken said, would have been supplied by a Japanese company, which has been secured by the Heritage Group, a Williamsburg, Va., marketing firm. Douglas would not confirm that figure.

“I’ve heard people say that they might each get $1 million for three races,” Douglas said. “It’s not that high, but it is the best contract ever offered to anyone in track.”

As part of the deal, Douglas said the sprinters must agree to undergo drug testing three weeks before two of the races and immediately after all three.

Lewis and Johnson have not met since the World Championships in Rome last August, when Lewis tied the previous world record at 9.93 and still finished a distant second to Johnson’s 9.83.

Comment: “Realistically, I see Sabonis as being a fulfillment of Lenin’s prophecy. The capitalists are selling the rope they (the Communists) can hang us with.”

Those are Georgetown Coach John Thompson’s words to a Portland newspaper, The Sunday Oregonian, regarding the Trail Blazers’ efforts to aid in the rehabilitation of 7-3 Soviet center Arvidas Sabonis. Sabonis, who will be in Portland for the next two months, has not played since last August because of a ruptured Achilles tendon.

The issue is of particular concern to Thompson because, as the U.S. Olympic men’s basketball coach, he would rather not have to send his team against a healthy Sabonis, once considered among the world’s best centers.

Thanks for the enlightenment, John. You obviously have been concealing your expertise in Soviet-ology. For all these years, we’ve been told that Lenin foresaw a world dominated by Communism. We now find that his prophecy actually was a victory in hoops for the Soviets over the United States.

We’ve learned our lesson. Never again will we confuse basketball with a game.

In your face, Vladimir.

Weight lifter Naim Suleymanoglu, who defected from Bulgaria to Turkey in 1986, has been granted permission by Bulgaria to compete for Turkey in international competitions, including the Olympics.

Suleymanoglu, who has been called pound-for-pound the best weight lifter of all time, made his comeback last week at the European championships and set a world record in the snatch. Once known as the Baby Bulgar, Suleymanoglu, 20, now holds all three world records in the featherweight (132) division.

Suleymanoglu, whose family is of Turkish descent, said in an interview last year that he left Bulgaria because of the mistreatment in that country of Turks.

Fearing that the Bulgarians might attempt to harm Suleymanoglu, the Turks had extra security at the European championships in Cardiff, Wales. But Arif Nusret Say, president of the Turkish weight lifting federation, said there were no incidents.

Olympic Notes

The two leading opposition parties in South Korea have asked the ruling party to forgo daylight savings time, which was scheduled to go into effect Sunday. Although it was never given as the official reason, it is widely believed in South Korea that the return to daylight savings time was ordered so that a U.S. network could televise more of the Summer Olympics in prime time. The difference in time between South Korea and the East Coast this summer will be 14 hours, 17 between South Korea and the West Coast. If the opposition party has its way, the differences will be 13 and 16. A spokesman for the Reunification Democractic Party said that daylight savings time harms productivity, leads to an increase in traffic accidents by “disrupting the rhythm of living” and causes confusion in transportation schedules.

Also in South Korea, Kim Dae Jung, whose Party for Peace and Democracy is the leading opposition party, said last week debates on controversial issues within the government should be postponed if they will disrupt the Olympics in Seoul. . . . A Tokyo newspaper reported last week that South Korea has offered materials to aid North Korea in promoting its chemical and textile industries if the North Koreans will participate in the Seoul Olympics. The newspaper said the goods would not be identified as South Korean and would be shipped through China so that North Korea would not lose face. . . . The United States will send its largest Olympic team ever--639 athletes and 169 officials--to Seoul. The United States had 565 athletes at the Games in Los Angeles.

Hoping to be elected president in the French elections Sunday, Prime Minister Jacques Chirac made a campaign promise to bring the 1998 World Cup of soccer to France. That effort caused Paris to decide against bidding for the 1996 Summer Olympics. Paris finished second to Barcelona, Spain, in the voting for the 1992 Games. Now that Chirac has lost, and his status as premier is unclear, speculation is that Paris might reconsider and bid for the 1996 Games. . . . After being wiped out, 10-2, in Atlantic City nine days ago, U.S. boxers have a 19-78 record in matches against Cuba since 1982.

Even though he resigned only 19 days after becoming the United States Olympic Committee’s executive director, Harvey Schiller received one month’s salary--$12,500--and $10,000 for moving expenses. The USOC, however. did not pay the $10,000 it cost for Schiller to move back to his home in Birmingham, Ala. . . . Some of Joan Benoit Samuelson’s friends say she bypassed the Olympic marathon trials not because of injuries but because she feared for the safety of athletes in Seoul.