Put him in a Chinese prison!

The above photo speaks for itself. The man on the left is Cuban taekwondo athlete Angel Matos, and the man on the right is Swedish taekwondo official Chakir Chelbat. Just before this photo was taken, Chelbat had disqualified Matos from the bronze medal match against Kazakhstan's Arman Chilmanov because he Matos had taken more than one minute to nurse an injury. That's not a judgment call on Chelbat's part, those are the rules of Olympic taekwondo. If you're hurt, you get one minute, and if you can't continue, you're done. It's harsh, but nobody gets an Olympic medal if they're injured too badly to compete.

Matos kicked the official in the head for the unpardonable offense of enforcing the rules. He'll get his due process, but he's going to be banned for life from international taekwondo, and rightly so. But that's not enough. Do you know what would happen if you were to kick a police officer in the head? Not only would you spend some time in jail, you'd "accidentally fall down the stairs" first. And you'd have it coming. Kicking a taekwondo official in the head is basically the same thing. I don't mean to imply that taekwondo officials have as dangerous a job, but to assault an authority figure for properly enforcing the rules? That should be punished not only by the taekwondo authorities, but by the Chinese court system. Because dammit, that's assault.

This offense brings to mind Orlando Brown shoving an official after being hit in the eye with a penalty flag. That was also completely unacceptable, and I also think he should have been prosecuted in court. The fact that it happened on the field of play doesn't make it any less egregious. This was not a player shoving another player. It's a little bit more understandable in Brown's case, because that flag actually injured Brown, causing him to miss three seasons.

Getting back to the current case, it's possible that Matos' coach, Leudis Gonzalez, will also be banned for being unapologetic afterwards. He claimed Chelbat was "too strict," and wondered out loud to a reporter whether the Kazakhs had paid him off. I'm a little bit more inclined toward leniency in this case, because I doubt whether Gonzalez, who has probably spent his whole life in Communist Cuba, has any concept of free press. This is probably the first time any reporter's even noticed him before, much less interviewed him. I'd bet he's surprised his remarks have even been reported. He must apologize, but if he does, I say let him off with a six-month suspension or something like that.