Frustrations with OHSAA "record-keeping"

JAVMAN83

JAVMAN83

Well-known member
Case-in-point: Mike Lee's (Columbus Briggs) - 1977 Class AA long jump champion - 24' 2 1/4". I have numerous newspaper article sources around Ohio reporting that Lee's winning jump of 24' 2 1/4" was wind-aided, but also reported he exceeded the previous record of 23' 3" (Manuel Glason - Mifflin, 1975) with Lee's best legal-wind jump of 23' 6".

However, in subsequent listings by OHSAA of the state meet AA record, they record the wind-aided 24' 2 1/4" as the meet record. Then, in 1985, they deny Bishop Hartley's Leigh Grey of tieing the meet record with his own wind-aided jump of 24' 2 1/4" in the AA meet. It's enough to give you migraines as a statistician. Given that OHSAA didn't publish field event series and the wind-readings until the early 2000s, I have zero confidence as to what the truly wind-legal meet record might have been during that period. I'm documenting all this in my state meet winners project for future historians to maybe tackle.


Note: Grey did set a new MR of 24' 2 1/2" in 1986, even though a little asterisk * mark was not placed beside his winning mark in the 1986 results on OHSAA's website.
ARGHHHH
 
 
Update: Track & Field News' publication HS Track 1978 recognizes Lee's 24' 2 1/4" jump as wind-aided (corrected), so now I'm going to contact Jack Shepard to see if they have any wind-info on this performance. Argh.
 
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After a series of emails with Jack Shepard @ T&F News, I confirmed that he did have the same information as myself that Mike Lee's 24 2 1/4" was WIND-AIDED and that he had a legal-wind jump of 23' 6" in the same '77 series that should've been the OHSAA-listed meet record. I don't know whether OHSAA just missed their own information in listing meet records afterward or if they decided to accept a wind-aided mark, but it still remains that Lee's winning mark was in fact wind-aided and that is how it will be listed in my compilation underway (I just loaded all the AA long jump winners from 1971-2024 the other day). I'll make a note in my compilation on the error made in record-keeping.
 
Without dedicated statisticians/historians, information gets lost to the wayside very quickly. Especially where there is turnover in leadership. It is unfortunate we are losing all these local newspapers to help with the record keeping. It is easier for me to find results of dual meets 20 years ago then it is 3 years ago.
 
KingHorn419 said:
Without dedicated statisticians/historians, information gets lost to the wayside very quickly. Especially where there is turnover in leadership. It is unfortunate we are losing all these local newspapers to help with the record keeping. It is easier for me to find results of dual meets 20 years ago then it is 3 years ago.
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This was my thought. I could see a scenario where they had the record correctly marked at 23'6 when it occurred. Years later, some new SID comes in who doesn't know a whole lot about track and field (very common), sees that record and compares it to the champions list and sees the same name and same year but with a better mark. He assumes it's a mistake on the record sheet and updates it, not realizing that there is the extra requirement (legal wind) for certain events.
 
Altor said:
This was my thought. I could see a scenario where they had the record correctly marked at 23'6 when it occurred. Years later, some new SID comes in who doesn't know a whole lot about track and field (very common), sees that record and compares it to the champions list and sees the same name and same year but with a better mark. He assumes it's a mistake on the record sheet and updates it, not realizing that there is the extra requirement (legal wind) for certain events.
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This happens more than one would hope for. However, in this case, OHSAA listed the 24' 2 1/4" as the record the very next year in 1978. I think somebody dropped the ball right away.
 
After some diligent digging over the past week and compiling those notes, I'm starting to get a handle on how OHSAA handled the transition of records from the 1920 to 1921 meet when going from the no class sytem to the 2-class system. Still a work in progress, but important for documenting for some schmuck down the line that wants to follow-up on my work :) ha ha! good luck to them!
 
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