My ‘Athlete A’ review

Athlete A is Maggie Nichols.

And the Netflix original is a documentary that focuses on the gymnasts who survived USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar’s abuse and the reporters who exposed USAG’s toxic culture.

It exposes the monster that Nassar is. And it brings to light the awful human being that Steve Penn is. Penn is not as guilty as Nassar but covering it up so he could profit off the gold medals and exposure certainly makes him guilty in a different way.

I used to think Bela and Marta Karolyi were just successful gymnastics coaches who changed USA Gymnastics forever.

Well, they changed it forever. But not in a good way. What I thought was just a demanding style turned out to be a nightmare for all the Olympians under their guidance.

We may never know how much the Karolyi’s knew about what Nassar was doing. They certainly knew what the allegations were though.

Nichols came forward in 2015 with allegations against Nassar and the Karolyi’s and Penn turned a blind eye to it. That allowed Nassar to most certainly abuse more young girls.

The documentary says 500 females have come forward. That’s an insane number. And it’s probably not even close to the accurate total.

Watching the Kerri Strug clip from when she performed the vault with an injury at the 1996 Summer Olympics brought me back to my high school days. I remember watching her.

We all thought it was a heroic performance at the time. And it still was. I don’t want to take that away from Strug. But she didn’t have a choice. The coaches basically made Strug go out there with that injury because winning meant more to them than doing things right.

The Karolyis might not have thought she was even injured. Or didn’t care. There wasn’t a choice in the matter. Strug had to compete. It was the expectation.

The documentary is extremely well done. And I would recommend it. But it’s disturbing. There’s no doubt about that.

As a journalist myself, what the Indy Star investigative reporting team did was fantastic. They put in a ton of time on that story and continue to work today to bring out the truth about USA Gymnastics.

The detective who worked on the Nassar case should be commended, too. He was out for blood, and got it. I don’t think 60 years is enough, but Nassar at least will likely die in prison.

At the sentencing hearing, Nassar had to sit in the courtroom and listen to any survivor who wanted to come forward with a message to him.

All of the messages were powerful. And Nassar looked like he wanted no part of it. And that’s a good thing. Making him uncomfortable for a few hours was nothing compared to what he did to those girls (now women) all those years ago.

I feel bad for all the gymnasts and what they went through at a young age. But I feel the worst for Nichols. She had her dream of being an Olympic gymnast taken away from her because she was the first to come forward 2015.

There is no doubt in my mind that she was left off the Olympic team even as an alternate because of her decision to come forward. Nichols finished higher than Gabby Douglas on the final USA team trial competition and Douglas was picked as one of the five who competed in the Olympics.

Nichols would go on to become a national champion gymnast at Oklahoma. And the Sooners won back-to-back national team titles.

Nichols was every bit as good as the five girls selected to that team in 2016. But Penny, Nassar and the Karolyis denied her the opportunity because they were covering up years of sexual abuse.

It’s disgusting. It’s disturbing. And it’s unacceptable. But it needed to be told.

Two thumbs up.

Contact Troy Hyde at thyde@shawmedia.com