[MicroBob]

Watched the finals tonight.

Thoughts: ABC did a pretty solid job with this. Not typically a Robin Roberts fan, but she was pretty good. Certainly much better than the typical ESPN announcers who mess this up.
Chris Connely did a very nice job on the interviews of those who got knocked out.

The features on the various kids were okay.
Not wholly necessary...but not too terribly intrusive.


Finola has some serious cuteness potential too.
Perhaps almost cuter than Winnie in my book.

I was rooting for her...but later not so much because I thought it was really unfair that she kept getting French words.

Carrie Close had some serious tells on her.
She would ask for the definition just because it was her routine, but you could tell she was just waiting for the guy to shut-up because she already knew how to spell the word.


Finally, I still don't like the clock. I think the kids are deserving of a little more time.
They only started the clock in 2004.
Specifically, if a word had 4 different pronounciations and also has a definition that is about 50 words long then I think the kid shouldn't be "penalized" when compared with a different speller with a single-pronounciation word and a 3 word definition.

I would recommend not starting the clock until after the kid gets the all the pronouncers 2x (and judges confirm he has it correct) and also gets the definition.
You can just make the definition standard right after the word instead of having the kid have to ask for it every time.


Also, they need to watch how they arrange the championship word-order list so that one speller doesn't get 5 straight French words or something.