A perfect 16? Doesn’t have same ring as that 10

BEIJING (AP)—Turns out, the perfect 10 wasn’t so perfect.
At least not in the minds of international gymnastics officials.
Four years after a series of scoring errors marred the competition at the Athens Olympics, fans who tune into gymnastics once every four years are in for a big shock Saturday. The perfect 10 is passe. Fifteens, 16s—maybe even a, gasp! 17—are all the rage.
“I hate the new scoring,” said Mary Lou Retton, whose Olympic gold medal came courtesy of a 10 on vault. “The perfect 10, you don’t have to say anything to describe it. The perfect 10, you were perfect.”
Even more than the 6.0 in figure skating, the 10 was gymnastics’ brand. Think of Nadia Comaneci, and you immediately think of that mesmerizing string of seven 10s in Montreal. Somehow, seven 15s doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.