The Olympics: My Greatest Hits, Part Four

With the Tokyo Olympics now behind us, I thought I'd take a look at some of my more acerbic comments from the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.  Plus my witty comments on the just-concluded Tokyo Olympiad.  Both of them.

"I'd like to ask this simple question about the United States national men's soccer team . . . Why do we have one? The American men's soccer team failed to qualify for the Olympics for the second time in a row . . .. The only way any of them will see Rio is if they're dating any of the players on our women's soccer team. And if they are, maybe their girlfriends will let them walk on the turf at the stadium and kick a ball or two . . . just to know how it feels." - Rio de Janeiro, 2016 

"[Pita Taufatofua is] the Olympic athlete who was the flag bearer at the 2016 Olympics' opening ceremony for Tonga, a Pacific island country heretofore known for issuing postage stamps in silly shapes. The judo competitor appeared at the ceremony shirtless, his torso covered in oil . . .. And women loved it; they ogled Taufatofua's well-oiled physique so much that their husbands must have been . . . scared shirtless! :-D - Rio de Janeiro, 2016

"Allyson Felix, already the most decorated female American Olympic athlete in track and field, was a moment away from a fifth career gold medal in the women's 400-meter race. She lost it when Shaunae Miller of the Bahamas suddenly leaped out over the finish line and crossed it first by landing on it.  Miller apparently forgot that she was a track runner and not a diver." - Rio de Janeiro, 2016

"[Swimmer Ryan Lochte] doubled down on his insistence that [he and his teammates] were robbed . . . when in fact they were stopping at a service station after having gotten drunk and vandalized a bathroom. The fake police officer was actually a real security officer who gave them a hard time because they were . . . giving him a hard time. Then ol' Ryan bailed on his teammates and went home, leaving [them] to take the rap and tell authorities . . . the truth. Which was caught on a security camera. I think the dye in Lochte's hair seeped into his brain." - Rio de Janiero, 2016 

"I haven't seen Winter Olympic skiing be delayed by bad weather this much since Sarajevo in 1984. At least NBC can shift to figure skating; back in 1984, ABC had to settle for commentary and music from John Denver to fill the time.  And Bosnian turnip carts.  Wow - a country-folk-pop singer who hadn't had a hit in three years . . . and adventures in pushcart vending on the streets of Sarajevo! Oh, the drama! And people wonder why ABC lost coverage of the Olympics . . .. Though it's been a long time since I've seen a Bosnian turnip cart." - PyeongChang, 2018

"If not for the real problems affecting our country . . . , overpaid television commentators would be talking about the United States' current fifth-place showing in the Winter Olympics medal count as a national crisis comparable to expensive gasoline. The athletes from Nordic and Slavic countries keep winning all of the skiing medals - wow, big surprise!" - PyeongChang, 2018 

"Now I know why Trump wants more immigrants from Norway! He wants to get immigrants who can build up our Winter Olympics team! Hey, I have an idea - why not admit Norway as the fifty-first state? No, better yet, an equal merger - they get to take over the national government and we not only get rid of Trump and Congress, we get their (Norway's) health-care system and public education system! And together we clean up at the 2022 Winter Olympics! Everyone's a winner!" - PyeongChang, 2018

"Thanks to Dan Hicks for declaring a winner in the women's super giant slalom before the eventual winner, Ester Ledecká of the Czech Republic, won in an upset. Seriously. Dan, you've proven yourself worthy of being a sportswriter for the Chicago Tribune, the paper that, on the day after the 1948 presidential election, declared Thomas E. Dewey the 34th President of the United States." - PyeongChang, 2018

"The Olympics started having mixed medleys - both men and women competing side by side - with the Tokyo Games. Oh, I get it. That way, the American women can carry our guys when the guys start falling behind their male counterparts from Croatia."  Tokyo, 2020 - no, 2021 

"I sometimes suspect if some of the sportscasters [at the Tokyo Olympics] hosting the coverage are actually in Tokyo. Rebecca Lowe, for all I know, could be in a TV studio in Miami, the one where the moon landing was faked. (That was a joke.) If that's the case, she's more likely to get COVID there than in Japan. (That was not a joke.)" - Tokyo, 2020 - no, 2021 

Right. My work is done here. 

The Olympics: My Greatest Hits, Part Three

With the 2016 Rio Olympics behind me, I look back at some of my more interesting comments about the previous summer Olympiad in London, as well as about the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics:

"I just finished watching the men's canoe double live, in which two British pairs won the gold and silver medals. After one of the canoers apparently fell into the water at the bottom of the artificial rapids, the other canoers and their coaches all jumped in. It looked like a cross between an evangelical baptism and a Monty Python sketch."  ("We have the Foreign Secretary, who has just returned from the bitter fighting in the Gulf of Oman. He's going to tell us about . . . canoeing!") - London, 2012

"If you've seen the rowing races at the London Olympics, you probably have wondered who those guys riding on bicycles along the water's edge are. They're the coaches of the rowers, calling out to them on what to do and how to do it as they follow them . . .. So . . . why don't the coaches get cycling medals? Come on! They deserve medals! Some of those coaches have actually crashed while looking after their rowers. One coach from Canada actually ended up in the bushes - twice . . .. If there's a cyclist in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed, then . . . it's just the head coach for the Dutch team." :-D - London, 2012

"[Katie] Ledecky not only unexpectedly defeated [British swimmer Rebecca] Adlington for the gold [in the women's 800-meter freestyle swim race], she broke [Janet] Evans's U.S. record as well .  . .. Prince William and the Dutchess of Cambridge were there, having thought they'd see Adlington win another gold for Britain. At the end of the race, Adlington swam over to [Ledecky] and said to her, 'Amazing!', which I believe is British English for 'What the f--- just happened?'" - London, 2012

"While American women's teams are going for the gold at the London Olympics, the [U.S.] men's teams lucky to make it there are sucking, except for the basketball team . . .. Come on, you Y-chromosomed wusses. Get your damn acts together. It's not that you were beaten by girls. You were beaten by Croatians. I want a men's team to root for in a gold medal game, and you have me on the verge of rooting for Bulgaria in volleyball." - London, 2012 

"I saw Paul McCartney and some people around him in the stands at the London Olympic stadium singing a chorus of 'All You Need Is Love,' the original recording of which begins with a sampling of 'La Marseillaise,' the French national anthem. I got to thinking . . . did a Frenchman win a gold medal in something at the time, and did someone get confused when the medal ceremony was held and the music started playing?" - London, 2012

"Shaun White had to drop out of the [slopestyle snowboarding] event owing a wrist injury. But's that not what caught my attention. What's up with White's new short haircut? Is the king of winter sport attitude going James Hetfield on us?" :-D - Sochi, 2014 

"The New York area has another big winter storm bearing down on it for Thursday. It's so warm in Sochi, it's too bad they couldn't have Olympic skiing here [in the New York area] this year. In fact, I know the perfect slopes for skiing in my area - all the shoveled, piled-up snow along alongside my driveway!" - Sochi, 2014

"Why is BMW designing American bobsleds? We have the athletic talent for this sport, but we don't have the engineering prowess to build our own sled? We have to go to Munich for that?" - Sochi, 2014

"The Russian men's hockey team lost on home ice to Finland, 3-1, in the Winter Olympics tournament. Somehow, all of the medals Russia has won at Sochi are irrelevant. I guess this is Finland's revenge for the Winter War? Because this loss certainly has the explosive power of a Molotov cocktail." - Sochi, 2014

"A tip of the hat to all the figure skaters who made daring choices in their music selections. Prince? Pink Floyd's 'Shine On You Crazy Diamond?' An orchestrated version of 'Bohemian Rhapsody?' Mama mia, mama mia! Okay, in a hip-hop world, these choices might seem conservative, but not in the very conservative world of figure skating. And choosing Floyd or Queen music from 1975 would have definitely denied Dorothy Hamill a gold medal in 1976." - Sochi, 2014

What?  Nothing funny about synchronized swimming?  Well, I did have a post about it from August 2012, but I couldn't quote from it without taking it out of context.  So feel free - please - to go to it here.

Oh yeah, and this: In my original post about Katie Ledecky defeating Rebecca Adlington for the gold medal in the women's 800-meter freestyle swim race, I concluded by saying, "Look for Katie Ledecky in 2016."  Called it! :-D

Time to put out the flame for now . . .      

Nolympic Update

I've joked that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) sees Americans as too arrogant and too vulgar to be trusted with hosting the Olympic Games (like when it comes to opening ceremonies) as a reason for Chicago not getting the 2016 Olympics, but even though I was only joking, my dears, I'm not exactly that far off.

The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) has been at odds with the IOC over revenue sharing of American broadcasts of the Olympics. Peter Ueberroth, when he was the USOC's chairman, had blocked a negotiation with the IOC on the issue. The USOC has also been accused of wanting to monopolize revenues collected from an American Olympiad and thinking they can offer superior facilities for such an event without playing well with the international body. NBC Sports president Dick Ebersol put it this way after Chicago lost its bid for the 2016 Games: "This was the IOC membership saying to the USOC there will be no more domestic Olympics until you join the Olympic movement."

Not going to happen. Americans are legendary for refusing to join the rest of the world.

William Kristol, the conservative journalist, said after the rejected Chicago bid that Americans don't need the Olympics and all of the logistical nightmares that apply and therefore should just shrug them off. What he was really saying was that Americans don't need the rest of the world telling us what to do.

Oh yes, we do. We haven't demonstrated much of an ability to act intelligently on the world stage. Many is the time we should have listened to the rest of the world and avoided getting ourselves into trouble.

I hope you didn't take my earlier jokes seriously. But then, I never said this blog was a legitimate news source. :-p