Winter Olympics Hangover

The Winter Olympics in Vancouver ended last night, and would you believe I still have something to say about it?

It seems that I am the only person in America who thought that NBC did a good job in broadcasting the Games, which must mean I am an idiot. Hey, everybody disagrees with me, and they can't all be idiots, right? (Well, this is America, so who knows?) The main beef critics of NBC had toward its coverage is that too many events were shown on tape delay in prime time when they could have been shown live in the afternoon, given the fact that Vancouver is three hours behind New York and in sync with San Francisco. Thus, critics charge, people going home from work knew the results of the competition - especially the news of Lindsey Vonn or Bode Miller occasionally falling short on the ski slopes - and watching it at night felt as fake as the fireplace in the NBC studio at the Olympic broadcast center. (Or "centre," as our neighbors to the north would say.)

While I understand and sympathize with the sentiments of the critics, the basic fact is that not everyone could stay home and watch the skiers and speed skaters, because, as the Republicans would say, for every unemployed and underemployed person and discouraged worker in this country, there are five of us with full-time jobs, and those folks work nine to five more often than not. Critics have suggested that Dick Ebersol, Bob Costas and company could have shown these events live in the afternoon on NBC's sister cable stations and again on prime time on NBC itself. Well, they showed other events live on weekdays on the cable channels, and many events, like hockey, were shown live on NBC on weekends (as well as on the cable stations suring the week). Also, events such as the mega-popular women's figure skating program, were in fact shown live on NBC in prime time. Too bad many people in the Northeast didn't even get to see women's figure skating live. (Those blizzard blackouts were so unfortunate.)

I keep hearing about how Canadian Broadcasting Corporation coverage was wonderful, but that's no surprise. The Winter Olympics were held in Vancouver, British Columbia, not Vancouver, Washington. And BBC coverage of the 2012 London Olympics is sure to be just as wonderful. I know American coverage of American Olympiads is rampantly jingoistic for ratings, but last time I checked, we don't have a national broadcast network like our Canadian neighbors and British cousins do; PBS is hardly a network, and we Americans are too right of center to even entertain the idea of a "public" broadcasting system being truly public and truly a system. (Look, I want BBC-style broadcasting in the U.S., too, but it's not going to happen, and there are more important battles the left needs to focus on, like health care reform and mass transit.)

I sometimes wonder if NBC did blow an opportunity to provide quality coverage, but then, unlike the BBC or the CBC, NBC has to deal with advertisers who were eyeing the more lucrative prime time slots to shill their products. Anyway, live coverage will be virtually impossible at the next Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, which is eight hours ahead of New York; tape delay is going to be the rule rather than the exception there, and likely even more so in 2018, as those Winter Games are likely to be awarded to Pyeongchang, South Korea (fourteen hours ahead of New York). The next North American Winter Games won't likely be staged until 2022 - or 2024, if the International Olympic Committee decides that holding the Winter Games in alternating even-numbered years was a bad idea and moves them back to leap years in time for the centennial of the Winter Olympics. (Admittedly, that might not happen for reasons that boil down to money, but the world could just as easily be a different place by then.)

Denver, which was awarded the 1976 Winter Olympics but forfeited them when the city couldn't get its residents to pay the higher taxes necessary to pay for the facilities, has expressed interest in 2022, but the United States Olympic Committee needs to get more stable and get more cooperative with the IOC before any American Olympics can be staged again. (I'll go out on a limb and predict Boston making a bid for the 2024 or 2028 Summer Games.) The new leadership at the USOC may be replaced tomorrow or sooner by newer leadership before it's given a chance, and if it is given a chance, their work is cut out for them. Better relationships not just with the IOC but with American federations representing different sports, who have been more responsible for American athletic successes at the Games than the USOC, have to be built. And corporate sponsors, who have run away from the USOC faster than Michael Johnson from the starting line, have to be re-assured. Alas, the USOC is so dysfunctional right now (note my use of the passive voice) that if it were a for-profit corporation it would be facing the likelihood of a government bailout. Given the fact that most other national governments provide financial support of some kind to their national Olympic committees, that wouldn't be a bad idea.

The Olympic movement in America is too big to fail.

In the meantime, congratulations to the 2010 U.S. Winter Olympic team - 37 medals are nothing to scoff at.

Okay, I hope I'm done commenting on all things Olympic for awhile. And aren't you glad I didn't mention Janis Kipurs again? ;-)

No 2020 Vision

I can't believe I missed this story when it broke over the past weekend. It wasn't in my local Sunday paper, nor was it mentioned on the television news broadcast I always watch. If Bob Costas reported it, I must have missed it. But here's the latest in the continuing story of the United States Olympic Committee against the International Olympic Committee. . . . No American city will bid for the 2020 Olympics.

The USOC explained that, what with Chicago having spent $80 million for an unsuccessful bid for the 2016 Games that IOC animosity toward its American counterpart doomed from the start, it would be fruitless for any American city to bid for 2020. USOC Chairman Larry Probst said the IOC made it clear; as long as the USOC is unable to get its act together (leadership keeps changing at the top) or compromise with the IOC on revenue sharing, the United States is not going to get the Olympics again.

The USOC doesn't even want to discuss 2024.

It might be tempting to write off the USOC's move as sour grapes - taking all of its marbles out of the game and walking away. But Probst - who may be replaced as USOC chairman by the time you read this - is trying to make amends. He has been in Vancouver during the Winter Olympics and has spent more time talking with Olympic officials from other nations and 32 IOC members. He's been asking how the USOC can do better and respond to IOC concerns. It's going to be an ongoing process, as the disputes between the American and international committees will take more than a couple of cocktail parties in Vancouver to resolve.

In the meantime, American winter athletes have been taking more responsibility for their own appearances at and preparations before the Games, with the USOC growing more dysfunctional by the day and corporate sponsorship drying up due to the recession. (Stephen Colbert is only one man, supporting one sport. He can't do it alone.) It's why Americans have been winning more medals in Vancouver than anyone else - they've taught themselves the maturity and responsibility the USOC can't teach them. The children have become the parent, and vice versa. Probst has spent more time negotiating with Olympic officials in Vancouver than attending the actual events. Maybe he feels he shouldn't take the credit for the success of his country's athletes.

I'm glad we Americans won't get the Olympics for awhile. Let the USOC fix itself first, if that's even possible. Besides, if American cities had been able to bid for 2020, one of them would have likely been Tulsa.

Tulsa?

(My sympathies to Lindsey Vonn and Julia Mancuso for their giant slalom mishaps, especially to Vonn for her injury.)

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