Olympics Shmolympics

Now that the Olympics have finally hit the lowest point yet, I hope we can learn from this and just stop having the Olympics altogether.


It's too bad to see yet another fantastic western idea ruined and besmirched by our modern implementation. I always felt that the 1988 "Dream Team" was the final nail in the olympics' coffin but apparently I was wrong.


I hardly followed this year's winter Olympics, (mostly because I hate figure skating and all olympic team sports) but I did catch a few things here and there.


The Dream Team was pretty bad, but the whole Russian skating gold-medal scandal about buying off the judge and the pathetic "shared" medal solution was downright embarassing. Even more pathetic was that the Russians petulantly claimed they were going to boycott the Olympics if they didn't start getting "better treatment"(?) from the event. Then the Koreans chime in that they want to boycott too! Hunh?


Here's how I propose to save the Olympics.


1. Re-consolidate the winter/summer games into the same year.


2. Re-instate the no-pros rule.


3. Eliminate all head to head team sports.


4. Eliminate all sports that require judges to make interpretations or evalutions. If you can measure it or time it, it stays.


Here's some examples of what's going to be in natedogg's olympics:


IN:

400 Meter relay

High jump

Judo

Fencing

100 M Butterfly

Snowboard racing

Skeleton

Ping pong

4 man bobsled


OUT:

Basketball

Hockey

Ribbon dancing

Synchronized Swimming

Gymnastics

Figure skating

Baseball

Volleyball


Did I mention basketball?


natedogg


PS:

The slow death of the Olympics, the decline from being anything worth paying attention to can be traced as follows:


1972: Israeli wrestling team murdered by Palestinean terrorists. First time olympics/olympians are targeted as a political vector for someone's agenda.


1980: Jimmy Carter unilaterally withdraws all U.S. athletes from the 1980 Moscow Olympics in protest of Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan. While not only ruining the life's work and dreams of hundreds of U.S. athletes, Jimmy Carter finally lays to rest any hope or pretense of continuing to live up to the original ideals of the modern Olympics (which were to bring men and women of all nations together to compete at sports and leave behind their political differences for the time being in the hope of inspiring brotherly love and goodwill between nations. So much for that. )


1988: The Dream Team is formed. Just because a few communist nations support their athletes with state money, some gung-ho whiners and complainers decide it's just not "FAIR" to the U.S. athletes, who dominate as it is anyway, so we send all the NBA over to put the rest of the world in their place. Not only do we diminish the opportunities of all the college players who used to get sent over for this incredible experience (and competed quite nicely), but we embarass ourselves as a nation by sending Charles Barkeley who promptly elbows his opponent in the face.


1996: A bomb explodes at the Olympics killing one person. The victim's parents can thank the PLO or Jimmy Carter for that, take your pick.


2000: Michael Johnson wears golden shoes during his races. 'nuff said.


2002: The true nature of the Olympics is revealed in the scandal surrounding the Salt Lake selection (technically this happened a couple years before the games got underway). It turns out that the selection process is determined by which city officials can bribe the most Olympic Committee members. Then the games themselves get underway and in one case a gold medal is awarded by a bribed judge.


What a disgrace the olympics have become. Better to just end them now and forget it ever

happened.


natedogg

Then havent made the requesite sacrifices to Zeus in centuries.


Also they need to bring back pancratia. Simple event. One rule, no eye gouging. Looser is the one who gives up or dies first.

I lost all hope the year they decided to broadcast the Olympics as a "Pay Per View" event. Let's see, I lived in North Seattle then, so it must have been 1992. This years Olympics were really dismal, though. Can the Canadians really rejoice in their Gold? I guess it's worth a bundle in endorsemnets, though. Also, the coverage is downright pathetic. Lock me in a room with a loaded handgun and a bulletproof T.V. set with Bob Costas emceeing the Olympics and its only going to be a matter of time before the barrel of that gun is in my mouth.

I have a few more suggestions for sports to be included:


Three-legged race (isn't that the most fun you've ever had?)


Synchronized drowning


The involuntary luge (force people to do it)


Greco-roman curling


Simultaneous bobsledding (two or more bobsleds on the course at the same time, so they can hydroplane or bump the other bobsleds, just like auto racing)


Nude balance beam (and you're not allowed to wipe it off between competitors)


Nude roller derby ("Hit 'em in the tickets!")


Uneven perpendicular bars


Just watch the ratings skyrocket. . .

Hadn't read your post before I suggested some new sports.


Now I'd like to add synchronized nude involuntary Greco-Roman eye gouging.

If you don't enjoy the Olympics, just choose not to watch it. Why cancel the Olympics for those (not me) who enjoy it.


None of your suggestions would make the Olympics more fun to watch.


At bare minimum, the Olympics gave me the most enjoyable hockey game I've ever seen- the 1980 semi-final matchup betweein the U.S. and U.S.S.R.

You'd think that with all of the advances in science, we could make a women's gymnastic outfit that doesn't ride up her crack during any routine. What's the first thing they do after dismounting an apparatus? Uh-huh.

I happen to think that a womens gymnist outfit that does ride up her crack IS a scientific advancement.

Seems like you want to take the fun out of the Olympics. The ratings for your olympics would be sad.


I do think the winter olympics needs more variety in their events. Perhaps boxing could be moved to the winter games. In lieu of the long program, the leading figure skaters could duke it out for the gold! (It makes as much sense as the biathalon.)

Modern Biathlon. This is a hybrid designed to highlight some of the best America has to offer. It is essentially NASCAR with drive-by shooting. The cars would be set up to NASCAR specs, enclosed, V-8 motors, etc... It would have a jump seat in the back where the shooter would have a very small area to shoot, as when the guy in the back of the Camaro starts busting caps into a crowd. (Yes, we even have that in Idaho.) Pistols would be box-stock and provided to competitors only at the starting line, just like when a criminal procures an unfamiliar stolen pistol before going to the crime scene. No chance to get used to the sights or trigger. The USA would seem to have an advantage, but I think some other countries will make a good run at the gold.

For every dream team that you don't care for, there's a Jack Shea, a third generation Olympian winning a medal with a picture of his grandfather in his helmet.


For every bribed judge you can't stand, there's a riveting performance to go from fourth to first on the final skate and the unabashed joy you can see on the face of the girl that did it.


For every Russian delegation that threatens to boycott unless they get better treatment, there's a country like Canada which sees about 80% of the population in watching the gold medal hockey game.


What you are suggesting is equivalent to cancelling the WSOP because a couple of players threw cards at dealers. I don't give a flying fig about the people who try to wreck the Olympics. I look at the amazing performances from people who weren't expected to get there, I look at the people who live up to overwhelming expectations and come through in the clutch, and I look at what a great performance does to the morale of a country, and how it reminds me of how pure sport can be when its not being done by a bunch of overpaid babies who don't like that it's in the newspaper that they are dating a supermodel (don't look for any sympathy from me!).


If you don't care for it, don't watch it. I'd rather watch the Olympics than anything else they put on TV.

I enjoyed this Olympics even though I didn't watch very much. I cannot stand the hypocricy of the Olympic "movement" so I loved the scandals. The IOC is essentially a professional sports league that doesn't have to pay athletes or pay for their venues. They get countries to not only supply them with free stuff, but bribe them for the right to pay for the professional league. Then my tax dollars go to subsidize both the boondoggle and individual athletes. US athletes winning medals get tax-funded cash awards. So my money is forcibly taken from me to subsidize crack pipe, ER, half-pipe and figure skating. The whole thing is a purely immoral scam. I kind of like the IOC because they basically do the Tom Sawyer and the fence routine because they are lazy and don't want a real job. I can respect that. But give me the purity of professional boxing over the awful hypocricy and politics of the Olympic "movement."

That's the only reason I watch.