Always amazes me the time people waste posting about things they claim they don't care about.
As far as the topic of the posts go, the Olympics are faltering. The public cares more about team events than it used to. The Olympics are still "stuck" on the individual sports. I don't know if it's still the case or not but I remember hearing once that Ice Hockey was the only team sport in the Winter Olympics. You see the expansion of the NFL, the NBA, the expansion of the EPL, rise of soccer in the US. The Olympics are still very heavy with individualized sports such as Figure Skating, Gymnastics, Track and Field, Swimming, etc... There are team events but by "team" I mean multiple athletes on the field taking part at one time...forwards, centers, defensemen, etc... Not just a track and field 4X100M team.
There aren't any easy solutions to the issue from a commercial standpoint. Expanding the roster of "sports" is likely not the answer if you're still talking about the Olympics as being a sports festival. The only obvious solution is to re-brand it as a recreational festival instead. And in the early days of the modern Olympics--the organizers did have an entire arts component that went by the wayside. That ended in 1948. The feeling back then was to have it be a cultural event as opposed to just a sporting one.
It looks as though it may be getting back toward that in some way.
One thing they should do, in my view, is shift sports from the Summer to the Winter games.
Summer Olympics:
Winter Olympics:
You probably don't want to do yatching or beach volleyball in the winter but certainly the boxing, fencing, and wrestling, judo, taekwondo events could be shifted to the winter. As could basketball.
Something else they should do is do what the NFL used to do with the Super Bowl. Have it rotate between three cities and a fourth to be named later. The Olympics should be held in a few cities only...cities that don't have to break the budget to host it and more importantly, can host it. I'm sure Lake Placid was great but hundreds of thouands of people coming to upstate New York strains the infrastructure. That some hundred thousand going to Denver...not so much.
Anyway, good to see the Olympics being discussed. I say expand the roster as much as you want. You want to put poker in the Olympics? Do it. But you've got much bigger problems than that IOC.
As far as the topic of the posts go, the Olympics are faltering. The public cares more about team events than it used to. The Olympics are still "stuck" on the individual sports. I don't know if it's still the case or not but I remember hearing once that Ice Hockey was the only team sport in the Winter Olympics. You see the expansion of the NFL, the NBA, the expansion of the EPL, rise of soccer in the US. The Olympics are still very heavy with individualized sports such as Figure Skating, Gymnastics, Track and Field, Swimming, etc... There are team events but by "team" I mean multiple athletes on the field taking part at one time...forwards, centers, defensemen, etc... Not just a track and field 4X100M team.
There aren't any easy solutions to the issue from a commercial standpoint. Expanding the roster of "sports" is likely not the answer if you're still talking about the Olympics as being a sports festival. The only obvious solution is to re-brand it as a recreational festival instead. And in the early days of the modern Olympics--the organizers did have an entire arts component that went by the wayside. That ended in 1948. The feeling back then was to have it be a cultural event as opposed to just a sporting one.
It looks as though it may be getting back toward that in some way.
One thing they should do, in my view, is shift sports from the Summer to the Winter games.
Summer Olympics:
Winter Olympics:
You probably don't want to do yatching or beach volleyball in the winter but certainly the boxing, fencing, and wrestling, judo, taekwondo events could be shifted to the winter. As could basketball.
Something else they should do is do what the NFL used to do with the Super Bowl. Have it rotate between three cities and a fourth to be named later. The Olympics should be held in a few cities only...cities that don't have to break the budget to host it and more importantly, can host it. I'm sure Lake Placid was great but hundreds of thouands of people coming to upstate New York strains the infrastructure. That some hundred thousand going to Denver...not so much.
Anyway, good to see the Olympics being discussed. I say expand the roster as much as you want. You want to put poker in the Olympics? Do it. But you've got much bigger problems than that IOC.
