| Vol. I,
No. 1 |
Oct.
20th, 2000 |
Sports & Recreation
Good
Sport? That's the Question for NBC
After months of hype, it finally came -- NBC's broadcast of the
2000 Olympics Summer Games. But wait a minute! Was that sports event
we were watching?
But let's try to be fair. ...
This year's Olympics came from Australia, the Land Down
Under. But it's also one of the lands on the other side of the
international dateline. So before NBC even thought about airing some of
the events, the results had already been broadcast on the newswires first thing
in the morning. {One way to get tomorrow's news today is to report on
what's going on on the other side of the world. There, tomorrow's already
come and mostly gone.} But the time and even the date differences weren't
up to explaining what NBC was doing.
Each night, after supper, I turned on the tube, hoping to see
some great contests. Instead, I saw one after another of these supposed
human interest stories. Stories of pain and heartbreak, stories of courage
and tenacity. Even stories about WW II, including one that interviewed the
fellow who'd helped to save Jack Kennedy's life after PY-109 went under.
Now don't get me wrong. I've got nothing against human
interest. There's a time and a place for everything. But during
NBC's ostensible broadcast of the 2000 Olympics was neither the time nor the
place.
Well ...
As might be expected, the NBC extravaganza, when it did show
some of the competition, placed a heavy emphasis on three things --
gymnastics, track and the pool, for both swimming and diving. All three
are distinct medal prospects for the U.S. ... and track is almost a sure thing,
if not in every event, then certainly at least in the sprints.
But what about all those other sports?
If one watched only NBC's coverage, you might be tempted to
think that the Big Three was just about it. Beyond that, NBC did manage to
pick up on a couple of worthwhile things, for example, the US Women's Volleyball
win over Korea. And they did show women pole vaulting for the first time
in Olympic history, though it came across about as quick as some embedded
message in a Republican campaign ad. But we know better. We all know
better. There's more to the Summer Games than gymnastics, track, and the
pool.
So, undeterred, I flipped the channel over to the broadcasts of
our neighbors to the North, CBC, and finally rested a bit more
comfortably. There ... and only there ... was anything even remotely
resembling the full-fledged coverage.
We're lucky up here along the border. Heck. Up here
in the Notch, on a good night with the right conditions, we can pull in 2 French
and 3 English Canadian stations. As a result, we could see crews pulling
up their oars across finish lines in races every bit as tight as 4x100 meter
relay. You could watch riders take the steeples, or go through their
dressage drills. You could see cyclists pedal furiously on the
steep-banked circuits of an indoor track. Heptathalons.
Marathons. Judo. Fencing. And more. Oh, so much
more. ... Oh ... Canada!
The rumor that's been flying about this side of the border is
that, after paying $750 million for the rights, NBC wanted to be sure they'd
draw the largest possible audience. But they blew it. {It was like
one of those compromises, where one person wants to live on the East Coast and
the other, on the West. So they end up in Indiana where neither of them is
happy.}
On one Monday night, while Bob Costas {much to his credit,
visibly and uncomfortably embarrassed through most of the affair} droned
on with someone about something, and all I could think about was watching
someone compete, at anything, I flipped over to CBC. But they'd already
finished their coverage for the day. I wasn't quite ready for bed, so I
did the only logical thing any real sports fan would.
I watched Monday Night Football.
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