With the 2008 Beijing Olympics now over, here is a look at the winners and losers from the games.
Winners
Swimming | The profile of swimming may be as high as it has ever been. The exploits of star Michael Phelps helped drive the impressive ratings for the first week of the Olympics, and NBC has signed on to air the U.S. National Championships for the next three years. One danger: Phelps cannot be the only star in the sport, or else swimming will suffer in the same way the NBA and golf did in the absence of Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.
Basketball | The Redeem Team did not only achieve a stirring sports victory, but a PR masterpiece as well. In the U.S., NBA players are generally reviled. But the Redeem Team, led by polished, corporate stars like Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, said all the right things — almost as if they were reading from a script. Players showed up at a variety of events, and were shown openly rooting for other U.S. players, in what one could argue amounted to very well choreographed publicity stunts. The entire idea of the “Redeem” label was brilliant in and of itself; the powers that be took the disappointment of the bronze medal in Athens and turned it into a virtual marketing slogan. Overall, the USA basketball team had far fewer detractors at these Olympics than in ’04, ’00 and ’96.
Softball | Believe it or not, Team USA’s loss in the gold medal game of the last Olympic softball tournament for the foreseeable future may have actually improved the sport’s prospects. Part of the reason softball was dropped from the Olympics stemmed from the USA’s dominance. With the team finishing with a silver medal, the sport is now more competitive, which could lead to a groundswell to bring it back in 2016.
Tape-delayed coverage | While the concept seems positively ludicrous in the internet age, NBC drew superb ratings for the Olympics — especially out West, where nearly all coverage was tape delayed. Eight of the ten highest rated markets for the Olympics were not in the Eastern Time Zone. The strong numbers for these Beijing Olympics ensures that NBC will be in no hurry to abolish the increasingly outdated tactic.
Losers
Gymnastics | For at least this writer, gymnastics was easily the least enjoyable of the Olympic sports. From the constant, unending whining from NBC’s announcers to the age situation with Chinese gymnasts, to the subjective and unclear judging, it is more soap opera than actual sport. Watching the events on NBC was like watching coverage of George W. Bush on Fox News Channel or Barack Obama on MSNBC — no matter what, you know you’re getting significantly skewed coverage. The Americans could do no wrong, and everyone was out to get them, or so said the party line from Bela Karolyi. And just how many times did the usually not-entirely-horrible Al Trautwig have to ask “how old does [any Chinese gymnast] look to you?”
Boxing | While boxing received little attention, and hence little criticism, NBC Olympics host and HBO boxing announcer Jim Lampley blasted the sport on-air early Sunday morning. Lampley: “On the sick list: boxing. Once a marquee sport now registers well-deserved apathy, even disgust among viewers. The event that once introduced the world to Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard now borders on the irrelevant, victimized by incompetent governing bodies and an inscrutable scoring system. Boxing authorities, to fix it, should immediately contact a private firm called Compubox.”
