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Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

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Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

I thought the main reason baseball and softball were curbstomped was because much of the world didn't want to build the facilities to hold them when no one in that country played.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

ScoobyDoo said:
Women's Hockey is not going to be in the Olympics next time around if this keeps up. The upset over the US by "Finland was it?" in Torino helped but Canada whacking Sweden around is not going to look good.
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Sadly, it was these Swedes that did it. I'm assuming that the American team got drunk the night before right now.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

state of hockey said:
I thought the main reason baseball and softball were curbstomped was because much of the world didn't want to build the facilities to hold them when no one in that country played.
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http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/8504326/site/21683474/

The two sports were kicked out of the Olympics, unwanted by international sports officials who felt they were too American for the world sports stage.

The decision, made during a secret vote in Singapore, is effective for the 2012 London Games, meaning the two sports will have a final fling at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The sports, the first eliminated since polo in 1936, are eligible to reapply for the 2016 Games. Crystl Bustos, who hit a record five homers during the 2004 Olympics, said the one-sidedness of the softball tournament should not have been used as a factor. The Americans outscored opponents 51-1.

“If that did play a role in the decision, then that’s pretty pathetic,” she said. “I don’t mean to cut anybody down, but it’s supposed to be the best of the best, and if you get knocked for your excellence, then that’s just not right.”
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Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

They should have just admitted the not wanting to build venues. Half the sports have the same issues where a couple countries win every **** time. The stupid Russians didn't win the figure skating thing the other night for the first time in 54 freaking years.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

bronconick said:
They should have just admitted the not wanting to build venues. Half the sports have the same issues where a couple countries win every **** time. The stupid Russians didn't win the figure skating thing the other night for the first time in 54 freaking years.
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If Venue is the issue that's better than whining about getting creamed I suppose.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Old Pio said:
Let me just offer another perspective for ski jumping (I'm a guy who gets weak in the knees on the second rung of a step ladder). Unless you've been to the top of one of these facilities, or at least been at the base and looked up, you can't imagine what it's like to do what these guys do. I've been to the top of an Olympic 90m hill and that big sky flying hill in the UP (Ishpeming?). As I say, I needed a day or two to recover, and obviously did no jumping.

Remember the opening sequence of Wide World of Sports? The "agony of defeat? "It's still a durn miracle that guy didn't wind up in a body bag. And I've posted before about a DU jumper who broke his neck during training at the '68 Olympics. I resoectfully submit the risks involved make this a sport, notwithstanding style points.
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One interesting fact is the any ski jumper is never more than 12 feet up in the air on his in-air jump, as the landing hill is "following" the jumper on his downward trajectory. The fear comes from the height of the tower.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

ScoobyDoo said:
http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/8504326/site/21683474/
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I'm inclined to the view that anti-Americanism played a significant role here. Imagine if the former Soviet Union was a world beater in softball or perhaps if the workers paradise in Cuba had done a bit better in baseball, can't see the IOC eliminating those sports.

And didn't the US always used to win basketball? Up 'til 1972, the US hadn't lost an Olympic basketball game. It took the Russians, with a little help from the zebras, to stop that winning streak. The point is, the world caught up in basketball and might well do so in softball.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Puck Swami said:
One interesting fact is the any ski jumper is never more than 12 feet up in the air on his in-air jump, as the landing hill is "following" the jumper on his downward trajectory. The fear comes from the height of the tower.
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Well, that and the fact that even if it is just a 12 foot fall to the ground you'd probably tumble and roll for quite some time. :p
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

I think women's hockey has more of a chance. Men's hockey is popular enough globally to attract interest on the female side of the sport - the European programs will improve in the coming years. Baseball and softball aren't played enough places to really warrant the development of a program.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

bronconick said:
They should have just admitted the not wanting to build venues. Half the sports have the same issues where a couple countries win every **** time. The stupid Russians didn't win the figure skating thing the other night for the first time in 54 freaking years.
Click to expand...

Gees, nobody is asking them to put up Citi Field for the Olympics. From what I remember of the Sydney facilities, they looked like a AA ballpark. A small minor A ballpark. The softball facility was even less impressive. I can't imagine thats breaking the bank in the grand scheme of the summer games.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Venues were only part of the reason to drop baseball and softball. The real reason they dropped it was because Major League Baseball would not drug test on the WADA standard, and they would not break their regular season to send their best players for an Olympic tourney of serious duration.

The IOC is a Euro-Centric organization and there was also a fair bit on Anti-american feeling there as well.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Puck Swami said:
One interesting fact is the any ski jumper is never more than 12 feet up in the air on his in-air jump, as the landing hill is "following" the jumper on his downward trajectory. The fear comes from the height of the tower.
Click to expand...

Does it ever. That nearly catastrophic accident on "wide world of sports" was caused by an icy track and after that guy took his famous tumble, they shortened the lip of the ramp. In the case of the DU jumper, he got caught by a gust of wind and blown into the stands. They closed the hill after that. . .one jumper too late.
 
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Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

BUT09 said:
I think women's hockey has more of a chance. Men's hockey is popular enough globally to attract interest on the female side of the sport - the European programs will improve in the coming years. Baseball and softball aren't played enough places to really warrant the development of a program.
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Meh. There are more countries that take baseball seriously (with larger populations) than ice hockey and some are quite wealthy. I think the winter/summer split might explain the different treatment of the sports.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

ScoobyDoo said:
Women's Hockey is not going to be in the Olympics next time around if this keeps up. The upset over the US by "Finland was it?" in Torino helped but Canada whacking Sweden around is not going to look good.

AFAIK softball and baseball got dropped because it was too American and in Softball we were too dominant.
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The vote to eliminate women's hockey for Sochi would have to have taken place in 2007, so that isn't going to happen. Notice that baseball/softball were eliminated in 2005 for the 2012 games.

It doesn't make sense that they would eliminate baseball from the Olympics because of American dominance. The Americans didn't even qualify in 2004, and won its only gold in 2000. They simply didn't want to build diamonds in European countries, especially since they don't easily convert to football pitches. :p
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Old Pio said:
I'm inclined to the view that anti-Americanism played a significant role here. Imagine if the former Soviet Union was a world beater in softball or perhaps if the workers paradise in Cuba had done a bit better in baseball, can't see the IOC eliminating those sports.
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The Cubans won gold in '92, '96 and '04, and won silver the other two times it was played. How much better do you think they'd have to do?
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

If they don't get more competitive, they'll probably cut women's hockey for the 2018 games. The 3 cities up for hosting are in France, Germany and South Korea. Maybe the Germans want a couple rinks, but I imagine the French and South Koreans would rather just have one arena with a practice rink and let the men use up all the time over the two weeks.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

Priceless said:
The Cubans won gold in '92, '96 and '04, and won silver the other two times it was played. How much better do you think they'd have to do?
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Okay, bad example. Let's say Germany had won all that Olympic baseball hardware, would baseball have been eliminated? Maybe. And the US never really did send its best players as Swami noted previously. My only point is there is a fair amount of anti-Americanism in the olympic "movement," and what happened to Chicago earlier this year is just the most recent example.
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

As nice as watching USA curling is, I was really hoping to have some hockey on my TV when I got home tonight. :o
 
Re: Part II of the XXIst Winter Olympiad....and NBC still sucks.

The winter Olympics is a pretty small sports program, with nothing really great waiting to get in beyond women's ski jumping.

The problem with womens hockey is in the registrations. Canada has 85,000 players, the USA has 65,000 and China and Russia have less than 500 between them. If the IOC leans on the Russia and China to improve, I would bet they could get there in 4-8 years with effort and resources.
 
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