Rio Olympics

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Shann

Joined
Sep 2, 2004
Messages
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I've been addicted to the Olympics forever. My favorite events are wrestling, judo and weightlifting, but I found myself strangely fascinated by the team archery competition. Really good stuff.

The gymnastics seems to be ultra pressure packed even with the USA women being so great. It just seems like the slightest misstep and you're done.

Not a big fan of swimming and diving but that's mainly because they have so many events and televise every single heat!

Was very disappointed by the fencing, mainly because all of the athletes acted like spoiled divas. They seemed to complain and yell about every point. Maybe that is part of the sport's culture, but by the end of some of the matches I was hoping neither side would win.

Do you watch and what are your favorite\least favorite events?
 
The only time I ever watched the Olympics was the winter games when I was in middle school, they allowed my class to watch the ski jumps, 1992 or 1990 maybe. In 2012 I broke my back, chest cartilage, ribs and leg in a car accident, and spent most of August watching the games. I was bored to tears. Only had regular TV and had watched all of the movies and DVDs in the house.

The poor guy that broke his leg in the pole vault was quite entertaining. I'm glad to see the medal count the USA athletes have racked up. Other than that, I have no interest.
 
I usually love watching the Olympics, but I am very annoyed by NBC's coverage. I understand rooting for Team USA, but they will not show gymnastic routines from any of the other country's athletes. Can you imagine watching a tennis match with the camera only showing one of the players? :confused: They will not show a medal ceremony unless an American wins the gold. I remember when I was a kid how it was kind of cool to hear all the different national anthems.

I know they can't show everything, all the time, but last night, instead of seeing actual athletic competitions, we got to see Michael Phelps sitting on deck waiting to swim, Phelp's new baby in the stands, a video about Phelps learning how to put on one of those baby-carrying thingys, USA men's gymnasts sitting and drinking water while other country's athletes compete, etc.

And what has me melting down is an article I read last night that says the NBC execs decided to do all this to appeal to women! That women watch the Olympics even though they don't generally follow sports year round, so instead of showing competition in real time (even if tape-delayed) they want "stories" :mad: As a woman, I'm offended. Besides, they aren't even doing a good job of "telling stories."

Whew! I feel better. Sorry about the rant. :D
 
r8shell said:
I usually love watching the Olympics, but I am very annoyed by NBC's coverage. I understand rooting for Team USA, but they will not show gymnastic routines from any of the other country's athletes. Can you imagine watching a tennis match with the camera only showing one of the players? :confused: They will not show a medal ceremony unless an American wins the gold. I remember when I was a kid how it was kind of cool to hear all the different national anthems.

I know they can't show everything, all the time, but last night, instead of seeing actual athletic competitions, we got to see Michael Phelps sitting on deck waiting to swim, Phelp's new baby in the stands, a video about Phelps learning how to put on one of those baby-carrying thingys, USA men's gymnasts sitting and drinking water while other country's athletes compete, etc.

And what has me melting down is an article I read last night that says the NBC execs decided to do all this to appeal to women! That women watch the Olympics even though they don't generally follow sports year round, so instead of showing competition in real time (even if tape-delayed) they want "stories" :mad: As a woman, I'm offended. Besides, they aren't even doing a good job of "telling stories."

Whew! I feel better. Sorry about the rant. :D
Click to expand...

Go get em!!
 
r8shell said:
I usually love watching the Olympics, but I am very annoyed by NBC's coverage. I understand rooting for Team USA, but they will not show gymnastic routines from any of the other country's athletes. Can you imagine watching a tennis match with the camera only showing one of the players? :confused: They will not show a medal ceremony unless an American wins the gold. I remember when I was a kid how it was kind of cool to hear all the different national anthems.

I know they can't show everything, all the time, but last night, instead of seeing actual athletic competitions, we got to see Michael Phelps sitting on deck waiting to swim, Phelp's new baby in the stands, a video about Phelps learning how to put on one of those baby-carrying thingys, USA men's gymnasts sitting and drinking water while other country's athletes compete, etc.

And what has me melting down is an article I read last night that says the NBC execs decided to do all this to appeal to women! That women watch the Olympics even though they don't generally follow sports year round, so instead of showing competition in real time (even if tape-delayed) they want "stories" :mad: As a woman, I'm offended. Besides, they aren't even doing a good job of "telling stories."

Whew! I feel better. Sorry about the rant. :D
Click to expand...

My understanding is that you can watch all events live on the internet. But my home computer is stashed upstairs so I just watch the tv and know that i miss a lot. I DVR is during the day and fast forward through all of the fluff.
 
Shann said:
My understanding is that you can watch all events live on the internet. But my home computer is stashed upstairs so I just watch the tv and know that i miss a lot. I DVR is during the day and fast forward through all of the fluff.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they do have streaming, but my old computer doesn't stream video very smoothly. It's pretty glitchy and frustrating. I want to come home from work, put on the TV and veg out. You can't beat sitting on the couch eating cheezy-poofs while criticizing an athlete's performance. :D Plus it's kind of a matter of principle.

On a positive note: what I like about Olympics is coming across some obscure sport like fencing or archery, etc. and getting drawn in. The announcers will explain enough for the unfamiliar viewer to follow, along with a bit of background about the athlete. For the next hour or so, I really, really care who wins. Then I don't give it a moment's thought for four years. :D
 
One thing that really bugs me about the Olympics (and I may be the only one it bothers) is allowing pro athletes like Serena and Venus Williams to compete. When I heard they lost, and yesterday Serena lost against a true underdog, Elina Svitolina of Ukraine, I was GLAD, GLAD, GLAD. I didn't care one bit that her opponent wasn't an American. IMO (and again, others will probably disagree), the Olympics should be for AMATEUR athletes, to give them a chance in the spotlight. What the hell are people like the Williams sisters, or pro NBA players, who have been pros for years, doing competing there in the first place?!? I suppose they just can't stand the thought of aspiring up-and-comers hogging all of their spotlight for a very brief moment in time.

Rant over. :)

Jim
 
I hear you James. For the Olympics, I don't care for any of the main stream sports where the Olympics aren't the pinnacle of the sport. The NBA, tennis players and golfers all would rather win other things than Olympic gold. I think that's why a bunch of NBA players skipped the Olympics, as did a lot of the golfers. For other sports like wrestling, nothing else matters anywhere near as much, not even the World Championships.

On the other hand, all of the track athletes are paid professionals, and probably a lot of other sports too.
 
My wife watches the Olympics. I find it boring. Who can watch a hour of water polo without falling asleep? YAWN!
 
The Olympics is full of sports I don't care about so I don't watch. I will be glad when it's over.
 
James Y said:
One thing that really bugs me about the Olympics (and I may be the only one it bothers) is allowing pro athletes like Serena and Venus Williams to compete. When I heard they lost, and yesterday Serena lost against a true underdog, Elina Svitolina of Ukraine, I was GLAD, GLAD, GLAD. I didn't care one bit that her opponent wasn't an American. IMO (and again, others will probably disagree), the Olympics should be for AMATEUR athletes, to give them a chance in the spotlight. What the hell are people like the Williams sisters, or pro NBA players, who have been pros for years, doing competing there in the first place?!? I suppose they just can't stand the thought of aspiring up-and-comers hogging all of their spotlight for a very brief moment in time.

Rant over. :)

Jim
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For a very long time, it WAS amateurs only for the US team. We did well, but not really well. Teams from other countries (USSR, China, East Germany, to name a few) subsidized their olympic athletes. Essentially they were professionals paid by their governments to do nothing more than practice and go compete. Loose often enough and they were fired, uh, retired from competition. I think the first big change for the US was when the rules/regs were changed and the US started using professional NBA players on the basketball team and things have expanded from there, i.e., tennis, now golf has been added to the sports line-up, many of the big name track & field folks are "paid professionals" in all but name - they get corporate sponsors wh pay them in return for making commercials and making appearances at company sponsored events.
 
Kayla Harrison fights for the Gold again in about an hour on NBCSN.
She's the only American to win Judo Gold in the Olympics, man or women.

She's crushed everyone so far, and she is the favorite, but I've seen upsets before in all of the fighting sports.
Don't see an upset coming in this one though, and if she wins back to back Gold's she will be considered the best ever from any country.


Now that Golf started it's on six channels. I need TV's all over this room !
 
Ken44 said:
Kayla Harrison fights for the Gold again in about an hour on NBCSN.
She's the only American to win Judo Gold in the Olympics, man or women.

She's crushed everyone so far, and she is the favorite, but I've seen upsets before in all of the fighting sports.
Don't see an upset coming in this one though, and if she wins back to back Gold's she will be considered the best ever from any country.


Now that Golf started it's on six channels. I need TV's all over this room !
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Kayla Harrison is a beast! And I mean that in only the very best ways on the mat. I've seen her interviewed and she seems very personable and nice when she isn't throwing people all over the place. Her personal story is also extraordinary. If you aren't familiar with it, its worth looking up. Travis Stevens took silver for I think only the second silver for the U.S. in men's judo (Jimmy Pedro, Kayla's coach won silver as well).
 
Shann said:
Kayla Harrison is a beast! And I mean that in only the very best ways on the mat. I've seen her interviewed and she seems very personable and nice when she isn't throwing people all over the place. Her personal story is also extraordinary. If you aren't familiar with it, its worth looking up. Travis Stevens took silver for I think only the second silver for the U.S. in men's judo (Jimmy Pedro, Kayla's coach won silver as well).
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Yes, I know her story from the last Olympics. Kept up with her since.
She just won Gold again via armbar, and is now the best ever, no matter the country.
Very happy for her, and you're right, she is a beast. Never seen anyone dominate at Judo the way she has.
 
The family's been watching it some in the evenings. NBC fills the slots of time between commercials with three minutes of competition followed by four minutes of replays, contrived "stories", and commercials. No Thanks! Soooo boring. :thumbdn:
 
Fiji win first ever medal, gold in Rugby 7s.
600
 
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