Now, I am one of those purist types who believe that only track, field, boxing, and wrestling should be in the Olympics. For other sports (and other things that are not sports that are for some reason in the Olympics), you can have world championships. In fact, in many sports, you do.
For instance, why is soccer in the Olympics? There's a World Cup. And people actually care about the World Cup. And the best players play in the World Cup, whereas they avoid the Olympics like the plague. They already have enough fake tournaments in which they can injure themselves. They don't need the Olympics.
But at least the World Cup is in a different year from the Olympics. The US Open is in two weeks. No one is watching Olympic tennis. No one cares about the outcome. The defending champion had to be extended qualification specially because he apparently has forgotten how to play in the intervening years. Also, he's some scrub of whom I have never heard.
And yet, both Federer and Nadal, and a sprinkling of other distinguished players, are in Beijing, putting their bodies and lungs at risk for a title that means absolutely nothing in tennis. The Olympics are not as big as any of the Grand Slams. I don't know if, having listed the Grand Slams in order of importance, I would put the Olympics next. Perhaps they are Switzerland's and Spain's best hopes for a gold? That's sad, but still doesn't make it acceptable.
Andy Roddick is not going to the Olympics so that he can prepare for the Slam on his home turf. Now, he's still not going to win, but his example should be instructive. I don't know, Rafa, that biting that gold medal is going to be all that satisfying....
3 comments:
Another question: why is baseball in the Olympics? It's right in the middle of baseball season and no spectacular players are going to take two weeks off in the middle of the season to play. Because of this, it's not even enjoyable to watch. Also, they add all sorts of stupid rules for overtime play so that it's possible to fit all the games in. Evidently someone realized that the whole thing was stupid, as baseball won't be back in 2012.
I'm basically of the opinion that the only team sports that should be in the olympics are relays. I also don't think that one-on-one sports, that thus require a tournament to determine a winner (instead of everyone just doing the sport in order and seeing who did it best) deserve a place. Tournaments are much too time consuming, and it's more fun to watch lots of people throwing a big iron ball one time than two teams hitting a ball back and forth over a net over and over again, and then watch the same team doing it again tomorrow, and then again the next day, etc.
Well I'm basically of the opinion that relays are retarded. What is the point of adding four random people's scores together and treating it as a single unit, when you could just as easily evaluate them on their individual merits?
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