Gold....Wow! Also...That’s a Sport?

The US Men’s Olympic Basketball team won the gold medal in Beijing the other day. WOW! What an amazing accomplishment...you mean to say that our professional players who play in the top league in the world with the best players in it, who make the most money, beat the professionals from other countries who maybe only sport one or two NBA players on their rosters. Wow we are sooo good. I can’t believe we pulled it off.

To hear the pontificators and sportscasters tell the story (ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Fox Sports) we should be in shock that the best players in the world beat everybody else! Not only that but the nice folks at Sports Center (including Stuart “please stop talking like you’re a 20 year old hip-hopper” Stuart) kept using the phrasing “our first gold medal in 8 years.” Really? The USA has gone eight years without winning a gold medal? Is it perhaps because the summer Olympics are held ONCE EVERY 4 YEARS!! Hey idiots, that means that we’ve only Not Won gold once in that period. Get it straight, we’ve not claimed the top title in Olympic (not world) basketball just once, not 8 straight years! It’s the kind of Tony Kornheiser moment when I start screaming at my TV.

This reminds me, if we are so good at Basketball, why is it still an Olympic sport? The IOC is canceling baseball and softball because of US dominance (we didn’t win gold in either this year!) so why not cancel basketball. Well the answer is simple; the IOC is composed mainly of Europeans who are great at basketball but awful at baseball/softball so we’ll just cancel them. And with a few sports being canceled, the agenda opens up a few slots for some new sports like BMX bicycling. Huh? BMX...you mean like in the “X-Games”?

I’m sorry but I saw the gold medal races for both the Men and the Women and all I was rooting for was for everybody to fall at once (almost happened in the Men’s race). This should not be an Olympic sport. Of course there are other sports that have medals awarded that deserve to be dropped quicker then 4^th period math.

Synchronized Swimming and Rhythmic Gymnastics: These don’t really need much explanation. They are dancing in the water and on a gym mat. Either let Ballroom Dancing in or kick them all out...no major athletic talent needed...just dance your ass off.

Race Walking: Um....Walking is a sport? Look 50 kilometers is a long distance (31 miles) and to do it in roughly 3 and half hours is very fast but it’s still WALKING!!

Trampoline: I don’t care what you say about power, grace, beauty, it’s jumping up and down on a trampoline. Anything you can do in your backyard should not be an Olympic sport. And why the hell is this not part of the “gymnastics” category? Who sat down and decided that it should be its own sport? Hopefully the shooting range will cause a stray that veers into this person’s hotel room.

But not to make you think that I have negative feelings about everything that transpired in Beijing. I liked some of the things I saw including the Men’s marathon on Saturday night which produced an Olympic Record or my favorite moment of these games, the Cuban Taekwondo competitor kicking the judge in the face (see video!)

Until London (4 years from now Stuart!!), Toodles!