Television coverage of the Athens Olympics begins tomorrow. NBC plans to use all of its free-to-air and cable networks, boasting for the first time to show all the sports of the Games.
The purpose of this thread is to record all the complaints directed at NBC by Dopers who will not get a chance to see their favorite sport, favorite athlete, favorite country (other than the USA), etc., since NBC has a history of talking heads and endless up close and personal cutaways.
Will America really see the opening ceremonies? Or will we see the crap NBC pulled during the Sydney games? Now’s your chance to reserve your favorite gripe after the opening ceremonies. Will we see any athletes other than Americans? Any indepth stories about the Thorpedo? Will the Iraqi soccer team take center stage as the feel good team that NBC will focus its energies and make endless connection to the war in Iraq?
Sure, NBC has its American television networks for its American audience. So will we see anything other than Americans?
When I was at the Los Angeles Games, at the closing ceremony I was sharing a beer with the legendary British decathlete Daley Thompson. He was wearing a blue t-shirt with the words “Thanks for a great Olympics L.A.” written on the front - and he was getting TV interview after TV interview live in the middle of the infield. In the background, all of us were literally cracking up with mischievous laughter.
You see, on the back of his shirt he had the words printed “Shame about the shit TV coverage…”
If Daley Thompson had THAT to say 20 years ago, I seriously doubt the situation had gotten any better since then. For some really, REALLY bizarrre reason, American TV Networks feel that the viewing public costantly wants to see all this touchy-touchy feelgood background cutaway story crap instead of actually showing the real action - and let’s be frank people, there’s more action that one person could possibly ask to see during any given two week period.
You know, this is the first Olympics that I absolutly don’t give a shit about… and I had hoped to be there. (Not that I even came remotely close) I think it all ended for me when I witnessed Michael Johnson double in the 400 / 200 and set the 200 WR. (I had tears in my eyes for that 200m) Bob Costas, whom I HATE, listed Johnsons accomplishments and asked him “but you didn’t set the 400 WR, are you DISAPPOINTED?” (capitalizing mine) Are you fucking disappointed? He didn’t say it like “you did great, but wouldn’t this have been nice” he said it like, “isn’t it all kinda meaningless without that second WR?”
Of course, Johnson was a gentleman, and his answer was kind of like… umm not disappointed… I kinda just smashed the WR in the 200 and I’m the first man to double in the 400 / 200, so I think I can go home feeling ok." So you were left feeling like Johnson is still Track God, and Costas is still Fucking Idiot, but man does anyone really want to hear that shit?
PS, as an American, I must say, I don’t want to see all Americans, all day. Yes it’s swell that the 400m underwater basket weaving champion is a parapalegic from Memphis, but I’d still rather watch the Ethiopians run the 1500m.
In contrast to the '92 olympics where they had 3 pay stations running 24/7 and STILL couldn’t be bothered to show a single Judo match :rolleyes: They couldn’t even show 1 hour of finals highlights at 3am, fuckers! I’m still mad about that.
I’d pay good money to see a raw-footage-type of broadcast. No sappy background stories, no obnoxious commentators yapping constantly, none of that crap. Let me listen to the official announcers who basically say names and scores, and that’s about it.
During the 2000 Sydney O’s, when we lived in Saudi Arabia, the **Orbit Satellite ** had excellent coverage. They showed almost everything. I don’t recall who gave them the feed though I just was happy I didn’t have to put up with Katie Curic(sp)
Well, I’m a bit annoyed that the opening ceremony is going to be tape-delayed. If anything surprising or interesting happens, I’m sure it will be on the net instantly.
It’s going to be the same with Phelps. He’s probably going to set a couple of new WRs in the 400IM and 200 fly and be right there in the rest of the stuff he’s wimming and if he gets even one silver they will be all over him asking him the same shit. Only an idiot would be upset at getting a few golds and a silver.
I want to watch the Olympics but I know it’s going to be the crap they always show.
And here comes the current favorite in underwater basket weaving. Four years ago he was also the favorite, but after a terrible bloody nose after a nose picking incident he came in fourth, can he win this year?
While I agree that the network coverage has been horrible in the past, I think it has gotten better since then. This year, in addition to the NBC coverage, there is more coverage on MSNBC, CNBC, Bravo, and KMAS (Spanish language channel).
Yesterday I watched Iraq beat Portugal 4-2 in soccer on MSNBC. No Americans. Tomorrow on Bravo is Australia vs. Germany in women’s field hockey, with sailing and judo coverage. On CNBC is Argentina vs. Tunisia in soccer (live) as well as Brazil vs. Japan in women’s volleyball and coverage of women’s air rifle and fencing.
Here in Deep South Texas on the Texas/Mexico border, we get the Mexican TV stations as well as US. In the past, their Olympic coverage has been excellent without all the talking heads and touchy-feely stuff. They are very good about covering events as they happen, so we watch them instead.
Asterion, I think that’s dead on. I c&p’d the broadcast listings for the things I wanted to watch (Gymnastics, Weightlifting, and Judo), and this is how it came out:
Beach Volleyball, Gymnastics, Swimming : 5 nights
Cycling, Diving, Gymnastics, Swimming : 2 nights
Cycling, Gymnastics, Swimming, Track and Field : 2 nights
Diving, Gymnastics, Swimming, Volleyball : 2 nights
Volleyball, Weightlifting : 2 nights
Beach Volleyball, Judo, Weightlifting : Holy carp! They’re actually broadcasting judo! We must have a chance of winning!
I will not be shocked to the core of my being if I end up fastforwarding through 2 3/4 hours of Volleyball for 15 minutes of weightlifting.
Upon further examination, some of those broadcasts are eight hours long… I better go buy some tapes…
Take off the sunglasses, Katies and Matt!! It’s rude and unprofessional.
You are inside a darkend studio, you twits! Sure the glass wall behind you makes it look like you are sitting outside, but the outside shots looking in at you two shows the studio is plenty dark. Besides, when you “report” from some venue outside the studio you’re not wearing sunglasses, and often in the sun at the time.
Heh, when our local NBC morning crew had their little promo today from Matt Lauer, they wisecracked that he actually looked freshly-showered this morning. His response was a somewhat sheepish “Oh, you can tell from all the way over there…” Yes, he had the shades on. I’d half suspect they have bags under their eyes that even the makeup crew couldn’t deal with, otherwise I can’t imagine why their producer gave the go-ahead to wear shades on air.
As in participating, but the words in the brackets are very true. My training fell apart early on, and I never ran a time even worthy of US Olympic qualifying standards.
Anyway, I agree on Phelps. I forgot about him, and I hope he can manage not to be Marion Jones. I hope he wins a few golds and decides to come back strong next Olympics, seeing as how he’s young. Speedo is offering him a million dollars if he can grab 7 golds, and while that’s nice incentive, I agree with you, one silver and it’ll be “man, only 6 golds, could you suck any worse?”
