Biathlon - but not the current one. Used to be it was pretty much Winter Warfare - The Game ; with guys skying until they were good and knackered, then firing high powered war rifles at long range targets. As such, it was very much in keeping with the original Ancient Greece Olympics, which were all about the individual’s skill in warfare, only with an additional Winter component (in fact, the discipline itself got its start as a training exercise for the Norwegian ski troops).
These days not only have the skiing distances been reduced in most formats, but they get to fire 22LR carbines at targets 50m away. Might as well fire paintballs at point-blank range after a brisk walk from the bar if you ask me.
I like the boxing. Not particularly obscure but something that doesn’t get a huge amount of TV time. It seems like they have changed the scoring a little in that we don’t get to see the punches registering in real time, it now seems to be done after each round. I quite liked the old system but never mind.
Incidentally. To make others around the world jealous. In the UK I have access to total blanket HD coverage from the BBC.
24 channels devoted to the Games. Whatever is happening is shown live (and so no need for GB bias) and no adverts at all.
I know we pay a licence fee but I do get all of the above for no additional fees other than the cost of a satellite HDR (200 quid I thinkl) I feel quite spoilt. And this isn’t just because we are the host nation, this is the sort of thing that the BBC does for many big sporting events.
It’s good, but they’re just carrying fairly raw channels provided by OBS, and putting commentary on top, with no between-event presentation from what I have seen. Some of the OBS presentation isn’t that good - witness the dearth of timing and position information provided during the men’s road race. The poor BBC commentators were floundering, and Chris Boardman had to use his own stopwatch to time the gap that the breakaway had. It was actually quite difficult to follow the race at times.
Boxing, yeah - it’s the only time I watch the sport, and I like the shorter format and scoring transparency. Apparently they ditched live points updates because the corners were relaying that information to the fighters or something? Don’t see why that’s a problem myself.
In the US, handball is as you describe – you hit the ball against the wall with your hand much like tennis. There are many varieties, though one-wall and four-wall are the most common.
The team sport is called “team handball” in the US to differentiate. While it exists, it is very obscure here.
It’s only obscure in the US, but Judo is the sport I typically am more interested in watching.
I continue to be disappointed in how the coverage for the Olympics is handled. We live in the age of the internet and high speed data communication. There is no reason why the Olympics shouldn’t be able to setup a central hosting site, with live feeds or archives to all of the TV coverage from around the world, so that you can actually watch what you want, when you want.
I saw this thread title and thought “team handball!!!” so I’m glad the OP covered it. I totally want to play that sport. I don’t see why it wouldn’t catch on the US. It’s like water polo on land, only more accessible.
By the way, handball that is racquetball played with a hand instead of a racquet, is not fun.
I find this a little bit boggling - handball has a shorter time than football or hockey (per half) so why would this in any way affect its ability to be shown on TV? It only has a 30 min long half with a decent 15 min half time for commentary, analysis and adverts. If TV can show matches in other longer running sports (hockey 35 mins, football 45 mins etc…) without the need for ad breaks, why would this differ in any way?
Kids play the game easily, it has no more physical contact than any other sport, and any there is could easily be tweaked with slight amendments to the rules to suit the age level of those participating anyhow. For example, plenty of kids play full contact rugby, and if preferred can play touch rugby as an alternative - easy.
To answer the OP, I’ve got quite into weight-lifting in the past few days - amazed to see guys lifting three times their own body weight - incredible stuff!
The breaks may be few in handball, but there were enough times where the coaches called time out to talk to the team; a 30-second ad could easily have been run. But the problem isn’t the commercials; it’s the fact that there’s no US audience for it. If the demand was there, the issue with commercials could easily be dealt with.
The fact is that few in the US know the sport. Even in the olympics, thy aren’t going to show it here. At most, you’ll get a 30-second recap of the final – and that’s only if there’s some story behind it that is relevant to the US audience.
My point though was really this - why would there need to be any adverts shown at all during play? You show the game, you show adverts during the half-time interval, then you show the second half in entirety. No need for any interuptions of the coverage for any reason, just like I would expect for a hockey or football match.
Anyhow - Is the ‘squash with your hand’ game not generally referred to as ‘American Handball’? I’ve head that a few times.
Well, clearly. So would showing adverts continuously, if you could somehow keep people watching long enough. But who would want to, or stand to, watch a game that was littered by such distracting adverts? It all seems very ‘tail wagging the dog’, that only sports that allow large amounts of advertising due to constant stop/start action will get shown on networks, and subsequently only those sports will become popular with the masses. The popularity should begin with what people WANT to watch, then proceed to TV coverage from there.
For me, if a TV station cannot survive commercially without showing an advert for the 45 mins it takes to show a half of football (soccer), then it doesn’t deserve to be in business. There is already a plethora of advertising on show throughout the game, with league and stadium naming, player’s shirts and sideline hoardings etc… I honestly can’t fathom why viewers of sports on TV would even put up with such interruptions to the play – there would be a national outcry over here. I can just imagine…
“ …and Gerrard is lining up the free kick from the edge of the box, the wall is in place, he begins his run-up … and now a word from our sponsors…”
<snip>
“ And welcome back, you missed a wonderful strike there and a great goal for England, we’ll try to bring you a replay of that sometime when there is a break in play and we don’t have a further advert pending… it may be some time, but here’s a word for our other sponsor in the meantime…”
There would be riots! Or maybe I’ve just be spoiled by having the option of (commercial) advert-free TV for my entire life.
That’s pretty much it. In the US all commercial stations show advertising much more often than once every 45 minutes. Every ten minutes is more like it.
Now, there are public, non-commerical, advertising-free stations in the US. But they generally broadcast arts and educational programs, never sports. In the US sports on TV always goes with adverts.
Even the commercial channels here - ITV, ch 4, ch 5, ESPN, SKY, Eurosport, etc… who are all funded by advertising revenue, would never dare to consider going to a break during a game. I can’t imagine how that would ever be appropriate, I can only guess it’s a ‘cultural difference’ thing.
Apologies to the OP for the tangential discussion / hijack.
Women’s handball is a *huge *deal in Norway. On the list of obscure shit that people care about here that no one else in the world gives a flying heck about, that one is pretty high up, along with eating fermented cod and not wanting to be in the EU. I think I’ve only ever watched one game of it myself, but I’ll admit that I did find it pretty exiting, very fast paced and with a lot of action. None of that waiting around for half an hour waiting for a goal to be scored or anything goddamn comprehensible to happen that you get in soccer.
Edit:
I don’t think there’s too much contact for kids, as even very young kids around here seem to play it a lot. Especially the girls, for some reason, the boys usually seem to prefer soccer.
Or maybe I’ve just be spoiled by having the option of (commercial) advert-free TV for my entire life.