Beijing Olympics Update #3

- The clear winner of the NBC coverage team this year has been Jenna Wolfe who has been part of the Olympics roundup show everyday on MSNBC. This is really because she obviously doesn’t know anything about sports and doesn’t even bother to pretend. And if you have to be good if you are able to your co-host, in this case Tiki Barber, call you a word on television that George Carlin told me you couldn’t say on television. See you in London Jenna.

- Poor Ping Pong player, not only do no one actually come to see them play, even in a country that is supposed to big on the sport yet couldn’t fill out the area, the sport doesn’t even have ball boys and the athletes have to chase down their own balls like they were playing in my basement.

- As a former huddler myself who also tasted rubber, my heart goes out to Susanna Kallur of Sweden who tripped over the first hurdle of her preliminary race and American LoLo Jones (who should have Rashida do a bio pick on her) who couldn’t quite make it over the eighth hurdle dashing each hope for a medal. If either needs a shoulder to cry on, shout me a holla.

- Do they really need to say it was a clean start on every sprint?

- The gymnastics announcing team has been announcing and I couldn’t quite figure out why until I was flipping back between the competition and Monday Night Football to realize why. The football announces spent three quarters with the second and third strings and treated them with respect though many would be cut within a week or two. Yet the gymnastics would crush these sixteen year old girls saying things like they have “absolutely no chance to medal.” If they have no chance why should we bother to watch? They are dashing the hopes of young girls and their families and friends watching at home, acting like judges on some crappy Bravo reality show caring themselves with no class or professionalism and should be fired on the spot. They didn’t even know the rules and we didn’t even learn what a tie breaker was until Bob Costas broke in and told us. Which begs the question, why wasn’t Béla Károlyi commentating?

- And if we are firing NBC personal, add Andrea Kramer to that list, not only did she suck the life out of the swimming competition, she made a fifteen year old diver who failed to make the finals cry and then just stood their and watch her cry. Andrea, there is this thing called a hug, try it sometime.

- There is no cooler camera use in sports than the diving cam that follows divers into the water.


- Back to Gymnastics, it was nice to see Nastia Liukin actually where a red white and blue get up in the individual competition.

- The Beach Volleyball final in the rain is the reason HD was created. Or so I assume, I am too cheap to buy one.

- Who knew guys played Field Hockey?

- Just to show you how far Boxing has fallen, when it was being shown on CNBC, I chose to watch Synchronized Swimming on Oxygen. And where was all the programming on Oxygen, it seemed like almost every time I flipped on the channel it was always showing Tori and Dean. Which begs the question, who is sitting around all day watching Tori and Dean? Who is watching one episode of Tori and Dean?

- Let the Michael Phelps backlash begin, and naturally it was Best Week Ever who led the charge asking, Is Michael Phelps a Douche?

- Speaking of douches, did anyone else notice that Usain Bolt does the same hand spasms complete with finger kisses that Flavor Flav does? Next thing you know dude will be racing with a Vikings cap on.

- Those not on Michael Phelps overload be sure to head over to NBCDVD.com to purchase Michael Phelps: Greatest Olympic Champion...The Inside Story. Also available are 2008 Beijing General Highlight DVD and 2008 Beijing Opening Ceremony 2-Volume DVD.