—First off, best new word at the Winter Olympics? MONOBOB. That's right, for one-man bobsledding. Monobob. Sounds like Sideshow Bob getting run over in The Simpsons monorail episode.
—Exactly how much curling and biathlon IS there in the Olympics? Seemed to me they were on EVERY DAY. Can't the two sports be combined? Call it "Triathlon"? Competitors will ski, shoot, and then curl. Or, they can go for extra points by trying to shoot the curling stones as they whiz along. Hitting a sweeper instead is a major deduction!
—How 'bout that Eileen Gu, winning all those medals for China? Why, she's about as Chinese as chop suey!
—And hey, while I know there's no crying in baseball, there seems to be nothing but crying in figure skating.
Crying out of joy, as with Ms. Sakamoto (acceptable, even adorable).
Crying out of disappointment because the judges decided, with considerable reason, that your teammate was a little better than you were (not acceptable).
(Not for nothing, but surely there is a spot in the NFL coaching ranks for old Grunhilde there.)
I hold with the growing multitudes who favor banning children from the Olympics, something that has proved a bad idea for a long time.
But let's be honest. The problem here above all is one particular country.
A country that cheated so openly and grotesquely when it last got to host an Olympics that it was banned—sort of, but not really. And, whattaya know, was found to be grotesquely cheating again!
A country that has been cheating—openly and grotesquely—since it rejoined the Olympic movement in 1952. A country that, back in Communist days, insisted that its completely subsidized athletes were "amateurs."
A country that, thanks to captured Nazi scientists, introduced PEDs into modern sport.
Not to say that there aren't plenty of other athletes, coaches, and sports administrators from other countries that have cheated, too, in one way or another. But at least in those countries, means have existed to catch them out—and they often are caught, and punished.
(Except in Cooperstown. Where a good attitude and a nice smile conquers all!)
I say we need to go further.
I say ban all Olympics from being held in dictatorships, period. Ban all dictatorships from taking part, period.
Put the Olympics permanently in Greece, where they started, and, I dunno, some nicely neutral nation such as Switzerland or Japan.
Enough with the ridiculous expenditures and competitions for new games, which attract so many sleazy grifters to Olympics administration. I would even be for eliminating the medals ceremonies, and flags, and national anthems, that tempt countries to think this is all about them, instead of the incredible athletes involved.
It was awful to see a 15-year-old go through this. It was awful to see a certain individual represent a genocidal dictatorship instead of the country she was born, raised and educated in.
Enough of the awful. Back to the MONOBOB!
Curling and biathlon combined should be called "Criathlon"
ReplyDeleteNo, that's the new name for the figure skating.
ReplyDeleteThank you, thank you! We'll be appearing here for the next two weeks, Platoni and Horace—or at least we hope! Remember your waitresses—they're just innocent bystanders.
You don't want to shoot the women sweepers...
ReplyDeleteCurling became the only thing I watched when Mikaela started her meltdown. At least she's old enough to deal with it.
ReplyDeleteOur men's team was a real disappointment. The women's team, pretty much. The mixed couples, terrible shot decisions. Though the men had a few of those, too, and at key moments.
But yeah. These fucking dictatorships suck. Unless you're a (domestic political descriptor removed in the interest of keeping sports blogs nonpolitical).
Schiffrin, like that highly touted gymnast in the summer games, just didn't seem to have the mental wherewithal to keep it together for another Olympics.
ReplyDeleteWhich is fine. No reason anyone has to do this for life.
But they might have given a certain consideration to that, before utzing out someone else for a place on the team. Instead, it becomes all about them.
True "team" story of the Olympics was Brittany Bowe and Erin Jackson.
I want to see speed skaters racing the 500, 1000, and 1500 whilst tethered to a curling stone...by an elastic band around their waist, about 10-12 feet in length. It will make those tight corners a bit more tricky, and those lane cross-overs could become an award winning skill in itself.
ReplyDeleteI watched a lot of curling, because I could drink, talk and read a book and miss nothing.
ReplyDeleteI still have no clue how one team wins a round ( or is it an
"end?") for a match.
Do you count the stones in the circles, or is it whoever has the closest stone to the bulls-eye? What is the bulls eye called, anyway?
Why are the stone handles only red and yellow?
Also, what's with the " hammer?"
I know they play on ice and clean the ice a lot with brooms.l. Seems like knock hockey with big rocks.
And the US did dick, right?
We did dick all in a lot of sports. Men's hockey team couldn't beat Finland. Women couldn't beat Canada. And then there was Flopsy Shiffrin, of course.
ReplyDeleteBut hey, we used to suck much worse in the Winter Games. Back in the day, we usually had a figure skater or two who would win a medal, and maybe the hockey team would pull an upset. That was about it.
All spot on, Hoss. Olympics are over, as in "gone with the wind" over. What a shit show that thing has become. Hosted by a communist shithole ... ahem, excuse me, by a "country" that is actively practicing slave labor and genocide, amongst other evils. I just heard the other day that Communist China has its agents in the USA kidnapping and harassing people of Chinese descent or anyone who spits on their disgusting red flag.
ReplyDeleteEileen Gu? Excuse me whilst I vomit .... pfnghauuuu .... I read that the stupid Commie bitch is complaining about hypocritical treatment, that white guys from midwestern U.S. states who joined the hockey team for Communist China are not getting any hate. Well, they should be getting hate mail too, but the difference is that they actually laid an egg in China. Helped China finish dead last in hockey. So no one gives a crap about them. Whilst this stupid bitch wins a bunch of gold medals for possibly the shittiest regime in the world today. She should be stripped of her American citizenship. All this while China steals intellectual property and has an entire office building dedicated to cyberespionage of American military and industrial secrets. And those stupid phishing emails that ordinary people constantly get? There's probably about a 70% chance that those emails come from that Chinese cyberespionage unit.
Yeah, way to go Eileen Gu. You are a sellout and a traitor. I hope you realize that they paid you with the money they scammed from millions of Americans. Keep living in your Communist fantasy world, stupid bitch.
The Hammer of God