Bob Sledding

We watch the Olympics – if not all day these specific Games like in the past -- as much as reasonable, so that you don’t have to.

Though NBC has been promoting the Olympics as starting on Friday, the Games actually began yesterday, and were being broadcasted in the late afternoon on the USA Network, which is one of the Many Networks of NBC that will carry competition.  And it started off with curling.  And yes, I watched.  (And later stuck around for a training round Men’s Downhill skiing and then Women’s Hockey.  More on that below.)

What can I say?  I actually like curling.  I don’t understand the rules – and NBC doesn’t seem to ever tell their announcers to explain them.  The best I can figure is that NBC figures that anyone stupid enough to watch curling on TV already knows the rules, and there aren’t viewers (or enough of them) who don’t know how curling is played to justifying using up airtime explaining it all.  Either that, or the announcers don’t know either.

There are two reasons I like curling.

The first is that weirdly I grew up watching it.  For reasons I can’t quite explain, when I was a little kid they really truly honestly broadcast curling on TV in Chicago.  I think it was on WGN.  The main reason is that while I would never describe curling as “popular,” it has a core base of support in northern Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota.  And I guess in those days, there wasn’t the menagerie of sports to broadcast on the weekend, and also curling was pretty inexpensive put on the air (and get the rights.  Hey, for all I know, the curling league paid TV to get on…)  To be clear, it wasn’t like they put it on during prime time.  As I recall, it was on the weekends, and I think during the early evening.  I also have a fondness to curling because my dad always said that the only reason for curling clubs to exist was to give men a reason to get out of the house in the winter and drink beer.

The other reason I like curling is because it’s one of two sports where I’m able to keep my dreams alive of making the Winter Olympics.  It’s not that I’d be any good at either of the sports, but I could compete without looking totally idiotic (“totally” being the operative word) and with a chance of not getting hurt.  And do so without any training and at a moment’s notice.  The sort of thing where if I got a phone call one day to say that a team member dropped out and they needed someone to replace him immediately, could I rush to an airplane and fly to the Games right now – I’d be willing to do so.  No, I don’t know the rules of curling, and I’d be bad at it, and we’d finish last, but I can push a stone across the ice.  And sweep the ice.  And yell orders like “Go, go, go!!” and “Yes, sweep, sweep!!” and “Please, please!  No backing!” to my teammates.  (There seems to be a lot of repetition among teammates in curling.)

The other sport is the four-man bobsled.  Again, I’d be bad, and our team wouldn’t get the strong push it needed to be competitive, and we’d finish last.  But I can push a bobsled with three others for 10 yards and then step into the sled, duck down and sit for the entire run. Yes, the other three would be jumping quickly into the bobsled and have to wait until I made it inside, but we’d finish.  And I’d be an Olympian.

As for the match that got broadcast, it was Team USA. against Australia.  And for anyone who thinks curling isn’t cutthroat – one of the players on Australia, Dean Hewitt, used to be teamed in mixed doubles with his mother…and he dumped her to be paired with someone else.  As much as the announcers said she was very understanding, I wouldn’t want to risk being him coming over with the family for Christmas dinner.

On other thing I learned about these Olympics to keep in mind throughout the Games – because there is a huge time difference, the events are being tape-delayed.  And so, when I went to check something online about this competition, it turned out that the results were already posted, which ruined the excitement for me.

Happily, this was curling, so the “excitement” quotient is pretty low.

You’ll be happy to know that Team USA won, by a score of 6-5.

I’m always of a mixed mind which of the Alpine events I like more.  In recent years, the Downhill has pushed itself to the lead (with the Super G a close second).  It’s not so much the speed, or that they don’t have to go through the gates in an order I’ve yet to figure out or had explained, but more because the vistas of the mountain range they’re running in make it such a spectacular race to watch. 

Surprisingly, the vistas here were just fine, at best, especially compared to the just-competed European championships whose views were at the Oh-my-God spectacular” level.  Most of the surrounding range was actually gray, which suggests they didn’t get snow and that perhaps snow machines were needed for the competition hill.  And then later in the broadcast, it was mentioned that “billions of gallons” of water had been brought in for the snow machines.

Also, as I noted the other day, I’d read that TV announcers would be doing their jobs back home in studios, rather than on location in China.  I’m assuming that’s still the case, but I thought it possible that there still might be some “sideline reporters” there, to get on the spot interviews and to track down any stories that might come up.  And that appears to be the case, as there was an NBC reporter on the mountain.

I’ve become a big fan of women’s hockey.  It’s fast, but not as fast as men’s hockey and less physical, so it’s more about puck control and very watchable.  This was a game between Switzerland and Canada – it was of particular interest to me since Canada is always the biggest competitor for the U.S. team, which Gold Medal in 2018 after Canada had won the previous four, with the Americans getting the Silver each time.

They do have to figure out how to fix one thing:  two minutes in, Canada scored a goal but there was a coach's challenge that lasted eight minutes.  Yes, the play was close, but...eight minutes??  I think if a replay can't be decided in four minutes, maybe five, then you just go with the call made on the ice.  At least the crowd wasn't bored -- because there wasn't one.

After one period, Canada was leading 3-0, thanks to two goals and one assist by Sarah Fillier, the youngest player for Canada in her first Olympics, which is quite an auspicioius start.  During the rest of the year, she plays for Princeton -- and is someone the U.S. team has to keep an eye on.  And after two periods, the score was up to 8-0.

​More to come...