TV: Even More Olympics 2004

-- I caught some of the women's shot put competition earlier this week, and I got a kick out of how the distances were marked. Wherever the shot lands, some guy walks over and points to the spot with his toe. That's high tech, baby.

-- I'm disappointed Andy Roddick and Venus Williams both lost their chances to bring home the gold for the US. But Roddick, at least, was playing like a maniac. His second round against Tommy Haas was one of the most amazing tennis matches I've ever seen, with Roddick fighting off a double match point to stay alive, then surrendering a triple match point to give Haas a chance to get back in, before finally winning 9-7 in the third. But I've got a complaint about the television presentation of the match: where the hell was the score? It's pretty standard practice these days to keep the current game's score constantly displayed onscreen, in that little box on the upper left. Not only was the score not there, they didn't even flash the score in between points, which left me floundering during several games. Very frustrating.

-- Another game new to me that I instantly became addicted to: handball. I watched Croatia beat Slovenia, and I was riveted. It's so simple: it's like soccer.... with your hands. But the games are fast, the scoring is high, and the action is rough; more than one player was brutally knocked to the hardwood floor (it's played indoors), and I even saw one guy grappled by his opponent and wrestled to the ground -- and he still managed to score, hurling the ball past the goalie as he fell. Amazing.

-- I watched some judo last night, and I was struck by the strange, soporific movement of some of the competitors. I'm sure it's just my novice eye, and they're competing at a level far beyond my comprehension, but they mostly appeared to be making slow, infrequent, ineffectual lunges at one another, as though they were sleep-judoing. And when they did make contact, they would kind of rumple up the bathrobe-like costume of their opponent, then eventually let go for some reason or another, and back away for another attempt. I don't think I get this event at all.

-- I think it's funny that of the fifteen headlines Yahoo has so far compiled in its Olympic weightlifting section, six of them specifically mention failed drug tests. Wow, you mean there's a problem with weightlifters taking steroids?? Knock me over with a feather. Also, I don't care how mature you are, it's just plain funny that one of the weightlifting events is called "snatch".

-- The worst thing about the US men's basketball "Dream Team" isn't how spectacularly they've failed to live up to that name (falling 92-73 to Puerto Rico in the first round, winning less than convincingly in their subsequent games), it's that the arrogance surrounding them has permeated America to the point that TV Guide actually stated as fact that Tim Duncan and the Dream Team would be competing in the gold medal game on Aug. 28 -- in last week's issue, before the Olympics had even begun. What a bunch of dicks. Man, I love this country, but now even I hope the Dream Team loses.

-- And how about those fans, folks? By which I mean, where the hell are they? As King Kaufman of Salon.com has already joked, judging from the poor turnout, Greece appears to be the first host country to boycott the Olympics. Venus Williams, possibly the most popular tennis player in the world, played one of her center court matches in front of five hundred people. That's nothing. She gets a bigger crowd than that practicing in her backyard. And the Greeks have been stubborn sons of bitches about it. During early gymnastics rounds, most of the fans were stuck in the upper tier, while the lower level was sparsely populated with little more than family members and press. I don't care how greedy you are, if you can't sell those tickets, then at least let the people in the upper tier come down and fill them, so it doesn't look so bad on camera. Whether or not Greece is making back its financial investment (they claim they are), all those empty seats gives the appearance of a monumental failure. Just suck it up and start handing free tickets out on the streets, already.