Mexico Takes Gold, Brazil faces Disaster, and Other Olympic Notes

I don't really want to dwell on the Olympics too much longer, so with this (longish) post coming after the final ceremonies dragged on, I'll try and not post anymore about it. Like in 2010, when I mentioned my rationale for enjoying quadrennial sporting events, here it's much the same. The Summer Olympics are larger it seems, and more in your face, and trying to watch it sometimes grates on my last nerve, and the contrived stories are hard to swallow, but we do get to see some stars, right?

1) Gold for Mexico and Disaster for Brazil

In the men's gold medal soccer match, Brazil faced Mexico, and a first-time gold medal winner was going to be crowned. Not being terribly surprised that Mexico hadn't ever won a gold medal isn't news, but Brazil? I believe this was their third silver medal, which means three failed attempts to get a gold medal, which is the only piece of hardware in international soccer the Brazilian team has yet to win.

Olympic soccer is different from the World Cup variety in that it uses a country's U-23 team--their Under-23 years old team. Nations are allowed three players overage, but everyone else has to be 23 or under. This is in order to keep the Olympics from becoming an event that rivals the World Cup in importance.

An error within the first thirty seconds let Oribe Peralta of Mexico score a quick goal, and left Brazil staggered. After halftime, Peralta scored again on a beautifully executed header, and Brazil really started to press, even fighting amongst themselves. Hulk scored in extra-time to bring the score to its final of 2-1, and all across LA the party was starting (not to mention a few hours south).

That there is a guy on the Brazilian team named Hulk seems like it would really only make sense if the guy looks like the Hulk---which he does, strangely enough. They also have Neymar, a young kid who Pele spoke about as being the next great Brazilian super-duper star, and he's looking like he's up for it. They've got a big dude known simply as Juan, and the poofy-afro guy and the sleek older goal-scoring machine guy.

Between Hulk and Neymar and Juan and the old sleek guy, they were a freaking powerhouse during every match they showed on TV, which was every match. This team scored at least three goals in every game they played. In the game against Honduras, Brazil conceded a goal, then tied it, then conceded another goal, then tied it, and then went ahead, winning 3-2. At no point that game did it seem like Brazil was not in complete control. An amazing thing to see.

This Brazilian squad has the majority of the team that will be performing in the World Cup in 2014, which will be hosted by...Brazil. This is pretty much their World Cup team, an event their hosting, and anything short of the gold medal was going to be a disaster.

This was to be part of a larger argument to thrust the majority of this Brazilian team into that old argument about best ever. Olympics, 2012; then hosting the World Cup (which anything short of winning will be catastrophic); then, they were to try and defend their medal in the Olympics in 2016. Where are those games going to be held? Rio.

Brazil gets the next World Cup, and the next summer Olympics.

But, if you like watching soccer at its prettiest, Brazil, game-in and game-out would be worth your time. We're talking about a country that, besides sending 27k troops to the Italian front during WWII (and losing just over 900 of them) and sending a handful of seamen to the Allies in WWI (that didn't get used because the war ended), hasn't been involved in any military battles since the 1860s, and has never even lost any wars since it gained independence. Soccer has Brazil's most well-trained young men in anything, and it shows. Hosting and then losing the 1950 World Cup to Uruguay counts as one of the countries most tragic events, and that's not a joke.

In soccer, in Brazil, it's 2014 or bust.


2) What's the Deal with Usain Bolt Coverage?

Maybe I'm not the right guy to talk, since I don't have all the neato cable channels, but why the hell is the replay of the men's 4x100m so goddamned hard to find on NBC's Olympic coverage site? Am I being cynical if I wonder why we're being force fed the women's 4x100m, which is a spectacular result--the US ladies breaking the world record--while at the same time the non-US world record breaking  result is trying to be diminished?

That's probably too strong. We get tiny doses of Usain Bolt on regular NBC, and then the replays on the web are buried under replays of heats, of videos about Johann Blake and even a special about a rural sweet potato that makes racers like Asafa Powell and Usain and Johann so fast. Just show me the fucking race.

Usain Bolt is the greatest sprinter yet to race on Earth, and it's hard to argue that at this point (barring some failed drug tests, ahem, Carl Lewis). Over the course of '08 Beijing games and these games, Bolt's been in six events (three each), got six gold medals, and set four world records. He's broken his own records as well at non-Olympic games.

The sprints are marquis track and field events...they're just more marquis when Americans are winning I guess. Waiting to after 11 pm to show the races...please...


3) Hope Solo Enters my Ring of Great Athlete Names

Hope Solo, the foxy goalie for Team America, gold medal winning ladies of the soccer world, has a great name that signifies both her femininity, her sport, and her position in her sport.

Her and Alex Morgan? Goddamn...


4) Phelps vs Lochte

In the run-up to the events I kept hearing about this new swimmer, Ryan Lochte, hearing about how he was the next coming of Michael Phelps, how he was even better than Phelps. He even started showing up all over the place in commercials. Sweet, I thought, someone better than Phelps is going to be probably the greatest swimming phenom ever.

After doing some research I learned that Lochte is older than Phelps, and the perception that he was better came from the constant chatter about him, mostly due, I can only guess, to his victories over Phelps in American qualifiers.

I guess Phelps was holding it for the real games, as he went on to become the most decorated Olympian ever.

For sports fans, this is a pretty heady time to be watching sports. We've got, in Bolt and Phelps, two humans that could be considered the greatest ever at their sports. Add them to the lost that also includes Roger Federer, and maybe even Tiger Woods, and you could say that either this is just a thing we've created for the here-and-now crowd, or it's just one of those moments in life we're lucky to see.


5) Fat Man Lifts Fat Weight

Holy cow! I searched out and found on the NBC site the gold medal Clean & Jerk results. The Clean & Jerk is always more weight than the Snatch, the other weightlifting event.

I could probably make an entire post about the hilarity of the names of the two weightlifting events: the Snatch and the Clean & Jerk...

In any case, the C&J winner was a great big fat man from Iran, whose last name I find it easiest to consider as three names wedged together, Salimikordasiabi, lifted 247 kilograms. That's an equivalent of almost 545 pounds.

Wow. Now go fight that bear and put that shit to use.


6) No Heartwarming Redemption Video for Ukhov?

Ivan Ukhov is a Russian high-jumper who was best known for being the drunk guy, then lost his shirt, jumped in tee-, and eventually won the gold medal. I've changed the channel from seen background stories of redemption or rising in the face of great adversity about Oscar Pistorius--the Blade Runner from South Africa--and that runner from Grenada, Kenyard, so I know they have made them featuring non-US athletes.

Why not Ukhov? Is it because he looks like a hippie?

Well, it's more likely that it's because he's Russian, and they're not going to be letting any American company film any of their athletes for anything that isn't part of the games themselves.


7) Ribbon Twirling Surpisingly Mesmerizing

Dancing around with toys and props apparently is a medal worthy Olympic event, rather series of events, and I learned that Russia has dominated them since, eh, forever?

I was trapped, though, hypnotized almost, by the twirling of the ribbons, either solo or in the groups when three girls had ribbons and two had hula-hoops.

I heard that trampoline was also a medal worthy sport, but I didn't see any of it.


8) Epilogue

I wanted this to be the last post about Olympic material, but I have one more observation I wanted to mention, but I'll put that somewhere else. It's just not ready yet (I have numbers to crunch). I also have a post that touches on a gesture I noticed many times during the games but isn't a gesture with a necessarily sports specificity. I'll get to that later also.