Spot-on, Paulie...

Paulie is right about the new-wave "overkill" Olympic coverage that has been provided by NBC.

If someone is a Winter Olympics junkie, I'm sure these two weeks are nirvana, but Paul brings up a valid issue about TV scheduling, and which NBC network carries which sport, etc. The only constant seems as if it will be some sort of figure skating, whether it be pairs, mens, womens, ice dancing, etc. on big NBC prime time every night. Otherwise, it is mass confusion.

I was reading a Jim Lampley interview the other day, and he was recalling back to his early days at ABC for the 1976 Innsburck Winter Olympics, and how at the time ABC had a then-staggering total of about 48 hours total of broadcast for the entire games. By comparison for his gig in Torino, NBC is providing something like 10 times that amount of coverage, split between its networks.

I'm sure ABC would be guilty of much of the same overkill today were it, and not NBC, telecasting the Torino games in the states, and would probably be similarly shuttling events between big ABC and its various ESPN affiliates. Yet for me, at least, the Olympics started to lose their edge once NBC got hold of them. I don't think ABC has done one since the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary.

The "Olympic "fluff" has been so overdone by NBC that it makes watching an almost tedious affair, and the winter version seems to include more of this stuff than the summer Olympics. ABC just did it better, with Jim McKay in his perfect element, not talking down to the audience as does the patronizing Costas. If we had a men's downhill at this Olympics that was as thrilling as Franz Klammer's run in 1976 (called by Gifford and Bob Beattie!), I doubt it would be as big a deal, simply because it would probably get lost in the mass of NBC coverage.

At least my folks, and my mom in particular, are enjoying watching all of the Olympics (especially the ice skating for my mom and Aunt Rose). They were all over for dinner last night, and were looking forward to watching more Olympics, as they love to watch the skaters. Maybe NBC's strategy is sound after all, if it has hooked a lot like my mom and Aunt Rose on the skating every night, knowing that viewers like them will watch the skating and care little about luge or biathlon.

Yesterday, for me, I had the digital TV fired up and probably had 25 college hoops games from which to choose throughout the day, plus watching a few more on the internet (such as the Loyola-Chi. vs. Ill.-Chicago game), and spent very little time chasing the Torino events on the NBC networks. I will risk political incorrectness and say that I switched away from that women's ice hockey game I came across when channel-hopping yesterday. I saw a lot more of Jay Bilas and Digger Phelps than I did of Costas on Saturday. By me, Old Dominion vs. Virginia Commonwealth in CAA hoops was a lot more interesting than women's ice hockey. But that's just me.

Still no complaints, as what can beat a full Saturday of college hoops? For me, that was nirvana!