Filling Some Seats

   One of the fun things about watching the Olympics is looking at all the empty seats. They literally can't give the tickets away- everyone from Greece is running a (Insert Your Town Name Here) House of Pizza, I guess. Maybe they're all guarding Macedonia's border. Either way, I've seen more poeple at Hug A Leper day in Calcutta. If this was a high school party, somebody would desperately need to make a beer run.

   Maybe terrorism scared everyone away. Maybe the Greco(Grecian?) economy is so bad, no one can afford to ditch work. Or maybe, just maybe....nobody gives a damn.

   Nothing personal. These athletes train their whole lives for this moment. I always feel badly when I look at some poor pentathlete or swimmer. The corporate American entertainment machine refuses to allow team handball and their ilk to thrive. The NBA, NFL and MLB collude to keep the other sports- like Prone Shooting- down. Or...maybe nobody gives a damn.

   Rulon Gardner walked into Sydney in 2000 and defeated the most dominant man in ANY sport, the fearsome Russian Alexander Karelin. He's an aw-shucks kid from a farm, and he is the epitome of courage- he's fighting with 9 toes, and a pin in his wrist. Still, he's about the 50th most famous wrestler in the world, trailing The Rock, Stone Cold, Triple H, and the splendidly curvy Dawn Marie, among others. He probably meets people who don't believe he's a wrestler because they haven't seen him on Smackdown ©.

   Because nobody gives a damn.

   Can you see some poor Spartan trying to scalp tickets to this crap? "Yo...got them curling tickets here, y'all..."

   What they need to do is liven these games up- pronto. I'm just one girl, but I have a few ideas. Let's throw these sports out there in China, 2008:

 

- One on One Basketball

   People probably made the same noise you just made reading "One on One Basketball" when someone suggested "Beach Volleyball." Yet Beach Volleyball gets on TV, and it seemed like people not related to the participants actually showed up for last night's game.

I like it, myself. US kids can't play fundamental ball? Bring Yuri out onto our court, and we'll see how the skills serve him. No double screens to hide behind here.

   Think of the American tryouts. Think of the Egos involved. Iverson, Jordan, TMac...with the spotlight allllll to themselves. No meddlesome Larry Brown trying to put his stamp on the game. No goofy trapezoid lane. No biased European refs. There is the potential for great drama, as well. Hell, imagine the joy if some Lithuanian kid manages to steal a game from Kobe in 2008?

 

- NFL Football

   Europeans, without American intervention, beat themselves into starving ruin every 50 years or so. Then we come along with a Marshall Plan, and everyone gets fed. Simply put, we know what they need more than they do. What they need is NFL football. I'd even go so far as renaming the sport to avoid putting off the soccer fans. It could only fatten NFL purses.

   Including football in the Olympics might actually spell the end of modern warfare- it's no coincidence that there hasn't been a Civil War in the United States since we founded the NFL.

 

- Knockout

   Medal contenders walk through the crowd in disguise, trying to score one-punch knockouts on random fans. This will either draw the fans to the games in droves, or empty the stadium completely.

 

 

Dodge Ball

   As goofy as this sounds, I can make it sell. We just have to replace the squishy red ball with large stones. I can already see a Dodger on the SI cover, stepping over the body of a comrade to dent the dome of some hapless Romanian.

It is very hard to relate to an Olympic sprinter/gymnast/equestrian/whatever. They live this cloistered life of training, they are usually soaked with reknown, and they are usually quite far removed from Joe Six Pack or Mary Motherofthree.

But every American who went to public school has been on the wrong end of the Dodgeball. Africans, Europeans and Asians, while they may have had no exposure to the sport, can relate to the feeling a Dodger would have when the lines have pressed forward and they are unarmed in the face of an onrushing adversary.

 

Catfighting

   In order to draw in the viewers, the selection process will be unique, here. Countries will simply send their Miss Universe candidate to the China games. The Gold Medal round will be conducted in a big vat of Jell-O © brand instant pudding. If Mills Lane can be revived, he may be the only man who can keep the combatants in order.

Now, while we might be better served sending Gail Kim or Mighty Molly to China, I really think Shannen Doherty is the one we want over there. She will embody the attitude a catfighter should have, and I would not be at all surprised to see several Doherty imitators at the 2012 games in Las Vegas.