NBC Olympic coverage / Favorite broadcast team

[Steveknj]

I'm really surprised there's no thread on the Olympic Coverage? Is anyone watching? I admit, I'm a sucker for the Olympics, and I am spending my two weeks watching (while my trusty Tivos are recording my normal shows!!) So what does everyone think? I think the coverage has been good, and they have stayed away from too much "Up Close and Personal" stuff to coin the old ABC phrase. The few stories they HAVE done have been relatively short. I think the graphics and camerawork has been top notch. Now on the announcing teams...they have, for the most part, taken homerism to another level. Yes, I undersand that we are an American audience, and we root for Americans, but is anyone else noticing how the announcers seem to find small flaws in foreign athletes while building up every Americans performance, good or bad? Even the overhyped Bodie stuff they seem to be trying to put a positive spin on. That said, my best and worst announcer teams:

Best:
Hockey announcers, especially Doc Emerick and John Davidson (and the woman who did the woman's hockey). I usually am not a DOC fan, but I think he's been fantastic during the Olympics. JD as always is very insightful. And I think that Bill Clement has grown into a very accomplished studio host.

Worst:
Figure skating. This group is homerism at it's worst. Dick Button, who I used to actually enjoy do figure skating on ABC back in the day, has been about the worst announcer I've ever heard. If a skater doesn't "inspire" him, it doesn't matter if they did a quintuple flip with a triple double heart bypass, he hates the performance. Dick, the sport has past you by. The technical part of it is what counts these days. Scott Hamilton has had very little to add because Button hasn't let him say anything. And the woman (who's name escapes me also) is about the only decent one, but she's ALSO been a huge homer. I bet poor Hammond wishes he's back doing college football about now!!

Any other comments?

[mrpantstm]

None. I just wish they'd stfu. They repeat the same things over and over again. I really only want to hear the roar of the crowd and maybe whose turn it is. Otherwise ssssh.

[flyers088]

The curling announcers are the best. Very knowledgeable and give real insight as to what needs to be done on each shot. Not afraid to criticize.

[lalouque]

Have you heard the curling announcers?? Not very professional, but funny as heck and you can tell they love their sport. Actually, the two Dons are pretty good. It's the other guy (who's name escapes me) that scares me.

[Steveknj]

I agree, the curling announcers are very good. Makes a rather boring sport (in my opinion anyway) seem pretty exciting. Don Chevrier, the lead announcer is kind of a legendery voice of Curling and if I recall used to do a lot of NHL and baseball in Canada. I like any announcers who are doing sports out of the "mainstream" who explain the nuances. I'm not sure there are many teams that NBC is using outside of the curling guys who have done a good job of this. The Bobsled announcers have done it somewhat. So have the shortrack speedskating guys. Other than that, I'm not too sure who else has.

[Steve_Martin]

I quit watching mainly because the coverage was 2 days old and I got tired of the wall to wall ice skating coverage (figure skating, ice dancing and all its permutations).

[DLiquid]

I like Scott Hamilton but I can't stand that old guy.

[Lainie*H]

Dick Button has been making me laugh. Last night I had to rewind because I had to hear him say "ugly feet" again.

[Scubee]

I quit watching mainly because the coverage was 2 days old and I got tired of the wall to wall ice skating coverage (figure skating, ice dancing and all its permutations).

Outside of NBC, none of the other channels have covered ice skating and they're only six hours ahead of the east coast. 2 days? Sounds like your just thread crapping.

I agree the ice skating announcers need to shut-up. It's like the HAVE to be talking. Biathalon may be worse though. Thumbs up to the curling guys.

[Steveknj]

I quit watching mainly because the coverage was 2 days old and I got tired of the wall to wall ice skating coverage (figure skating, ice dancing and all its permutations).

The figure skating has always been the premiere event at the Winter Olympics, and some of the women's figure skating has gotten some of the hightest ratings in Olympic history (and if I recall, the Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan episode is one of the highest rated shows of all time). No wonder NBC is showing so much coverage. But, do they need to show the 34th ranked skater from Upper Slabovia who has no chance of winning? They don't do that for the other sports. It just bores me, and I do admit that I enjoy the drama of the last few figure skaters going for the gold (does that make me less of a man? hmmm?) In fact, I remarked to the wife that I couldn't believe I actually noticed one of the skaters "two footed" a landing. I was almost embarrased to admit it!!

That said, for those of you who are generally fans of the Olympics, do you notice, since Kwan dropped out that there is a lot less of a buzz about figure skating these Olympics?

[Steve_Martin]

I agree that figure skating is most popular, just not with me. :)

I really like the winter games because there are lots of sports that don't get regular coverage (skating being the obvious exception). I'd enjoy it more and watch more frequently if there were more variety in the coverage and less backstory on the athletes.


(edited to clarify a few things)

[ReenieS]

:) I do love Ice Skating, but the coverage has been awful. Instead of watching the main broadcast, I've started TIVOing the "Olympic Ice" segments. I get all the top skaters, the best falls, and usually no Dick Button. I always enjoy Scott Hamilton, and I think David Pelletier has a future as a commentator (but not his partner, Jamie Sale-- she just kinda sits there with a blank stare most of the time).

The recap for the Original Ice Dance was a scream. :eek: The opening featuring all the couples falling set to music was funny, Especially Scotty's singing at the end...."Original dance...Ambulance! Freestyle Dance--- No Ambulance!! (we hope)"!! I rolled off the bed on that one! I had to replay that bit over and over for my husband, and he HATES figure skating!

[Steveknj]

OK, after watching some of the women's final, I must admit, they did a better job, mostly because Dick Button kept his mouth shut for the most part. I enjoyed how they explained the scoring and how they broke down why the Japanese skater won and how Sasha Cohen beat Slutskya. After Sasha was ahead during the short program, I thought there was the proper buzz/hype. I didn't think it was too overdone, which I was glad. I did remark to wife, before Sasha skated that she was going to choke, and sure enough she did. I was surprised that Slutskya choked too though. The Japanese skater, with nothing to lose shined through. Which leads me to my next point:

Do you think that with NBC overhyping some of these athletes it adds a temendous amount of pressure on them? Consider:
Bodie Miller - no medals and he's already been hyped and has his own commercials. I know he SAYS that this doesn't bother him, but in the back of his head, all the hype HAS to be bothering him.
Sasha Cohen - built up as the next Amercian skating queen, falls in her event
Michelle Kwan - doesn't skate because of injury, but some of the hype might have lead to that discision
Jen Rodriguez - hyped as the Amercian female hope in figure skating, gets nothing
Opolo Anton Ono - one bronze medal, expected to win more
Henrich and Davis - Win one gold each after being hyped as multiple winners, lose in what was both's premiere event and then snipe at each other

I'm sure there are a couple of others who I'm not thinking about. That said, some of the other gold medal winners who had no pressure came out winning. The skier who won the men's combined. The other speedskater, Creek. It just seemed when the hype was there, the American atheletes for the most part choked.

[EchoBravo]

Another thumbs up to the curling crew. I've been watching a lot of curling. It's only after about an hour that I think to myself "Why am I watching this?" I still don't get the scoring, but it's hypnotic somehow... And looks like it'd be fun to play (while drinking... like shuffleboard, but you're standing on the table).

This group is homerism at it's worst. <snip> And the woman (who's name escapes me also) is about the only decent one, but she's ALSO been a huge homer.Methinks that's what 'Merica demands. The ratings bear this out. Down significantly since Salt Lake City. "It ain't in 'Merica, so I don't care." And look at the hockey ratings... Which never light the world on fire even in the best of times. The home team is shamed out early and nobody watches after that.

The Finns look unstoppable!

[zync]

Oh ya, Curling wins rocks down.

[smak]

Henrich and Davis - Win one gold each after being hyped as multiple winners, lose in what was both's premiere event and then snipe at each other



HEDRICK and Davis won 5 total medals.

-smak-

[DianaMo]

It would be nice if the local cable company would tune in NBC better.

Last night I thought the burn-in on the tv was getting rather extreme, but it turned out that the cable company just didn't have the channel tuned in as well as they should have.

[TomK]

The curling announcers are the best. Very knowledgeable and give real insight as to what needs to be done on each shot. Not afraid to criticize.

Well put! I find them very informative and very entertaining and they get my vote.

[TiVangelist]

Ray Ferraro and Bill Clement, the hockey studio hosts, have been great. They did their homework and always have something interesting to say, despite having been through something like 54 games. I miss Ray already. Plus Doc Emrick and John Davidson have been great, too. Those Finnish games can be quite a tongue-twister ("Peltonen goes to Numminen, on to Niemenen....) but Doc handled it all with enthusiasm and excitement.

[jsmeeker]

Do you think that with NBC overhyping some of these athletes it adds a temendous amount of pressure on them? Consider:
Bodie Miller - no medals and he's already been hyped and has his own commercials. I know he SAYS that this doesn't bother him, but in the back of his head, all the hype HAS to be bothering him.
Sasha Cohen - built up as the next Amercian skating queen, falls in her event
Michelle Kwan - doesn't skate because of injury, but some of the hype might have lead to that discision
Jen Rodriguez - hyped as the Amercian female hope in figure skating, gets nothing
Opolo Anton Ono - one bronze medal, expected to win more
Henrich and Davis - Win one gold each after being hyped as multiple winners, lose in what was both's premiere event and then snipe at each other


I don't agree with all of these.

Sasha Cohen was barely talked about. It was all Michelle Kwan. Then, she dropped out. So, they talked about her dropping out and her replacement (Hughes) coming in. Sasha barely got mentions until the ladies competition actualyl started.

The speed skating duo did a nice job jauling in medals. They performed well. However, I think the media helped to fuel the tension and feud between the two of them. I really think they wanted it to be as big as possible to give them more crap to talk about.

Ono won a gold in an event. Took the least from the start and held onto it the whole way. Did you really watch any of this or even read about it?

[Steveknj]

I don't agree with all of these.

Sasha Cohen was barely talked about. It was all Michelle Kwan. Then, she dropped out. So, they talked about her dropping out and her replacement (Hughes) coming in. Sasha barely got mentions until the ladies competition actualyl started.

The speed skating duo did a nice job jauling in medals. They performed well. However, I think the media helped to fuel the tension and feud between the two of them. I really think they wanted it to be as big as possible to give them more crap to talk about.

Ono won a gold in an event. Took the least from the start and held onto it the whole way. Did you really watch any of this or even read about it?

I watched about 2/3 of it and just about all of the last week. I would have watched the whole thing, except I was away on business. I wrote what I wrote before Ono won his gold and I take back some of what I said about him. The man is a class act and I took the whole thing seriously. But somehow I feel raped by Bodie, who admitted all he cared about was the Olympic experience, meaning party time. He took none of it seriously.

I still maintain, a few days after Kwan left, they started hyping Sasha, especially the 2 days leading up to the ladies figure skating.

Back to Bodie, I wonder if he's going to have to give back his Nike money?

[murgatroyd]

The best coverage of the Olympic figure skating I've seen so far was Nagano, where TNT ran hours of daytime coverage plus a daily review show similar to "Olympic Ice". We got to see the entire short program except for the very top skaters, which they pulled out of sequence to show in primetime, and the commentary show included cool things like Roz Sumners demonstrating what makes up a good layback spin.

Part of the reason Dick Button was not as his best at these games is that he was a last-minute addition to the commentary crew. It was particularly stupid to put Dick in the booth along with Tracy Wilson, because Button doesn't know ice dancing, and Wilson and Button have wildly incompatable styles of doing commentary on events.

When Dick is 'on' and with the right partners, there are few people better -- if you had heard him in the booth at US Nationals with Kurt Browning as his partner, you would have thought it was an entirely different guy. Wilson is one of the best of the business, but if there is going to be someone else in the booth with her, it's better if they are aware of her style.

I find Sandra Bezic interesting for after-event commentary but not for play-by-play. She has an annoying way of throwing out comments that a skater or a person in the rink will understand (because they have seen the program in person), but won't necessarily make sense to a TV viewer -- and no one encouraged her to explain things more extensively. This is one of the places that the coverage suffered badly from having too many people in the booth.

The OP said:
And the woman (who's name escapes me also) is about the only decent one, but she's ALSO been a huge homer. I bet poor Hammond wishes he's back doing college football about now!!

I find this complaint especially lame because there were two different women doing commentary -- pretty dumb to complain about someone being a homer when you can't even be bothered to know who it was.

And it didn't take long for me to wish that Tom Hammond, whom I usually like, was back home doing horse racing or almost anything else. Perhaps it was the producers giving him dumb things to say, but I was very annoyed by Hammond this time around, especially his comments that "the points don't matter" for the competitors that we know will end up in the bottom of the standings. WTF was that about? The new scoring system allows skaters to earn points in an absolute sense, thus they can have "personal bests" and all the other kinds of stats beloved by fans who are into that sort of thing. Even if a skater finishes 24th, if they earn a personal best, the points matter to them. I didn't hear the guys at the speedskating venues commenting that "the times don't matter". :rolleyes:

I don't care what howlers Dick Button might have made -- what Hammond did is worse. If you are a skating fan and you start having a new appreciation for Terry Gannon while listening to Hammond, it's a sign that Hammond is screwing up bigtime.

Olympic Ice was 80% great, 20% dreadful. I disagree with the remarks about Jamie Sale. She's perfectly capable of doing good commentary, as the 'instant reports' posted on the website will show. Just because she is Canadian, and too polite to bully her way over the top of what someone else is saying, doesn't mean she doesn't do good commmentary.

I enjoyed most of all the demonstrations that Jamie and David did -- it's a pity we couldn't have seen more segments like that. And the "Moskvina Minutes" -- fabulous.

Jan

[danyb]

Hey I loved the Olympics as well. By the way did you tivo the closing ceremonies? I didn't get a chance to see it, and it would be really cool to get a copy. Let me know danyb4 at yahoo

[Steveknj]

The best coverage of the Olympic figure skating I've seen so far was Nagano, where TNT ran hours of daytime coverage plus a daily review show similar to "Olympic Ice". We got to see the entire short program except for the very top skaters, which they pulled out of sequence to show in primetime, and the commentary show included cool things like Roz Sumners demonstrating what makes up a good layback spin.

Part of the reason Dick Button was not as his best at these games is that he was a last-minute addition to the commentary crew. It was particularly stupid to put Dick in the booth along with Tracy Wilson, because Button doesn't know ice dancing, and Wilson and Button have wildly incompatable styles of doing commentary on events.

When Dick is 'on' and with the right partners, there are few people better -- if you had heard him in the booth at US Nationals with Kurt Browning as his partner, you would have thought it was an entirely different guy. Wilson is one of the best of the business, but if there is going to be someone else in the booth with her, it's better if they are aware of her style.

I find Sandra Bezic interesting for after-event commentary but not for play-by-play. She has an annoying way of throwing out comments that a skater or a person in the rink will understand (because they have seen the program in person), but won't necessarily make sense to a TV viewer -- and no one encouraged her to explain things more extensively. This is one of the places that the coverage suffered badly from having too many people in the booth.

The OP said:


I find this complaint especially lame because there were two different women doing commentary -- pretty dumb to complain about someone being a homer when you can't even be bothered to know who it was.

And it didn't take long for me to wish that Tom Hammond, whom I usually like, was back home doing horse racing or almost anything else. Perhaps it was the producers giving him dumb things to say, but I was very annoyed by Hammond this time around, especially his comments that "the points don't matter" for the competitors that we know will end up in the bottom of the standings. WTF was that about? The new scoring system allows skaters to earn points in an absolute sense, thus they can have "personal bests" and all the other kinds of stats beloved by fans who are into that sort of thing. Even if a skater finishes 24th, if they earn a personal best, the points matter to them. I didn't hear the guys at the speedskating venues commenting that "the times don't matter". :rolleyes:

I don't care what howlers Dick Button might have made -- what Hammond did is worse. If you are a skating fan and you start having a new appreciation for Terry Gannon while listening to Hammond, it's a sign that Hammond is screwing up bigtime.

Olympic Ice was 80% great, 20% dreadful. I disagree with the remarks about Jamie Sale. She's perfectly capable of doing good commentary, as the 'instant reports' posted on the website will show. Just because she is Canadian, and too polite to bully her way over the top of what someone else is saying, doesn't mean she doesn't do good commmentary.

I enjoyed most of all the demonstrations that Jamie and David did -- it's a pity we couldn't have seen more segments like that. And the "Moskvina Minutes" -- fabulous.

Jan

It is obvious you are a figure skating fan and know your stuff. I, on the other hand, am not, so I have to look at it from that perspective. SO here are my thoughts:

I remember Dick Button from when I was a kid and when he was on top of his game. It was sad to see his commentary be so awful.

You know, I didn't even REALIZE there were two different women doing the different figure skating events. I thought both equally were homers, as I stated earlier. And to me it shows, that if a casual fan cannot tell them apart, then they really didn't do a very good job.

I didn't watch Olympic Ice, so I won't comment on that. I find a lot of the background Olympic stuff rather boring, so I generally skip it.

As for Hammond, I think the point he was trying to make, was that for a good portion of the skaters in the lower rung, it was the experience of skating in the Olympics that mattered more than the points. Probably a poor choice of words on his part...

[murgatroyd]

It is obvious you are a figure skating fan and know your stuff. I, on the other hand, am not, so I have to look at it from that perspective. SO here are my thoughts:

I remember Dick Button from when I was a kid and when he was on top of his game. It was sad to see his commentary be so awful.

You know, I didn't even REALIZE there were two different women doing the different figure skating events. I thought both equally were homers, as I stated earlier. And to me it shows, that if a casual fan cannot tell them apart, then they really didn't do a very good job.

I didn't watch Olympic Ice, so I won't comment on that. I find a lot of the background Olympic stuff rather boring, so I generally skip it.

As for Hammond, I think the point he was trying to make, was that for a good portion of the skaters in the lower rung, it was the experience of skating in the Olympics that mattered more than the points. Probably a poor choice of words on his part...

Sure, non-fans and hard-core fans are obviously going to have different experiences. It's always tricky finding the balance for the Olympics because the network has to satisfy the non-fan, yet also give enough tech-talk to keep the fans happy. Look at it from my view, though, you blew off the commentary that was really interesting, then complained about the dumbed-down stuff. :p

Button clearly has good days and bad days. IIRC this is the first time he has worked with every single person in this broadcast team. I don't expect you to know that as a casual viewer -- but the fact that they did say, in essence, "ABC let us borrow Dick Button" should have been a clue. Maybe you missed that part. ;)

Point taken on your comments about not being able to tell apart Sandra Bezic and Tracy Wilson -- you must have missed the segments where Tracy did the analysis of the new judging system and the chalk-talk stuff. But as far as the 'homers' thing goes, I put that squarely on the shoulders of the producers. I am 100% sure that they did exactly what NBC asked them to do. It's a particularly amusing comment to me because both Bezic and Wilson are Canadian, and I was wanting them to talk more about the Canadians. Oh, well.

And I agree on your last comment about Hammond somewhat -- he probably meant the experience is more important than the final placements -- but yeah, a very, very poor choice of words.

Jan