Poll: Will the 2020 Olympics ever happen?

[mnewsham]

They should just move the cycle back another year and hold it next year, future Olympics scheduled would be pushed back two years.

I don't think it would be fair if Japan had to completely scrap the whole thing.

I believe IOC already said they're not going to do that.

It's either this summer, or it's after LA's 2028 Olympics so it would be 2032 by the time it would go back to tokyo, and they'd need to do a bunch of infrastructure redevelopment AGAIN at that point.

So basically flushing billions down the toilet no matter which way it goes. Having it this summer would be the cheapest, but has a high potential of causing COVID issues. And they've already lost billions from the 1-year delay. Canceling entirely would be wasting even more billions but would significantly reduce the risk of a major COVID event.

Really a shit show.

 

[Red Squirrel]

They should just have two olympics in the same year, especially if it's winter and summer, I don't think it would be too bad of a thing to do. So they could push it to 2022, hopefully things will be back to normal by then. The way things are going though... I can see it where things are not still back to normal by then.

But either way, yeah they are losing lot of money right now. Not a great situation for them.

 

[Muse]

They should just have two olympics in the same year, especially if it's winter and summer, I don't think it would be too bad of a thing to do. So they could push it to 2022, hopefully things will be back to normal by then. The way things are going though... I can see it where things are not still back to normal by then.

But either way, yeah they are losing lot of money right now. Not a great situation for them.

One thing you might not be considering is that the athletes have already (most of them) had to recalibrate their thinking, training, mindset, etc. by a one year delay. Asking them to do that again is tough on most of them. It goes beyond money and the pandemic.

 

[Red Squirrel]

One thing you might not be considering is that the athletes have already (most of them) had to recalibrate their thinking, training, mindset, etc. by a one year delay. Asking them to do that again is tough on most of them. It goes beyond money and the pandemic.

Oh that is true as well. They train knowing it's on a certain date then it changes, then they basically need to keep training or at least maintain etc, then change it again on them... that can be a pain.

 

[Ajay]

I think that they will go on a scheduled with greatly reduced on site crowd sizes. The TV rights should rake in huge bucks. But, what the heck do I know

 

[Captante]

They should just have two olympics in the same year, especially if it's winter and summer, I don't think it would be too bad of a thing to do. So they could push it to 2022, hopefully things will be back to normal by then. The way things are going though... I can see it where things are not still back to normal by then.

But either way, yeah they are losing lot of money right now. Not a great situation for them.

If I'm not mistaken they used to do this every year so it's certainly feasible, however they sheer amount of media alone that has to be shuffled around is a bit daunting in 2021.

 

[Muse]

Some 70,000 are descending on Tokyo including athletes, support staff, media, etc.

Emergency has been declared in Japan, the delta variant being the dominant strain there now. The Japanese want to do what they can to prevent possible exacerbation of the situation. Vaccination rates are very low as of yet in Japan.

Word yesterday is Japan has banned crowds in most venues, not just foreigners, but Japanese, people who have tickets. Some outdoors events (including baseball, the marathon, I'm thinking golf) will have some spectators, I didn't get details.

 

[Edgy]

It's all money and politics at this point.

Why? Because just being best performing athlete is not enough for THIS Olympics.

An athlete can be best but if they get unlucky and catch covid = disqualification.

Basically Japan has lost any sort of control over pandemic and whether or not athletes are able to avoid catching the virus during competition will become the most critical aspect of this supposedly fair and good-willed athletic competition... Basically an athlete can medal even if they are not top performer as long as they can avoid catching covid .
Meanwhile Japanese government is busy pushing their political agenda that this is "recovery" Olympics (recovery from nuclear plant disaster from decade ago), which is kinda ironic cause it's happening in the middle of massive covid breakout and potentially a world-wide spreading trigger point for delta variant of virus.

Then there's IOC which don't give a damn for anything else as long as games go on so they can keep the billions they negotiated for selling the broadcasting rights.

Japanese populace who will ultimately end up footing the bill for this fiasco and the poor athletes who find themselves competing not only with each other but also the virus in midst of uncontrolled pandemic are the victims of all this greed and politics.

Like someone said here... a real "shit show"

 

[pmv]

It's all money and politics at this point.

Why? Because just being best performing athlete is not enough for THIS Olympics.

An athlete can be best but if they get unlucky and catch covid = disqualification.

Basically Japan has lost any sort of control over pandemic and whether or not athletes are able to avoid catching the virus during competition will become the most critical aspect of this supposedly fair and good-willed athletic competition... Basically an athlete can medal even if they are not top performer as long as they can avoid catching covid .

Depends whether a significant number of athletes do get COVID. If it doesn't affect most of the serious competitors I don't think what you say here would be true.

However, if some high-profile, serious-contenders, do have to withdraw because for that reason, it will cast a shadow over the eventual medal-winners.

Meanwhile Japanese government is busy pushing their political agenda that this is "recovery" Olympics (recovery from nuclear plant disaster from decade ago), which is kinda ironic cause it's happening in the middle of massive covid breakout and potentially a world-wide spreading trigger point for delta variant of virus.

Then there's IOC which don't give a damn for anything else as long as games go on so they can keep the billions they negotiated for selling the broadcasting rights.

Japanese populace who will ultimately end up footing the bill for this fiasco and the poor athletes who find themselves competing not only with each other but also the virus in midst of uncontrolled pandemic are the victims of all this greed and politics.

Like someone said here... a real "shit show"

I think that's absolutely true about the IOC. And is typical of why it's a joke that they pretend large-scale, organised competitive sport has anything to do with 'health' or physical activity. In this case the 'health' effects are quite likely to be seriously negative.

It's part of the entertainment industry, and it's always about money. And the vast majority of those involved in this industry do very little in the way of physical activity.

 

[Spacehead]

The TV rights should rake in huge bucks. But, what the heck do I know

It's part of the entertainment industry, and it's always about money.

Yeah, there's a few bucks involved.

Per the historical precedent of swimming at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and figure skating at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, swimming finals are scheduled to be held in the morning to allow live primetime broadcasts in the Americas. NBC paid substantial fees for rights to the Olympics, so the IOC has allowed NBC to influence event scheduling to maximize U.S. television ratings when possible. On 7 May 2014, NBC agreed to a US$7.75 billion contract extension to air the Olympics through the 2032 games, which is one of the IOC's major sources of revenue. Japanese broadcasters were said to have criticized the decision, as swimming is one of the most popular Olympic events in the country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Olympiad#Event_scheduling



It's going to happen so i guess we can just hope for the best

 

[Muse]

It's all money and politics at this point.

Why? Because just being best performing athlete is not enough for THIS Olympics.

An athlete can be best but if they get unlucky and catch covid = disqualification.

Basically Japan has lost any sort of control over pandemic and whether or not athletes are able to avoid catching the virus during competition will become the most critical aspect of this supposedly fair and good-willed athletic competition... Basically an athlete can medal even if they are not top performer as long as they can avoid catching covid .
Meanwhile Japanese government is busy pushing their political agenda that this is "recovery" Olympics (recovery from nuclear plant disaster from decade ago), which is kinda ironic cause it's happening in the middle of massive covid breakout and potentially a world-wide spreading trigger point for delta variant of virus.

Then there's IOC which don't give a damn for anything else as long as games go on so they can keep the billions they negotiated for selling the broadcasting rights.

Japanese populace who will ultimately end up footing the bill for this fiasco and the poor athletes who find themselves competing not only with each other but also the virus in midst of uncontrolled pandemic are the victims of all this greed and politics.

Like someone said here... a real "shit show"

Why so cynical? Olympics is in large part about the love of athletics.

Delta variant is everywhere already anyway, so some more dispersion isn't gonna change much.

Many if not most of the athletes will have been vaccinated, at least from the major nations.

It's not an uncontrolled pandemic at this point. A lot is known about the virus and it's variants and there's the vaccines.

You can call it a shit show but what you will see on TV isn't gonna be a shit show. It will be interesting to see what the other media coverage is saying, of course.

No one is forcing athletes to go AFAIK. If they think it's not in their best interests to go, they don't have to. Steph Curry's not going, he says it's so he can better prepare for next season. Sha'Carri Richardson has been banned. What her true thoughts and feelings are concerning this, I don't know. Maybe she violated the protocols thinking she didn't want to go. But I bet Steph is vaccinated. And Sha'Carri? Don't know. Anyway, most of these athletes are probably not terrified of the virus, they are relatively young and healthy. Then there's the entourages... 70,000 are descending on Tokyo from abroad. However, I have to think they are going to be bubbled to a considerable extent. Protocols will be in place. People know how this virus is spread now. Professionals will be on this. We'll see. By the end of October, it should be pretty clear how this went in most every respect.

 

[ultimatebob]

Yeah, it's probably safe to let the Olympics move forward at this point now that most of the participants are vaccinated.

Of course, the host country is probably going to lose a fortune from hosting it because they can't sell tickets for spectators to watch the events.

 

[Edgy]

Umm... Vaccination does not equal immunity FYI.

And level of knowledge and understanding about the virus does not necessarily mean things are under control. If the rate of co19 infection in Japan shows steady declining trend (which is definitely NOT the case), I would not label that uncontrolled pandemic.

When Athletes began arriving (vaccinated prior to arriving in Japan which is a requirement) and still contract the virus (whether it's during flight or on-site in Japan is yet to be determined). The organizers did not have and SOP for fundamental contact tracing system for teammates and other general populace who may have been exposed to the contracted athletes which strongly hints at the level of competence in co19 prevention standards they have in place.

This is why I label it a shit show.

Who knows, maybe I'm just pessimistic and games will be great with co19 affecting the athletes or games integrity at all which would be good thing.

 

[Muse]

If indeed the athletes are required to be vaccinated before even coming to the Olympics that would suggest that they'll be fairly well protected and this won't be a spreader event. I suppose the attending staffs must be vaccinated too? I've seen nothing suggesting any of this except for @Edgy post (#38) here, so don't know.

Edit: Says here that IOC estimates that over 80% will be vaccinated, certainly not all.

Tokyo’s Olympic Village will be very vaccinated

The IOC says most athletes will have their shots. What about the rest of the world?

www.vox.com

 

[ultimatebob]

Is anybody going to place bets on the first famous athlete that's going to get sidelined from a positive COVID-19 test? It seems like a bold new era for sports betting

 

[Red Squirrel]

Is anybody going to place bets on the first famous athlete that's going to get sidelined from a positive COVID-19 test? It seems like a bold new era for sports betting

I can just see it now, there will be covid pools and everything lol.

 

[Torn Mind]

Is anybody going to place bets on the first famous athlete that's going to get sidelined from a positive COVID-19 test? It seems like a bold new era for sports betting

Still will be a wild orgy.

Plus, the Japanese sex industry will reel in a few behind the curtains too.

 

[sdifox]

LoL IOC Chief called Japanese Chinese at a press conference...

Olympics chief mixes up Japanese and Chinese at Tokyo Games presser

Gaffe by International Olympic Committee president triggers backlash on social media

www.theguardian.com

 

[Muse]

LoL IOC Chief called Japanese Chinese at a press conference...

Olympics chief mixes up Japanese and Chinese at Tokyo Games presser

Gaffe by International Olympic Committee president triggers backlash on social media

www.theguardian.com

They were enemies during WW II. My dad fought alongside the Chinese in Burma. Not exactly the same.

 

[Torn Mind]

They were enemies during WW II. My dad fought alongside the Chinese in Burma. Not exactly the same.

The physical features of most Japanese males are pretty easy to discern. Slanted eyes, the bishonen and effeminate look. I mean, the one time I took a peek at the summer Olympics in 2012, I see the Japanese male gymnast do his routine and his look was beyond distinct. The languages have vastly different cadences and how vowels work. Japanese is very much like Latin in some respects.

Or the guy might have been thinking winter games...or the cash Xi gave him that morning.

 

[Muse]

The physical features of most Japanese males are pretty easy to discern. Slanted eyes, the bishonen and effeminate look. I mean, the one time I took a peek at the summer Olympics in 2012, I see the Japanese male gymnast do his routine and his look was beyond distinct. The languages have vastly different cadences and how vowels work. Japanese is very much like Latin in some respects.

Or the guy might have been thinking winter games...or the cash Xi gave him that morning.

I think I'm far better at differentiating the languages than the people who speak them. To me, many Asian countries' inhabitants look similar to one another. Maybe if I'd visited Asia it would not be so. But I can tell when I'm hearing Japanese, probably because of all the Japanese movies I've seen! Now, to me, Indians and Pakistanis look different from southeast Asians.

But really, Japanese is probably the only Asian language I can probably always pick out, the others probably not. It's those movies. To me, Japanese is very distinctive and recognizable (the sound of the language).

 

[Captante]

The 2020 Olympics will be scrubbed
Votes: 853.3%

Surprised this is still in the lead ... I think its pretty much a done-deal at this point we'll be watching the Olympics next week.

 

[Torn Mind]

I think I'm far better are differentiating the languages than the people who speak them. To me, many Asian countries' inhabitants look similar to one another. Maybe if I'd visited Asia it would not be so. But I can tell when I'm hearing Japanese, probably because of all the Japanese movies I've seen! Now, to me, Indians and Pakistanis look different from southeast Asians.

I definitely agree language is easier to spot once you hear the cadence and breathing pattern enough. Having heard Japanese, French(hockey feeds for the Montreal Canadiens, and also Nigerians speaking them), German(opera), Russian, Italian(opera), Shanghaiese(from mother), and Cantonese(movies, phrases from dad), Tagalog(watching Super Sentai dubs) it's easy to pick them out.

Indians and Pakistanis certainly look different. Now, within India, there are a gazillion unintelligible languages amongst the Indians.

It does take a bit of sampling to get "visual trends". I am "Chinese". In actuality, I'm part Cantonese and part from Suzhou. The Cantonese is easy. My skin is a shade of darker brown, darker than Mediterranean.

But I dunno, I get pretty good at finding trends.

Like...in the Northeast, there's certain look on Irish females that become a dead giveaway they are at least partly Irish.
German women have square features often. Jennifer Connelly is one of the most famous to come from this stock.

In The Godfather. Having a bunch of Italians made Tom Hagen(Robert Duvall) really stand out like a sore thumb. But "Moe Greene" was played by an Italian.

If there's one great thing about the Olympics, you get pics of people's mugs to look at. The German's women hockey team was one that displayed a trend.

 

[dank69]

Why are they still calling it the 2020 Olympics? It's 2021...

 

[sdifox]

Why are they still calling it the 2020 Olympics? It's 2021...

Lots of headaches involved in changing that, from printing to contracts.