Welcome to the The Sports Report: Olympics edition

The Eiffel Tower is lit up at night days before the Olympics in Paris.

By John CherwaSpecial Contributor

July 24, 2024 4 AM PT

Welcome to the first of our 2024 version of our Olympic newsletters. Consider this one an hors d’oeuvre before we get down to business. I’m John Cherwa and I’ll be your tour guide down this Parisian adventure.

So, why the need for a separate Olympic newsletter, you may ask? Well, those of you of a certain age will remember when many hotels in Las Vegas would offer a 99-cent shrimp cocktail. That was before Las Vegas earned its well-deserved reputation for price gouging. The gold standard, of course, goes to Louisville during Kentucky Derby week. Note: The first of many digressions.

The idea with the dollar dollop of cocktail sauce with a couple of things believed to be sea creatures was just to get you in the door so you could sample some much more interesting fare, be it gaming, shows, and did we mention gaming? This newsletter is that 99-cent shrimp cocktail, luring you in so we can tip you to our outstanding coverage of the 2024 Olympics from our award-winning staff in Paris and support from a lot of journalists back here stateside. The newsletter also will have original content and commentary and surprises that even we don’t know about yet. Bundle it all together, plus a healthy amount of TV watching on NBC and its various platforms, and this should be a fun Olympics that we can experience together.

Before we leave this section, we need to point out there are two things that separate us from the shrimp cocktail. First, we’re free. Encourage your friends to read and sign up your enemies … twice. And, the other thing, is we promise no intestinal distress.

T-minus two days

In Olympic parlance, today is called -2 day of the Games. Competition starts before the opening ceremony with a couple of team events. So, we’ve got soccer (no, we’re not calling it football or using words such as pitch or equalizer, either) and rugby-sevens, which is pretty self-explanatory.

Be it coincidence or a random schedule that had all the honesty of an old Sepp Blatter World Cup draw, the U.S. is playing France in both soccer and rugby. This will be the first appearance by the U.S. men’s soccer team since 2008. France is pretty good and should win easily. But fear not, the first two teams in the group qualify for the quarterfinals and the other teams in the group are New Zealand and Gambia. So, the U.S. men may make the quarterfinals for the first time since 1956. Our Kevin Baxter will be in Marseille.

NBC, apparently, doesn’t believe these games are important enough to put on the big network, instead opting for reruns of “Chicago Med” (“I Think I Know You, but Do I Really?” First aired May 22), “Chicago Fire” (“All the Dark,” March 27) and “Chicago P.D.” (May 8) during its prime-time hours.

As an aside, more patients seems to survive on “Chicago Med” than on “Grey’s Anatomy,” which tends to kill off one of its featured patients each week. Just in case you wondered. Told you there would be digressions.

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The soccer match will be on USA Network, which is pretty much like having to take your brother or sister to the prom. It starts at noon PDT and we’ll deliver full coverage on our Paris Olympics page. The same page will feature our TV listings, top news and analysis and our live blog with constant updates about the Games. In fact, bookmark our Olympics page, right now.

The U.S. men’s rugby-sevens actually plays twice, first against France at 7:30 a.m. PDT and at 11:30 a.m. PDT against Fiji. They also will be on the USA network, or at least partially shown. We’re told Peacock has everything. Don’t get too attached to men’s rugby as it’s over on Saturday. In the world rugby rankings, words I’ve never typed before, France is ranked fifth, Fiji is sixth and the U.S. is ninth.

Have you bookmarked that page yet?

LA 2028 fast-forward

Gonna let you in on a little secret. The Olympic Games in 2028 will be in (are you ready?) Los Angeles. You knew? Sorry. Well, did you know not all of the Olympics are in L.A. or California. In a move that can only be explained as the alternate universe of the “Grapes of Wrath,” the softball and canoe slalom will be in Oklahoma City. When we figure it out, we’ll let you know.

OK, back to the point of this section. Most days, we’ll tell you where sports will be played in 2028. We’ll start with the rugby-sevens which will be at the multisports complex at Cal State Dominguez Hills in Carson. The complex will be jumping as it’s also hosting track cycling, tennis, field hockey, and — are you ready? — modern pentathlon.

Rugby will be held in the near-30,000-seat main stadium, where the Galaxy have mostly, but not completely, redefined mediocrity the last few years. This year, however, the club seems to be on a tear and is leading the Western Conference.

Why this host?

So, why was I selected to host this newsletter? That’s a pretty good question. While we think about an answer — other than the five who turned it down — I’ll give you a little background. I’ve been the bureau chief for 11 Olympics and worked on coverage for eight, now nine more. I’ve performed that task for The Times, Chicago Tribune and a now defunct company that used to own both the Times and Tribune. Rumor has it if you say its name three times in front of a mirror in a darkened bathroom, a terrible image will appear.

So it’s with those memories and prejudices that I will guide you through these Games the next couple of weeks. OK, let’s do a quick version of speed dating with me, about the Games since the turn of the century.

Favorite Games: (tie) Sydney (2000) and London (2012)

Least favorite Games: Sochi, Russia (2012)

Best food: Turin, Italy (2006)

Worst food: Athens (2004)

Favorite memory: Vancouver (2010), walking the streets after Canada won the gold medal in men’s hockey. Pure jubilation. Spontaneous choruses of “O Canada.” Everyone must have thought they were Hoda Kotb as much as they were just walking up to people and giving them a hug.

Least favorite memory: Sochi (2012), and being the only one at Olympic security upon my arrival at 3 a.m. as Russian officials took two hours to go through my bags and decided to throw away half my medications because they said I was allowed to bring only two into the country.

Weirdest Games: Rio de Janeiro (2016) had it all: green diving pools, bullets at the equestrian center and shots at the media bus, controlled explosion near the cycling course, sleeping guards at security and Ryan Lochte and his merry band of ne’er-do-wells being whisked out of the country like a scene from “Argo.”

Weirdest Games (Part 2): Beijing (2022), where our Times crew was not allowed to take one step outside controlled areas, which were limited to the hotel, Main Media Center and competition venues. Not one step. Plus, daily gag-inducing COVID throat swabs, a robot that made cocktails and colleague David Wharton getting a strong talking to for playing the Steinway in the hotel lobby.

Favorite event: Closing Ceremony.

Promise, once the competition starts, less of this and more of that.

Must-read links

Let’s catch up on some stories you might have missed, but shouldn’t have:

Your TV guide

How can you watch the Games today? Check out our Wednesday Olympic TV listings.

Until next time...

That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at [email protected], and follow me on Twitter at @latimeshouston. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.