It's no secret that the commentary from ESPN.com's columnists isn't exactly hard-hitting journalism. Sometimes I agree with them, but more often then not, I wonder where their idiotic points came from and how they were able to get jobs as "journalists." Bill Simmons is a Red Sox fan, so the likelihood of my agreeing with him on any particular topic is usually slim at best...then he writes something that makes me question the credibility of ESPN.com as a whole. The brilliance to which I'm referring comes in his mailbag, so instead of linking to the entire article, I'm going to post certain parts of it in italics, then rip them to shreds.
Q: Grant Wahl thinks we should play the Women's World Cup every two years. You down with that idea?
SG: Absolutely. I couldn't get my 6-year-old daughter to watch the Women's World Cup until the second half of the final game … and by extra time, she was totally hooked. She won't watch another meaningful women's soccer game until she's 10. How shortsighted is that? In general, we need to reconfigure these schedules: The Olympics and the World Cup should happen every three years.
He also proposed a schedule that goes like this: 2012 Summer Olympics, 2013 Men's World Cup, 2014 Winter Olympics & Women's World Cup, 2015 Summer Olympics, 2016 Men's World Cup, 2017 Winter Olympics & Women's World Cup.
Why wouldn't that work? Well, let's start with the soccer. He forgot another major event on the FIFA calendar, one which ranks as the second-biggest international championship in the sport...the European Championships. The Euro is also held every four years, opposite the World Cup. And teams have to qualify for both events. Believe it or not, World Cup 2014 qualifying has already started. For European nations, qualifying for one starts as soon as the other ends. Talk about short-sighted. How do you want to handle the qualifying, Bill? (For the record, Grant Wahl's suggestion about having the Women's World Cup every two years isn't that bad of an idea.)
Beyond the entertainment value of having at least one major event every year, did you ever wonder why we decided on the "every four years" thing in the first place? The modern Summer Olympics started in 1896 and settled on a four-year format for one simple reason … it was 1896! In 1921, they decided it was weird to include figure skating and hockey in the Summer Olympics, so they spun those events off into a Winter Olympics (along with new events such as skiing, speed skating, ski jumping, etc.) that launched in 1924 in France with the same every-four-years format. The Olympics didn't really become THE OLYMPICS until 1936...only we were stuck with the every-four-years gimmick at that point. And it's been that way ever since. Why? Because of the always-dangerous, "That's the way we've always done it!" logic.
Actually, the every four years thing has nothing to do with the fact that the first Olympics took place in 1896. It came from the Ancient Greeks (you know, those people who put on the Olympics for 1,500 years!). How often were the Ancient Olympics held? Every four years. That's your precedent. It has nothing to do with when the first modern Olympics were held. In fact, the IOC was founded in 1894 and the original plan was to have the first Olympics in Paris in 1900. However, the rest of the committee convinced the Olympics' founder, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, that waiting six years would be too long, and that the first Games should be held in Greece. So, the four-year cycle was preserved, Paris 1900 became the second Olympics, and the first Games were held in Athens in 1896.
And if you think about it, the Olympics don't take place every four years. They take place every two years. The first Winter Games took place in 1924, and they were both held in the same year until 1992. Eventually, the IOC realized that holding both in the same year was becoming too costly, so they moved the Winter Games to the even year in between Summer Games, starting in 1994. It's been that way ever since. The only reason the Winter Olympics ended up in the same year as the World Cup is because, when organizing the first World Cup, FIFA decided it didn't want to go up head-to-head with the Olympics, so they adopted the same four-year cycle, just opposite the Olympics. The IOC moving the Winter Games wasn't an issue because the World Cup takes place in the summer.
Going every three years would be more entertaining, generate more money, give us a better measure of who mattered the most during a 10-year window, and do a better job of capturing athletes as they're peaking.
This is my favorite part. I'll start with the money part. I'm not sure how much more money it would generate for the IOC or FIFA. Part of what the appeal of the Olympics and World Cup is the fact that they're held every four years. If they were held more frequently, there would be less novelty, and the TV contracts would reflect that (read: not be as high). In addition, do you have any idea how expensive it is just to bid for the Olympics or World Cup? If you ask cities/nations to do that more frequently, you're going to get stuck with inferior bids that end up hosting because they're the only ones willing to pony up the money. You're asking NOCs/local bid committees to fund bids that might not pan out more often, which isn't going to happen. And you'd get stuck with undesirable locations for the Olympics/World Cup, which means people would be less willing to travel there, and you're giving them one less year to get the money together if they decide they want to make a trip to one of these once-in-a-lifetime events.
But the athletes' peak argument is the one that really doesn't make any sense. If you figure an Olympic athlete's peak is anywhere between six and eight years, that's two Olympics. Sure, some unfortunately get stuck with only one Olympics in their prime, but, for the most part, they'll get at least two. Some of the lucky ones get more than two. Example: Michael Phelps. His peak was roughly 2001-08. There were two Olympics during that timeframe, and he won 16 medals in Athens and Beijing. And sometimes even the greatest athletes don't win Olympic gold even during their peak. Michelle Kwan won nine World Championships, was at her peak in 1998 and won silver. She wasn't exactly over the hill in Salt Lake City, when she settled for bronze.
The fact that you have to wait four years to redeem yourself is part of the appeal. For both fans and athletes. Unfortunately, there are some sports columnists that don't get that. So, Bill, do I agree with your plan to have the Olympics and World Cup on three-year cycles instead of every four years? No I don't.
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