It hasn't been the best of weeks for Boston sports fans. Golden Boy's suspension was upheld, although Bob Kraft still wants us all to believe that the Patriots are the victims in all this (despite the cell phone). This comes on the heels of the USOC officially pulling Boston as the U.S. bid city for the 2024 Olympics. Although, I bet there are far fewer people that are upset about that second one. The Boston Olympic bid was doomed from the start, mainly because it never had the necessary public support.
The fact that the USOC never should've picked Boston was apparent from the start. That was in January. And in the ensuing six months, nothing that transpired with the Boston bid did anything to quiet the doubters. There was the referendum, which wasn't even scheduled to happen until November 2016, more than a year after candidate names had to be in to the IOC. Then there was Bid 2.0, which took a walkable Games centered around existing venues at the colleges in the city to one that was spread across the entire State of Massachusetts. Boston was a hot mess the entire time, and Bid 2.0 didn't do a single thing to improve the bid. (A temporary Olympic Stadium that would cost $2 billion, just to tear it down right after the Games?) All it did was make it worse.
All of this left people begging the USOC to cut it losses, admit its mistake and pull the plug on Boston while there was still time to prepare a bid for another American city, likely LA. Then the last straw fell on Monday when Boston's mayor refused to sign the standard host city contract, which would've put the city on the hook for any cost overruns, even though he had previously pledged that he would agree to do that very thing. The USOC was left with no choice. Boston just made the decision for them.
IOC President Thomas Bach is understandably not happy about this development. After what happened with 2022 (more on that coming tomorrow with the vote looming early Friday morning my time), the Olympics no one wants, he knew he needed an American city in the race for 2024. That's still the case, even if it's not the USOC's first choice. Bach still expressed "confidence" that the USOC will get its act together and still submit a bid. A subtle nudge to indirectly say, "If you ever want to host the Olympics again at any point, you'd better bid for the 2024 Games, even though you now have no shot at winning."
That brings us to Los Angeles. It's not a stretch to say that LA saved the Olympic Movement in 1984. They're more than willing to come save the day again. This time for the USOC. And while I don't think LA should host the Olympics a third time when there are plenty of other American cities that deserve a shot, I do agree that they're the best option on short notice. All the venues are already in place. It would not take much for LA to get an Olympic bid ready. They'd certainly be able to get it done by the IOC's September 15 deadline.
Most experts thought LA should've been the USOC's choice back in January, which it probably should've been. The other two cities the USOC was considering were San Francisco and Washington. Both of them have seemingly moved on, which leaves Los Angeles as the only option if the USOC doesn't want to avoid the complete embarrassment of not even making it to the bid stage.
But even LA has managed to screw things up in the two days since they're suddenly back in the running. Rumor has it they're talking with San Francisco officials about co-hosting. Why? Both cities are plenty capable of hosting an Olympics on their own. And it's not like LA and San Diego would be co-hosting. One's NorCal. One's SoCal. They're close to each other relative to other American cities, but not close enough to make an Olympics work. Hopefully this is just talk and LA keeps all venues, of which there are plenty of options, within a 90-minute drive of LAX.
After the debacles of New York 2012 and Chicago 2016, the USOC sat out the 2020 race and said it would enter 2024 with a city that it thought could win. Boston was never going to be that city. Boston might be a big deal within the U.S., but it holds very little clout internationally. And it's certainly not as glamorous as the other cities that have announced their intentions to bid (Paris and Rome chief among them). Los Angeles might've had a shot if the USOC had picked them off the bat. But after everything that's gone down, I think LA's chances are doomed, too.
Whether or not the USOC switches to an LA bid (which I think they will), the race that many experts thought was an American city's to lose is going to be an uphill battle. Consider: The FIFA thing is going to make a lot of people leery about the U.S., the IOC voters will still have the whole Boston situation on their minds when they go to vote, Toronto's probably going to bid, and 2024 will be 12 years since the last Games held in Europe.
When the USOC first picked Boston, it looked like they didn't really want to win and they were just bidding because everybody expected/wanted them to. If they were serious, they would've gone with LA or San Francisco off the bat. The U.S. might've gone into that race as the favorite. We're still two years away from the 2024 Olympic host being selected, but I think it's safe to say that Bach won't be opening up an envelope that says "Los Angeles" when that vote is conducted.
My gut tells me that the 2024 Olympics will be in Europe. I've thought that ever since Tokyo was selected for 2020. It'll be 12 years since London, and that's the longest we've ever gone without an Olympics in Europe. And keep in mind, the IOC is still incredibly Euro-centric. After three straight trips to Asia, they'll want to be close to home. Especially since they already know they're going to have at least two beautiful world cities, which just happen to be European capitals, to choose from.
There's also a new elephant in the room. Toronto. Which just happens to be the most desirable North American city to the IOC right now, as well as probably the most Olympic-ready. Everybody knows that the Pan Am Games were a dress rehearsal for an Olympics. Toronto, of course, won't say that, but it's clear that's what it was. (It's not a bad strategy. Rio did the same thing.) The Pan Am Games had their skeptics, but they were beyond successful. Having been there, I can say first-hand that Toronto delivered and then-some. And I have no doubt that when (not if) they eventually host the Olympics, they'll be just as incredible as the Pan Am Games were.
Toronto should have the USOC scared. Because a successful Toronto bid delays an Olympics on U.S. soil for at least eight, probably 12, additional years. And right now, it looks like the IOC would much prefer going to Toronto. If the Olympics do return to North America in 2024, it'll be North of the Border. The USOC indirectly made sure of that.
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