COVID, geopolitics make Olympics 2022 not so joyous for NBC

From a TV perspective, it feels as if the Beijing Olympics will end with NBC’s host Mike Tirico summoning his inner-Bill Belichick and saying, “We’re on to Paris.”

That is where the network’s next Olympics, the 2024 Summer Games, will be held and perhaps — fingers crossed — we will have controlled the COVID-19 pandemic globally to a point that it will no longer be a dominant storyline.

But it feels as if, for the Beijing Olympics, which are upon us beginning this week, NBC will try to get through them as much as exalt about them. China’s zero-COVID policy means there will be no international fans. Meanwhile, nearly all of NBC’s announcers will be working 7,000 miles away, at the network’s Stamford, Conn., headquarters.

From that distance, NBC will try to navigate the geopolitical questions that plague China. They will likely address to appease critics, which may not satisfy anyone.

But the TV games must go on, because Beijing is one of the stops Comcast/NBC was given on its current 10 Olympic Games deal, which is for $12 billion and extends through 2032.

NBC is going to make an earnest effort to make these games as great as they can be, highlighting Olympic stars, such as Mikaela Shiffrin, Nathan Chen, Shaun White and Chloe Kim. What will you see?

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Mike Tirico, front and center

In 2016, Tirico joined NBC to become the new face of its sports division. It’s finally, fully happening. This month, Tirico will host the Super Bowl and the Olympics for NBC. Next season, he is slated to take over as the lead play-by-player on “Sunday Night Football.”

This will be Tirico’s third Olympics as host after replacing Bob Costas, who recently described the IOC’s selection of China as “shameless” due to its human rights violations.

Clockwise from left: Mike Tirico, Lindsey Vonn, Maria Taylor and Savannah Guthrie
AP (2); Getty Images; Shutterstock

“I would anticipate what they’ll do is acknowledge the [geopolitical] issues at the beginning, and then address them only if something specific that cannot be ignored happens during the Games, which very well may happen,” Costas said on CNN’s “Reliable Sources.”

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