Olympic TV Coverage: A Report Card

By Michael Hawk on February 23rd, 2010

• Link to StumbleUpon
• 9 Comments

As we sit closer to the end of the 2010 Vancouver winter games than the beginning, I wanted to make some observations about the broadcast coverage from NBC.

Scheduling: D

Hate to be a sourpuss, but it is a little annoying that I live in the same time zone as the Olympics and I am forced to wait till a chopped up highlight show airs in prime time to see the competitions.  This is East Coast bias at its worst.  NBC’s whole schedule revolves around Eastern Standard Time which means if you live in California, you better stay off the internet to maintain the element of surprise.  Not to mention NBC, midnight??  I can’t stay up this late every night.  As much as I enjoy watching the Olympics, jobs frown upon sleeping till noon.

Remembering the Olympics are International: C -

I am of Irish decent.  Ireland doesn’t usually win medals.  We’ve got 23 lifetime in only 4 sports and non of those are contested in the winter.  The Emerald Isle only has 6 athletes in Vancouver and it is a safe bet that none of them will appear on NBC.  Regardless of these facts, I would love to see one of my Shamrock brothers or sisters taking their one shot at competing on the world’s biggest stage.  I know I’m not alone.  The U.S.

prides itself on its melting pot and I am 100% sure there’s descendants from other nations that would love to see the occasional shot of their fellow countrymen.  Even our language pals Great Britain and their 5o plus athletes have been totally absent from our channels.  Which brings me to….

Editing: B -

So far, the tactic has been to show a couple of U.S. athletes do their thing and then cut away to Bob Costas for comment and some package on whale watching before they hit up another sport for American highlights.  I like competition and I would love to see the best athletes in the world, the whole world, go at it.  Thankfully they did the majority of the snowboarding half pipe finals, but I gotta believe they only did that because it was so painfully obvious Shaun White was gonna win.  I will also give them some bonus points for not editing the cuss words from that competition on my west coast feed.  There’s no need.  It was harmless and real and part of a very happy celebration.  Besides, it was after 11 and most of us had sleepy ears coming on anyway!

Online Presence: A

Although the NBC site is heavily U.S.-centric, information is easy to find and they even have a neat feature that let’s you search for Team USA members to root for by zip code.  The page is loaded with videos and slideshows, medal counts, streaming live coverage, profiles, and even a Twitter tracker so you can see the 140 characters floating through the mind of your favorite Olympian.

Commentators: B +

Who would’ve thought Jonny Moseley would be the best color guy on NBC?  Overall the Peacock has done a fine job assembling the right voices for the right events with few exceptions.  Although I will say I have a hard time understanding some of these Canadian accents during the curling matches.  What is it all “aboot?”

Hockey: B -

The NBC family has stumbled a little bit with bumping broadcasts back and forth over channels which has angered some hockey fans.  Chunks of Canada’s men’s opener were sacrificed as curling went long and the coverage started late and switched at one point from MSNBC to CNBC.  On top of that, NBC’s “never criticize anyone or anything to do with hockey” crew is back in the booth.  Their commentary has been inane and boring and continues to pander to the non hockey fan.  Guess what, non hockey fans aren’t watching Finland play Germany at 2 in the afternoon so feel free to call shenanigans on obvious goaltender interference.  Looking at you Milbury.  At least we have Jeremy Roenick willing to stir the pot.

Overall = B

NBC is doing a fine job but not as good as their Summer Games coverage.  That’s not entirely their fault as there are more warm weather sports than cold ones which makes it way easier to fill up time with lots and lots of medal thirsty athletes.  But what does it say about the prime time coverage when the best reporting from Vancouver comes at 8 am on the Today Show?  I love watching the Olympics, but I can’t help feeling that my available coverage is lacking somewhere.