ESPN again says it's for the Olympic boycott

ESPN isn't airing the Olympics are they? It would probably be in their best interest if we boycotted.

But it really goes to show how ignorant these hyped up talking heads are on the sport shows.

Can you not tell the difference between what someone says on a show and the corporation's stance? I do not follow it closely but I do not think Bayless is the spokesperson for ESPN or Disney (the parent company that I bet does not what to irritate the Chinese either).

I hate that guy with a passion. I'm surprised he is bashing running though, he likes to tout the fact of how great an athlete he is based on one sub 2:40 marathon. (May not even be sub 2:40, you'd think it was the way he talks) He even said that a SINGLE marathon was harder than the entire Tour de France.

skip bayless is an idiot

wait and bleed wrote:

He even said that a SINGLE marathon was harder than the entire Tour de France.

Lance said something pretty similar after his first marathon...

However, I do agree that Bayless is mostly retarded, and entirely too full of himself.

With dopers like Lance Armstrong, Marion Jones, Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds, etc. readily available for employment, ESPN should host the

ESPN TEST-FREE WORLD GAMES

Don't forget to invite Kevin Toth, Regina Jacobs, Tim Montgomery, Mark McGwire, Landis.

Feature events in all the doped sports, MLB, MMA, UCI, NHL, UFC, WWE, Weight Lifting, Body Building, etc.

It should be a great games. No horseys, no synchro swimming, no bullet shooting, no car driving, no billiards, no poker, which aren't real sports anyway.

irun wrote:

skip bayless is an idiot

How is he still on tv? I quit watching anything he was on 3 or 4 years ago. Charles Barkley was even bashing him occasionally, but Charles hate of Lebron James clouded his objectivity so much, he has turned into a Skip Bayless. I just turn the channel when those guys are on tv.

Why does charles barkley hate LeBron James? I don't follow the NBA and had never heard this.

There was some ESPN-related thread maybe a year ago in which I called Skip Bayless unwatchable and wondered how he could even be on TV. Nothing's changed.

Skip Bayless is the Howard Stern of sports commentators. He says outrageous, over the top things that probably even he doesn't believe just to get a reaction out of people.

He used to be in Dallas and basically got run out of town for a series of ever increasingly outrageous books, articles, and radio comments. He wrote a book calling Tom Landry a hypocrite, another claiming Troy Aikman was gay. The guy will say anything to get a rise out of people.

All this to say, ignore Skip Bayless.

What's the latest on Aikman's orientation? Is he straight now?

Wow, so everyone agrees on this?

I love track and field as much as the next guy, and I would certainly be sympathetic to our athletes if we did boycott, but no one finds the idea of a boycott to be even worthy of discussion?

China is doing some pretty terrible things in the world right now. If the threat of a boycott puts enough pressure on the country politically to start correcting the human rights and environmental abuses, isn't that ten times more important than the games we love? Running, swimming, and gymnastics are not the end-all, be-all.

If you want to argue that a boycott will not change anything - OK, we can have that argument. I'd be interested to hear both sides of that debate. But if it might actually work ...sorry, that's more important than Alan Webb's legacy.

Boycotting will do nothing. Things will remain the same. All boycotting will do is hurt our athletes.

Distance wrote:

Boycotting will do nothing. Things will remain the same. All boycotting will do is hurt our athletes.

Why do you think it will do nothing? You may be right, but I'm just trying to find out what basis you have for this belief. As I said before, I'd be interested to hear from people who think it WILL make a difference too.

I think it's an interesting debate and not one we should dismiss so easily just because Skip Bayless is a blowhard and because we're track fans.

What are you people smoking???? Boycott the Olympics? Ok we are still going to buy everything from your country and pump billions into your economy, but oh, we're not coming over for a couple weeks! That'll show them! Let's punish the athletes, but let every other citizen in America buy cheap sh.t and a low cost.

How the hell can you justify boycotting the olympics when pretty much everything you own is made in China? I buy Chinese goods thus have no valid arguement for boyoctting China. Plus you should not punish the athletes. Punish the people.

How about this, boycott Chinese made teeshirts for three weeks instead I think that will send a bigger message.

I agree. If we want to make a statement (and drag our economy further into disrepair) we would boycott trade with China, not the Olympic Games. That's not going to happen because we are becoming increasingly dependent upon China.

There is talk of boycotting the opening ceremonies.

I actually think boycotting would do more then not boycotting. Not by much, though. If the Olympics go off without a hitch, and China has its best shiny face on during the Olympics, to me it will only re-enforce the Chinese government's current modus operandi. At least a boycott would be a glaring chink in the armor, but probably won't change anything.

devils advocate wrote: If you want to argue that a boycott will not change anything - OK, we can have that argument. I'd be interested to hear both sides of that debate.

Hard to imagine there are two sides of that debate. I don't see China deciding the prospect of some countries staying home from their games is so important, they'd sacrifice much sovereignty over economic and domestic policy for this. Even more so starting the day after closing ceremonies.

Can you imagine America kowtowing to a proposed boycott, letting other countries dictate our policies in exchange for the presence of their athletes for a few weeks?

I find the idea of taking the Olympics away from China and giving them back to, say, Sydney, which worked pretty well, to be a notion worth exploring, but it won't happen. On political and human rights grounds, the Games should have been taken away from Berlin in '36 and Mexico City in '68 and Moscow in '80...but never happens.