Slightly OT... Rory, Jordan, and Peter Kostis on the Olympics with a Hanse cameo

[JLahrman]

The IOC is a hot mess. And a well documented one at that.


Obviously it's up to the individual athletes if they want to play or not. That being said, I am surprised at how little the stars of the PGA Tour care about potentially winning an Olympic Gold Medal. Michael Jordan won an NCAA National Championship and 6 NBA Championships...but he values his two Olympic Gold Medals greatly enough to have them prominently noted when he was elected into the Hall of Fame.


I guess the Olympics have fallen in stature significantly from 1992 when the first Dream Team was assembled.

I don't think it's because the Olympics have fallen in stature necessarily. There aren't really any other notable world basketball tournaments where you're playing for your country. Golf is an inherently individual sport, and these guys play against international fields all the time. Plus there is the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup for the whole 'play for your country/continent' type of setup. Plus, basketball has always been an Olympic sport, or at least has been for a long time.

Plus, even if everyone were playing who was eligible, this is the same format as most other tournaments and against a weaker 60-man field.

Professional tennis players do seem to place greater priority on Olympic gold than golfers have so far. Though they are used to travelling the world more than most golfers are.

[Jim Nugent]

Keith, I love golf, and I love the Olympics.  I could care less about Olympic golf, though. 

By its very nature, the field will be weak.  Even if everyone eligible took part, tons of top players would be left out.  That alone makes the event pretty much a joke to me, at least as a serious golf competition. 

Also, the Olympics interfere with tournament golf far more than they do any other sport I can think of.  Tour golf holds some of its biggest events right during and around the time of the Olympics.  Not true of tennis, basketball, swimming, track & field, soccer, gymnastics.  For most sports, in fact, the Olympics IS the premier event.  For golf it's a side show, featuring a weak field, no tradition, no purse and security risks (already several athletes who went to Rio early have been robbed at gunpoint).

We don't ask the world's best baseball players to break away from their season every four years, so they can take part in the Olympics.  Golf seems to me similar.   

Then there are the health issues.  The CDC has issued travel notices about Brazil: it considers Brazil as a country with epidemic Zica.  Any man who gets infected can pass the disease to his wife, gf, or anyone else he has sex with.  No one can quantify the risk, but as the CDC says, "The Zika outbreak in Brazil is dynamic."

I also think Tom Doak nailed it about telling other people how to live their lives. 

[John Kavanaugh]

Won't golf now be the longest sport time wise in the Olympics? Runners finish the Marathon now in the time it takes a golfer to play nine holes.

[Keith Phillips]

Fair enough, Jim - I must say I watch Wimbledon and the US Open but would rather watch Olympic track,  swimming and gymnastics than tennis or golf.  With respect to Tom's point, life on the internet would be awfully boring if we couldn't vent about decisions individuals make...I'm still mad at LeBron for The Decision!

[Ben Hollerbach]

Golf in the Olympics is a rather strange camel.


For most events, the Olympics is the pinnacle of their sport. For those that their greatest glory is achieves elsewhere, the Olympics often offers the players an ability to break away from their league play and participate in international competition. But for he world elite in golf the Olympics currently offer them little more than they can achieve under their current play. They get to play in high quality international competition each week, they get to play for awards older than the modern Olympic medals, and they get to play for their country in international competition on a regular basis.


Tennis is probably the most similar Olympic sport to golf, but while an Olympic medal in tennis is now a great accomplishment, when the event was returned to the Olympics in 1988 the players viewed with similar skepticism. Only 2 player ranked in the men's ATP top 10 participated in 1988. Even today an Olympic gold is measured more as a cherry on top of a fine career, but not a career defining victory.


While the IOC has expressed their interest in making golf a stalwart event, they've also expressed great concern. If they were concerned about golf's success in the Olympics why did they not include it in the 2012 games? Even if it was a demonstration event, including in the 2012 games would have been as logistically simple as one could hope. With the Open Championship concluding on July 22nd and the opening ceremony being held on July 25th every major player in the game would have stayed and played in the games.


I can't fault Rory, Jordan, and the dozen other world class players who have withdrawn from the games. Rio and the environment that surrounds these games greatly out shadow the glory of the Olympics and the risk is much too high. Beyond the potential for Zika, the security concerns that surround these games could have an alarming impact. Players competing on the Olympic course will most likely be participating in the longest sport in the games, leaving themselves exposed for more time than any other athlete. added with the inherent slow pace of the game puts these players at a greater risk for a mosquito bite than any other participants.


Unlike the LPGA tour, the PGA tour and PGA of America certainly did not go out of their way to facilitate and encourage the players in playing in the Olympics. Brendan deJong's withdrawal is most unfortunately illustrated by this. A player who qualified for the games, and with a great desire to participate, is forced not to as they are struggling to keep their tour status and level of employment. This resonates on so many levels as for so long the Olympics stood for the pinnacle of amateur athletics.


We can look as the decision of many players not to go as a crazy and foolish choice. But we're looking at it from the perspective as lesser players who can only dream of potentially playing at their level. But imagine if you were asked to take a job in a dangerous environment, prestigious as it may be many would end up turning it down as the rewards are not yet strong enough to outweigh the risks. If given the chance to remain and grow, one day an olympic gold medal may equal in prestige a major championship, but not today and not in Rio.

[Tom_Doak]

Won't golf now be the longest sport time wise in the Olympics? Runners finish the Marathon now in the time it takes a golfer to play nine holes.

They still have the 50-km walk as an Olympic event.  In 2012 it was won in a time of 3 hours 35 minutes, but the first race in 1932 took 4 hours and 50 minutes.  Funny how golf is the only sport where all the time records are going UP instead of down.