Posted on 10/16/2023 12:46:46 PM PDT by Red Badger
Five sports have been added to the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles have after being approved by the International Olympic Committee's executive board. Three of the sports — baseball/softball, cricket and lacrosse — have been played at past Olympic games, while flag football and squash will make their Olympics debut in LA.
The five sports are "in line with the American sports culture and will showcase iconic American sports to the world, while bringing international sports to the United States," IOC President Thomas Bach said in a statement. The global sports tournament hasn't been held in the U.S. since the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City.
While baseball and softball were played at the 2020 Olympics, which were held in Tokyo in 2021 because of the pandemic, they were removed from the upcoming 2024 Paris Olympics schedule.
But the sports are iconic American past times and the 2023 World Baseball Classic recently set an attendance record with more than 1 million spectators, according to the IOC.
Lacrosse has North American roots, as it was invented by indigenous peoples before becoming popular overseas in the 19th century. Also known as sixes, the sport appeared in the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis and the 1908 Olympics in London.
Cricket is wildly popular worldwide, with more than 2.5 billion fans, according to the IOC. The sport was part of the Paris Olympics in 1900 and now has a vast social media following and a growing U.S. community. The U.S. will also host the 2024 Cricket T20 World Cup.
Football is one of the most popular sports in the U.S. Flag football, a safer variation of the sport often played by children, has never been included in the Olympics – until now. About 20 million people participate in flag football at the elite level.
While squash has never been played at the Olympics, it is played in other multi-sport competitions. Participation in the sport has increased a whopping 87% in the U.S. from 2015 to 2019, the IOC says.
These 2028 Olympics additions were decided upon after analysis by the IOC, which looked at several criteria. Sports were evaluated based on cost and complexity for the host, their ability to put athlete health and safety first, their global appeal, their gender equality, their integrity and fairness as well as their environmental sustainability.
Boxing, modern pentathlon – where athletes compete in fencing, swimming, equestrian show jumping, pistol shooting and cross-country running – and weight lifting were also considered but did not make the cut for the 2028 games.
Four sports were added to the upcoming Paris games: Surfing, skateboarding, breaking and sport climbing.
Is the NFL maneuvering to push the league away from tackle and into flag football? Has the NFL donated significantly to the Olympics in an effort to mainstream flag football?
Who can shoot up the most Fentanyl
Who can Smoke the most Fentanyl
Who can pilfer the most from the average store
... Real Los Angeles Sports!
Pretty much.
If the RATS move all the Hammies here as refugeez, we could probably get them to add, Armed Paragliding as an event.
Cornhole next! (but only if scoring includes a weighting factor for blood alcohol level).
Smash & Grab, Carjacking, Purse snatching and ATM pulling................
I’m actually surprised that bowling, tug of war, and pole dancing aren’t Olympic sports, by now. Guys would love to watch pole dancing, and tug of war used to be an Olympic sport, a very long time ago.
India did win a gold medal in men’s shooting..
“Flag football?”
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Maybe Red Rover? Hide and Go Seek?
I wish they still had boxing. If they didn’t make the rules too sissified, it would be quite exciting, as it was in the past.
>>Four sports were added to the upcoming Paris games: Surfing, skateboarding, breaking and sport climbing.
So boxing, which was in the original Olympics, is out, but breakdancing is now an Olympic ‘sport’?? How civilization has fallen!
Good that they added Cricket. I’ve been watching some lately and it’s a great game, not to mention that it’s the worlds 2nd most popular sport.
I wonder which format they’ll choose? T20 would be my choice.
Would they add tent making, panhandling and looting?
I don’t know if it’s all that popular worldwide. It helps that 1.75 billion Indians and Pakistanis are fanatics. Outside of Australia, Britain, and the West Indies, who else is there?
Any sport where one can play silly mid off gets my vote.
Flag football? What’s next? Kickball, dodgeball and drop-the-handkerchief?
There’s a cricket team in Compton, a college town south of Los Angeles, which started in the 1990’s and is still in business.
All the Indians I know here are crazy for Cricket.
Been watching the Cricket World Cup. T20 makes sense.
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