Tag: Tokyo Morning Win

11 amazing moments (from Simone Biles to a shared gold) we’ll remember from the Tokyo Olympics

The Olympics are coming to a close soon.

This is the Morning Win. This is our last take on the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning. Charles Curtis is filling in for Andy Nesbitt today.

The Tokyo Olympics are coming to a close this weekend, with the closing ceremony just days away.

So let’s look back for a moment. What will we remember from the past two weeks of competition, with its usual set of awe-inspiring moments?

While there are still memories left to be made (U.S. men’s basketball will play for gold Friday night!), I’ll give you a few things that I’ll remember from this set of Games, in no particular order.

1. Simone Biles, of course, who made the right decision for her mental and physical health by pulling out of nearly all the gymnastics competitions before returning to incredibly win bronze in the balance beam.

This quote will stick with me from a TODAY show appearance: “We’re human too, and we have real emotions, and sometimes they don’t realize that we have things going on behind the scenes that affect us whenever we go out and compete.”

2. Caeleb Dressel winning five golds. What a performance. But he pulled back the curtain to remind us that competing at this level is really tough: “It’s not the most enjoyable process but it is worth it. Every part of it is worth it. Just cause it’s bad doesn’t mean it’s not worth it.”

3. Ahmed Hafnaoui’s reaction to winning 400m free gold.

4. Families and friends celebrating from afar. See: Suni Lee’s gold-winning moment and Dressel’s tearful moment.

5. Sydney McLaughlin and Dalilah Muhammad’s unreal 400m hurdles race.

6. Mopsi the dressage horse that stole the show.

7. Sifan Hassan falling down in a 1500m heat but winning it anyway.

8. An amazing block by Nic Batum that could eventually lead to a France basketball gold.

9. A pair of perfect 10s for China diver Quan Hongchan.

10. Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim and Italy’s Gianmarco Tamberi deciding to share gold in the high jump.

11. Little funny things: the basketball-playing robot. Australian swimmer Kaylee McKeown accidentally cursing on TV. The baseball bullpen cart that’s a baseball throne.

I’m missing so many more. But that’s quite a collection to start with, isn’t it?

Quick hits: Lionel Messi is out from Barcelona … a perfect punt … and more.

(Photo by LLUIS GENE / AFP)

— Huge soccer news: Barcelona isn’t re-signing Messi.

— The Hall of Fame game between the Steelers and Cowboys featured an amazing punt and fans went wild.

— MLB fans had mixed feelings about the Field of Dreams game uniforms.

The U.S. men’s hoops team is proving any talk about chemistry is totally silly

Talent > chemistry.

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

The U.S. men’s basketball team struggled in some exhibition games before heading to Tokyo and then lost its first game in the Olympics and a lot of people started bringing up the “chemistry” narrative.

You know the one I’m talking about – when people go on about how the players really need to figure out their roles on the team and come together as one and develop some really good chemistry so it can go on and win games and hopefully take home the gold.

Yeah, that is all fine and good but it’s also really silly. Because do you know what trumps chemistry, especially in a quick tournament like this one? HAVING THE BEST PLAYERS IN THE WORLD.

Chemistry, schmeistry, as the saying goes.

Is chemistry important over a long season? Of course. Is it important over a two-week tournament? No, not when you have the roster Team USA has. Chemistry becomes irrelevant.

The men’s team is heading back to the gold medal game after beating Australia in a semifinal game on Thursday, a game in which the U.S. trailed by as many as 15 points in the first half before storming back to win going away, 97-78.

Three of the top four scorers for Team USA were guys who played in the NBA Finals just a few weeks ago (Devin Booker 20 points, Jrue Holiday 11 points, and Khris Middleton 11 points) and basically joined the team on the fly in Japan.

The leading scorer was a guy named Kevin Durant (23 points), who is the best player in the world right now.

So yeah, all those chemistry concerns were pretty pointless.

The U.S. now faces France, the team that beat them in the opener, in the gold medal game and should Team USA take home the gold it will have very little do with chemistry and very much to do with the ridiculous amount of talent it possesses.

And that shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has ever watched basketball.

Quick hits: Wild artistic swimming photos… Hilarious diving photos… Carl Lewis crushes men’s 4×100 relay team… And more. 

(AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

– You need to see these incredible photos from the artistic swimming event to see just how tough that sport is.

– Also, you need to see these photos of the faces divers make while competing in Tokyo.

– Carl Lewis was embarrassed by the U.S. men’s 4×100 relay team’s struggles on Thursday and the Olympic great didn’t hold back at all.

– LeBron James deleted a fiery tweet aimed at everyone bashing the Lakers for being old.

– ‘Jeopardy!’ fans are not happy about who might be the next permanent host.

[mm-video type=video id=01fc9gy6kez7nygwjpdq playlist_id=01f09m93q11d4tbgfy player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fc9gy6kez7nygwjpdq/01fc9gy6kez7nygwjpdq-f281abfc3a2bff6d4c53f6a5f8e47220.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1061558]

The U.S. women’s Olympic basketball team continues to be absolutely incredible

The U.S. women’s basketball team hasn’t lost a game at the Olympics since 1992!

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

Over the year’s we’ve had a number of individual GOATs at the Summer Olympics – from Michael Phelps to Simone Biles to Katie Ledecky, just to name a few.

But it feels like we sometimes overlook one program that continues to be the absolute most dominate group at the Olympics – the U.S women’s basketball team.

Today in Tokyo the U.S. ran over Australia, a team that had stunned them in an exhibition game just last month, 79-55 in a quarterfinal game that was never in question. The win puts the U.S. in the semifinals and keeps them as the favorite to win gold yet again.

Here’s the crazy part of that victory, though – it was Team USA’s 53rd straight Olympic win. They haven’t lost a game at the Olympics since the 1992 bronze medal game.

1992! That is just ridiculous and wildly impressive.

Year after year after year the women’s national hoops team has groups of stars that simply cannot be stopped. It’s incredible and inspiring, unless you’re playing against them.

It also feels like this is a streak that isn’t going to stop any time soon because of the mix of veterans and young players has this team set to win for years to come. (Man, I hope I didn’t just jinx them.)

Breanna Stewart, who is just 26 and already a legend, had her best game of the Olympics against Australia, scoring 20 of her 23 points in the first half as she basically helped crush Australia’s hopes before the halftime break.

While this year’s men’s team has struggled a bit to find its way (they’ve rebounded from their loss in the opener and will play Australia in the semifinals tomorrow), the women’s team continues to just be a dominant force that is incredible to watch.

And now they’re are just two more wins from another gold medal.

Quick hits: Taylor Swift reaches out to Simone Biles… NBA fans had jokes about the very old Lakers… Golfer’s brutal miss… And more. 

– Taylor Switft and Simone Biles had a really sweet exchange on Twitter yesterday.

– The Lakers added Carmelo Anthony and NBA fans had jokes about how old this team has gotten through free agency this year.

– I feel terrible for this young golfer who missed a tap-in putt that could have led to his first start in a PGA Tour event.

– Here’s a brief history of the beef between Joel Embiid and Andre Drummond, who are now teammates in Philadelphia.

– Charles McDonald looks at five undrafted free agents that can have good seasons in the NFL this year.

[mm-video type=video id=01fc7q5sq5gppqpft9pw playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fc7q5sq5gppqpft9pw/01fc7q5sq5gppqpft9pw-95b93033fd4205a91a0de9a1ab047559.jpg]

Simone Biles added to her GOAT status with a historic finish on the balance beam

Everyone should strive to be like Simone Biles. 

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

Everyone should strive to be like Simone Biles.

Just last week the GOAT of women’s gymnastics angered a bunch of grifters who like to get upset over stuff they don’t really care about when she opted to take care of both her mental and physical health by pulling herself out of the team competition and then later the all-around competition.

She handled the whole situation with a level of class and dignity that should be taught in school to young kids everywhere. She cheered on her teammates during the team competition and then later spoke with the media, explaining in such a calm way about why it was important for her to take care of herself.

Biles hid from absolutely nothing and stood for absolutely everything that’s important to so many people who have been watching the Olympics each night from their couches.

It was all so beautiful and powerful and was a great example for everyone who is battling through their own things to learn from.

Then on Tuesday she made her return to competition and won bronze in the balance beam, giving her a seventh Olympic medal and tying her with Shannon Miller for the most medals by a U.S. gymnast.

Shortly after the event she said:

“It wasn’t easy pulling out of all those competitions, People just thought it was easy, but I physically and mentally was not in the right head space, and I didn’t want to jeopardize my health and my safety because at the end of the day, it’s not worth it.

“My mental and physical health is above all medals that I could ever win. So to be clear, to do beam, which I didn’t think I was going to be, just meant the world to be back out there. And I wasn’t expecting to walk away with the medal. I was just going out there doing this for me.”

Biles, who was battling a case of the “twisties” last week (which is something that sounds frightening and dangerous) deserves all the cheers and love that she received after her finish on the balance beam, which is an event where things can go really wrong.

She never backed down from any of the idiotic criticism she received last week. She was open about her mental health. She was so strong when many people who don’t know anything thought she was weak.

Biles added so many levels to her GOAT status in Tokyo and now she gets to take home another medal, too.

Which is awesome.

And historic.

Quick hits: Possible Wentz replacements… Aaron Rodgers’ awesome new ride… Cat invades Yankee Stadium… And more. 

Bob Donnan-USA TODAY Sports

– Henry McKenna looks at eight quarterbacks who could fill in for an injured Carson Wentz in Indianapolis.

– Aaron Rodgers casually driving around Green Bay in a golf cart is pretty awesome.

– A cat ran around Yankee Stadium last night and the grounds crew hilariously failed to catch it.

– Carli Lloyd was seen doing sprints alone on the field after USWNT’s semifinal loss to Canada and it was pretty awesome.

– The Nationals’ Victor Robles played an inning with a huge praying mantis chilling on his hat and it was pretty wild.

[mm-video type=video id=01fbv2m80v272sn7zb3d playlist_id=01f09m93q11d4tbgfy player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbv2m80v272sn7zb3d/01fbv2m80v272sn7zb3d-cf02b42efc3f7a203f8213edd8b7bc80.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1057383]

A dancing horse at the Olympics won the internet and showed us all how cool dressage is

Dressage rules.

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

Late last week Rory McIlroy – one of the greatest golfers in the world who was in Tokyo competing for Northern Ireland – was asked which event he would really love to go see at the Games.

His answer?

Dressage.

For real.

He had this to say, via Golf Digest:

“The one thing that’s on tonight that I would love to go to, the one thing I’ve always wanted to go and see is dressage,” McIlroy said. “Always. I just, I it’s mesmerizing and it’s on tonight at like 7:30. I’ll watch it on TV. I just think, I watch it once every few years, obviously and it’s like, I don’t know, it’s just, it’s mesmerizing and it’s really cool. I don’t know.”

I remember being surprised by that answer and also confused by it, too. I know next to nothing about dressage and, with no offense to the dressage community, thought it was something where horses just come out and do some tricks and stuff.

Well now, thanks to this horse that went viral over the weekend for it’s incredible, what I guess we can call dance moves, I totally get what McIlory was talking about. Dressage is mesmerizing and wild and incredibly fun.

If you haven’t see this video of Team USA’s four-time Olympian Steffen Peters and his horse Suppenkasper doing their thing in the dressage event then stop what you’re doing and watch it.

Incredible, right? The music also takes me back to some really smelly bars from college but whatever, that’s not the point.

The point is dressage is incredible and that horse is now rightfully a viral internet star for having the time of its life in Tokyo.

That’s what’s fun about the Olympic Games – random sports and events can steal your hearts for a bit and make you look forward to watching them again in the future.

I just never thought dressage would do that for me, but here I am.

Quick hits: High jumpers share gold in awesome moment… MLB fans crush Mets owner… Ump’s horrible strike call… And more.

(Photo by Christian Petersen / POOL / AFP)

– Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim and Italy’s Gianmarco Tamber had an awesome moment when they decided to share the gold medal in the high jump. They also had a pretty special reason for doing so, too.

– MLB fans destroyed Mets owner Steve Cohen over his tweet about not signing the team’s firsr-round pick, pitcher Kumar Rocker.

– How did a Major League Baseball ump, who is supposed to be among the best of the best, call this a strike?

– Reds outfielder Jesse Winker had a perfect response to a Mets fan’s rude sign.

– Urban Meyer broke down the one flaw he sees in Tim Tebow’s skills at tight end.

[mm-video type=video id=01fbw69vknvzygeder9k playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbw69vknvzygeder9k/01fbw69vknvzygeder9k-7ef5c051bf253027d098657d66a804df.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1059549]

Simone Biles reminds us with latest ‘twisties’ talk why no one should question her Olympics absence

“Literally can not tell up from down.”

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning. Charles Curtis is filling in for Andy Nesbitt.

By now, it should be certain to everyone that Simone Biles stepping away from the Olympic gymnastics competitions for now was, unquestionably, the right move.

The legendary gymnast is dealing with what’s known as “the twisties,” in which athletes in the sport lose control and awareness of where they are mid-air. And in a sport like gymnastics, that can be deadly.

Biles took to Instagram to discuss what she was dealing with further, and it should hammer home the point once again: The twisties are no joke, and the move to stop competing is one that’s what she needs to not seriously injure herself.

Per USA TODAY Sports, she posted two videos in which she struggled to complete twists while landing on safe surfaces, ones she wouldn’t be landing on in competition. The videos were deleted, but her Q&A in her Stories wasn’t.

“I seriously cannot comprehend how to twist,” she wrote. “It’s honestly petrifying trying to do a skill but not having your mind & body in sync.”

“Literally can not tell up from down,” she said in another post. “It’s the craziest feeling ever. Not having an inch of control over your body.”

That’s all you need to know. This isn’t something she can just shake off and move on from. And while no one should question her to begin with, any and all doubts should be erased.

Here’s hoping she gets well soon, no matter when that is.

Quick hits: NBA Draft winners and losers … a lovely swimming moment … Steve Spurrier took a shot at Texas … and more.

Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

— The NBA Draft was Thursday night, so here are the winners and losers.

— Check out this heartwarming moment when South Africa’s Tatjana Schoenmaker broke the 200 breakstroke world record.

— Steve Spurrier zinged Texas about leaving the Big 12.

— The Olympic baseball bullpen cart is the best.

Caeleb Dressel’s tearful moment with his family after his 100-meter win was so great

It got a little dusty in here!

These Tokyo Olympics have been hard – on the athletes and also on their families. We’re all finding out that’s what happens when you hold the Games during a global pandemic.

While the athletes are holed in the Olympic bubble in Tokyo, their loved ones are mostly back home where all they can do is gather together and turn on their TVs and watch the events that mean so much to them.

I can’t imagine what it must feel like for a mom or a dad or a husband or a wife or a boyfriend or a girlfriend or anyone who is close to them to watch from thousands of miles away as someone they love so deeply goes after their lifelong dreams on the other side of the world.

NBC has struggled a lot during these Olympics but one of the good things they have done has been showing the reactions from family watch parties back home in the states.

Last night we saw an incredible one of those moments as Caeleb Dressel’s family was shown going nuts back in Orlando, Fl. as he made his furious way down the stretch of the men’s 100-freestyle and taking gold with a new Olympic record of 47.02 seconds.

In normal circumstances he would have celebrated by waving to his wife and family sitting up above the pool in the arena.

Instead, he spoke with them in video call on NBC just moments after his win and it was pretty darn special with he and his wife, Meghan, in tears as his she told him over and over again that she loves him so much.

I mean man, this video is awesome:

And then this one during the anthem was equally emotional.

Again, none of this has been easy one anyone but these moments where the athletes and their families can still celebrate together, even being thousands of miles away from each other, have been darn special.

Quick hits: Final NBA mock draft… Aaron Rodgers held nothing back in an incredible press conference… Marshawn Lynch’s hilarious take on Rodgers… And more.

– The 2021 NBA Draft is tonight and Bryan Kalbrosky has his final mock draft to get you ready for what should be a fun night.

– Aaron Rodgers spoke with the media yesterday for the first time since reporting to training camp and he calmly held nothing back while talking about what bothered him the most about the Packers’ front office.

– Speaking of Rodgers, Marshawn Lynch had a classic Marshawn Lynch take on the whole situation with the QB and the Packers.

– Patrick Mahomes is back to throwing no-look passes at practice.

– Giannis Antetokounmpo is just like us – he doesn’t want to pay NBC to watch the men’s basketball team play in the Olympics.

[mm-video type=video id=01fbrncb5phb47rzrnz8 playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbrncb5phb47rzrnz8/01fbrncb5phb47rzrnz8-d3b4a4b3025a4f448d03f7450d0ab396.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1058291]

Michael Phelps offered his support for Simone Biles with a powerful message about mental health

“We’re humans. We’re human beings. Nobody is perfect, so yes, it’s OK to not be OK.”

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

Michael Phelps is the most decorated Olympian of all time and was hired by NBC to give his analysis on swimming at the Tokyo Olympics. But last night he offered his most important message of the Games and it had nothing to do with the sport in which he won 28 Olympic medals.

Instead, it was about Simone Biles and the importance of protecting and working on your mental health.

I could say a bunch of words about this but I think it’s better just to hear from Phelps himself. Over the past five years he’s been incredibly open with his mental health struggles and the work that he has done on himself and that openness has helped a lot of people.

You can watch the video of Phelps here, but this was his message:

“The Olympics are overwhelming. There’s a lot of emotions that go into it – I mean, I could talk to you about this for an hour.

“I think athletes, and Olympic athletes in general, talking about weight of gold – we need someone who we can trust. Somebody that can let us be ourselves and listen; allow us to become vulnerable. Somebody who is not going to try to fix us. We carry a lot of weight on our shoulders and it’s challenging – especially when we have the lights on us and all these expectations that are being thrown on top of us. It broke my heart but also if you look at it, mental health over the last 18 months is something that people are talking about.”

He continued by talking about the importance of asking for help.

“We’re humans. We’re human beings. Nobody is perfect, so yes, it’s OK to not be OK. It’s OK to go through ups and downs and emotional rollercoasters. But i think the biggest thing is we all need to ask for help sometimes, too, when we go through those times. For me, I can say personally it was something that was very challenging – it was hard for me to ask for help. I felt like i was carrying – as Simone said – the weight of the world on your shoulders. So yeah, it’s a tough situation.

“I hope this is an eye-opening experience. I really do. I hope this is an opportunity for us to jump on board and to even blow this mental health thing even more wide open. It is so much bigger than we can ever imagine. Look, for me when I started on this journey five years ago I knew it was big. I knew it was going to be challenging. Five years into it now – it’s even bigger than I can comprehend. So this is something that is going to take a lot of time, a lot of hard work, and people that are willing to help.”

He closed it by talking about his foundation and working with kids at a young age to teach them about the importance of mental health and asking for help when you need it.

“With the foundation it’s so important, especially to teach kids at a young age to take care of their physical and mental health. You guys hear me talking about that so much- if we’re not taking care of both, how are we ever expecting to be 100 percent.”

That was some very powerful stuff from Phelps and it was great to hear it from such a legend.

Quick hits: Ledeky dominates first-ever 1,500 meters… Aaron Rodgers’ amazing entrance to Packers’ camp… Arians rips wristbands report.

(AP Photo/Matthias Schrader) 

– Speaking of swimming legends, Katie Ledecky absolutely dominated the first-ever women’s 1,500-meter freestyle and won another gold medal.

– Aaron Rodgers casually reported to work on Tuesday and NFL fans had lots of jokes about his tremendous outfit.

– Bucs coach Bruce Arians blasted a report about his team wearing vaccination wristbands in an expletive-filled rant.

[mm-video type=video id=01fbp18nqvm6ec49mm95 playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbp18nqvm6ec49mm95/01fbp18nqvm6ec49mm95-cce4b81ee5fb7b72588815bfc52046b0.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1057383]

Synchronized diving is by far the coolest thing in the Olympics

What a beautiful, and frightening, event.

This is the Morning Win. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be writing each weekday morning about the Tokyo Olympics. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.

Every time the Olympics roll around – be it the Winter or Summer Games – an event seems to pop up that you’ve never really thought about but it then quickly becomes something you can’t turn away from.

For me, in these Tokyo Games, that sport has become synchronized diving and yesterday’s men’s synchronized platform diving final had me on the edge of my seat.

That’s something I definitely didn’t see coming just a few days ago but I’m glad that it did because all the different synchronized diving events are awesome.

And yes, there are lots of awesome events in the Olympics – swimming, gymnastics, team handball, and many more. But this synchronized diving is just so wild.

Yesterday’s finale was a beautiful, pressure-packed competition that saw Great Britain’s Tom Daley (who gave a great speech to the LGBTQ+ commuity) finally win his first gold medal as he and Matty Lee teamed up to edge a team from China. The gold wasn’t decided until the final dive by China, which looked like a pretty flawless dive. Everyone then stood there waiting for the judges’ numbers to be released and when they were, Daley and Lee went nuts, which was an awesome moment.

Now, I know very little about diving but what these athletes can do in synchronized diving just blows my mind. The platform is 10 meters high (just under 33 feet) and two divers just stand atop that thing before launching into a number of flips and twists before hitting the water at same time.

The courage and timing that all takes blows my mind. It’s a thing of absolute beauty and it all leads to some pretty incredible photos, too.

I want to know who these divers get into the synchronized world. Do they just see someone else training and be like – “Hey, want to dive at the same time?”

I’m kidding, of course, because I know the process is a lot more complex than that.

I am just in awe of what they can do and I can’t wait to watch the women’s final later tonight (even thought it happened already today and I don’t want to see any spoilers) and the men’s 3-meter springboard final tomorrow.

Because yeah, synchronized diving rules.

Quick hits: Fans had jokes about Jordan Love… Ripken, Darling have confusing talk about pitchers… NFL rookies react to Madden ratings… And more. 

AP Photo

– Well, it looks like Aaron Rodgers is going to play for the Packers this year after all and NFL fans had lots of jokes about his backup, Jordan Love.

– Billy Ripken and Ron Darling had a mind-boggling discussion about pitchers this year not pitching as fast as those in years past and man was this a bad segment on MLB Network.

– Mac Jones and other NFL rookies had funny reactions to their ‘Madden NFL 22’ ratings.

– Diane Sawyer is down for a date with Ted Lasso, which is great.

[mm-video type=video id=01fbhjb6sa8hfwxjc8fn playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbhjb6sa8hfwxjc8fn/01fbhjb6sa8hfwxjc8fn-a20b5f964d648bec11c715672dfec642.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1057071]

NBC is making it way too hard to watch the U.S. men’s basketball games live

Come on, NBC.

The U.S. men’s basketball team kicked off its run in the Tokyo Olympics yesterday with a disappointing loss to France that had many fans crushing the team for suffering their first Olympics loss sine 2004.

But during the game lots of fans had another problem – trying to find the game on their TVs.

NBC has made a business decision to put the U.S. men’s basketball games on Peacock Premium, their streaming service that requires a monthly payment of $4..99. On their website they tout a bunch of great content that you can watch on their free Peacock service and at the end mention about the $4.99 upgrade to watch men’s hoops.

Nothing says Olympics like a big company digging into your pockets for money so you can watch the Olympics!

U.S. men’s hoops is the only sport that is on the premium service. There are some other ways to see the games live, as some fans pointed out to the Athletic’s Richard Deitsch that you can watch on the Olympics app by verifying your cable service and password and jumping through a few hoops.

Also, NBC later aired Sunday’s game on TV which is dumb because it’s 2021 and everyone already knew what happened in the game.

NBC trying to get subscribers to its premium service during the Olympics is equal parts gross and greedy. These basketball games should be shown live and for free on main NBC. We shouldn’t have to hunt around for ways to watch it on an app or shell out more money to a streaming service that we’d likely cancel after the Olympics are over.

I know what you’re thinking, too – we didn’t miss much yesterday because the team was dreadful in its loss to France. But that’s what makes this team interesting! Since pros started playing in the Olympics we’ve mostly seen the U.S. teams roll to big victories (except in 2004 when they took home the bronze).

This year’s team had some struggles leading into the Games and now has to rebound from an ugly opening loss. It will be fun to see how they regroup and how they respond to the challenges they’re going to face later down the road in Tokyo.

But it’s not going to be fun trying to watch these games live.

Thanks, NBC. Good stuff.

Quick hits: Amazing synchronized diving photos… Doncic nearly breaks Olympics record… Top NHL free agents… And more. 

Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Network

– Synchronized diving took place over the weekend in Tokyo and these photos from the event are so cool.

– Luka Doncic nearly broke an Olympics record with 48 points in his scorching Slovenia debut.

– Mary Clarke ranks the 20 best NHL free agents.

– With NFL training camps getting started, here are the 12 teams that have never won a Super Bowl.

– This robot sinking long shots during a break in an Olympics basketball game was pretty insane.

– Is this wild video of Tom Brady throwing footballs at a Jugs machine real?

[mm-video type=video id=01fbh0ctyav384fqzs06 playlist_id=01f09p3bf720d8rg02 player_id=none image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01fbh0ctyav384fqzs06/01fbh0ctyav384fqzs06-fa2461002ca7a9c6405699abf7deed4c.jpg]

[vertical-gallery id=1057071]