Hooking Up Olympians' Parents to Heart Monitors is Just One of Many Terrible Ideas NBC Has in Mind for Paris 2024

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Maybe this goes to prove just how Old these Balls are, but I can recall an age when any time you brought all of the world together in a competition, it was an event that was not to be missed. Whether they were competing on soccer pitches, courts, tracks, fields, pools, mats, rinks, ski trails or pageant stages, any time people were showing up somewhere to represent their country and prove their superiority in any field of endeavor, the world couldn't take their eyes off it. Hell, there was a time when we enjoyed wall-to-wall coverage of a race between sailboats captained by men whose monthly whiskey and escorts expenditures were higher than the GDP of 45 United States, like there was some sort of national pride at stake. 

Granted, sometimes when the world would come together to compete, there really were high stakes involved. And while the Marne, Passchendaele, Belleau Wood, Gallipoli, Stalingrad, Midway, Normandy, Iwo Jima, Dresden and the like lacked the charm of Jesse Owens at Berlin or the Miracle on Ice at Lake Placid, the public was certainly stayed riveted by the drama. 

But that luxury, high tech racing yacht sailed a generation or so ago. Maybe the internet killed it. Instant global communication sort of shrunk the world and took away the novelty of all international competitions. People who once seemed exotic because they lived so far away are now the exact same virtual distance as every other human. A K-Pop group is no further away than that friend who insists on FaceTiming instead of texting, and 1/10,000th as disruptive to your day. So the thrill is gone from all worldwide big events. 

But burgers, colas and cell phones have still got to be sold. And dishonest business twats still have to join forces with corrupt oligarchs to rob as much of their national treasuries as can be transfered to accounts in the Caymans. Which means we still have an Olympics. For now, anyway. 

Which means NBC has the Olympic-sized problem of trying to find a way to trick the public into forgetting we quit caring Olympiads ago. Sure, there are ladies who much prefer women's sports like my own superfan Irish Rose, who'll be riveted to every cutaway of Simone Biles wiping her nose with a towel on the bench. But interest in archery went out with the last Hunger Games. Beach volleyball still peaked with the first Top Gun. And in the words of the late, great Dan Jenkins, "The only thing worse than Track is Field." 

But NBC has a plan to gin up interest. And it's so bad, it almost sounds like they're trying to make this as terrible as network televisionly possible:

Source - NBC revealed that it plans to place heart-rate monitors on parents of athletes competing in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, with results being shown live on screen. …

According to Variety, test audience have loved seeing 'moms and dads' sweat it out while their child competes in the 100-meter dash or plays midfield for the United States' pair of soccer teams competing in France.

The heart-rate monitors are one of several measures NBC is taking to try and make sure the Paris games are a smash hit in the ratings.  

Several celebrities with ties to NBC, but not with sports backgrounds such as Snoop Dogg, Kelly Clarkson, and Jimmy Fallon, will provide analysis of the Olympics.  

For now, I'll put a pin in the entertainment value of Snoop Dogg giving us a tour of the Notre Dame rebuild, Kelly Clarkson riding a bike up the Champs de Elysees with a baguette sticking out of the basket to go sample cheeses, or Jimmy Fallon learning to mime under the Eiffel Tower, and just focus on the heart monitor schtick. 

For starters, it feels even less like total invasion of privacy than it does a direct violation of HIPAA laws. We're not supposed to discuss another person's weight or take an educated guess at their age in polite society any more. But the network that had contestants on Fear Factor eat donkey dicks is now going to show us if some tracklete's dad is showing signs of a potentially fatal heart murmur. And why? To let us know they're excited? Nervous? Stressed? You can learn just as much from sitting in front of the moms row at a U10 soccer game. Or simply pointing a camera into the stands at the 100 Meter Anything.

But beyond that, this 100% sounds like a 30 Rock bit. One of those throwaway gags like all the bad show ideas Jack Donaghy was pitching to tank the network so he wouldn't have to be in charge of a sinking ship. Like "Hunchbacks" starring Jonathan Silverman and "God Cop" where everything is explained at the end by the wise black man played by Karl Malone:

As a matter of fact, NBC would generate more interest if they really did just present the Paris Games in SeinfeldVision:

But somehow a committee of allegedly smart, experienced TV executives voted to strap EKGs onto athlete's moms and dads so we can be treated to the nonstop, high octane adrenaline ride that is watching the stress test at a heart patient's semi-annual physical. Otherwise, how would we know they get nervous when their child competes? 

Though who am I to say it's a bad idea? For all I know, it'll bring Olympic TV ratings back from the abyss and create a whole new era in sports coverage. Maybe we'll love it so much every sport will get this treatment. Like the Manningcast, but with heart specialists. The CardiacCast. And we'll find ourselves wondering how we ever watched anything without knowing what was going on inside the rib cages of Archie Manning, Earl Woods or Tom Brady Sr. But I still think I'd rather watch SeinfeldVision.