‘What’s this?’ — it’s the hope of sport

‘What’s this?’ — it’s the hope of sport

DOHA, Qatar — As she came off the tatami in delighted shock at what she had just done, Inbar Lanir of Israel looked at her coach, Shany Hershko, and said, “What’s this?”

Lanir had just thrown France’s Audrey Tcheuméo, the Rio 2016 Games silver medalist, to become the 2023 judo world champion in the women’s 78-kilo class. 

A few moments later, in this Arab nation, they lifted the Israeli flag and played the Israeli anthem, Hatikva — it means “the hope” — and Lanir, alone at the top of the podium, wiped tears from her eyes. These were tears of joy. Of happiness. And wonder.

This is the hope of sport — that it can transcend political differences. Because when they played the anthem and lifted the flag, it was — normal. Everything was totally, completely normal. 

Money talks, always: Where is Peng Shuai? China. Where is WTA headed back? China

Money talks, always: Where is Peng Shuai? China. Where is WTA headed back? China

The women’s professional tennis tour is headed back to China, announcing Thursday the end of the boycott linked to concerns over former player Peng Shuai.

Wait! What about the moral high ground? The pre-Beijing 2022 Winter Games lecturing by so many in the West to China, repeated as gospel by willing journalistic interlocutors? The veneration over the past several months of WTA chairman and chief executive Steve Simon, who as recently as last month was saying the women’s tour would return to China only when 1/ it could directly contact Peng and 2/ the Chinese authorities conducted a “full, fair and transparent” investigation?

What about the self-appointed high priests from the many tribes of the reflexively high-dudgeon and sanctimoniously judgmental?

The issue is not boxing. Right or wrong, fair or not, it's Umar Kremlev

The issue is not boxing. Right or wrong, fair or not, it's Umar Kremlev

It has been nearly eight years now since Marius Vizer, then head of what was called SportAccord, launched one of the most memorable inside-the-Olympic-world attacks of all time — if not the grand prize winner, honestly —  on the International Olympic Committee, saying at a gathering in Sochi, Russia, that the IOC was running a system he called “expired, outdated, wrong, unfair and not at all transparent.”

Vizer, then and still also head of the International Judo Federation, speaks his mind. To this day. Nonetheless, he and IOC president Thomas Bach have, at least for public consumption, significantly patched up differences. And for the past eight years, no one, at least inside the Olympic landscape, has sought so directly and forcefully to take on Bach and the IOC.

Cue Umar Kremlev and the International Boxing Association.

War? Good for absolutely nothing. Myopic focus on one, the "globalization of indifference'

War? Good for absolutely nothing. Myopic focus on one, the "globalization of indifference'

So much of our world is mired in inhumanity. 

The west seemingly can only see Ukraine. But the past 10 years have brought a paradigm shift, one that is now all but hiding in plain sign — one about which the International Olympic Committee, to its credit, recognized and, for once, has been ahead of trend.

If only the most vocal, the most strident, politicians in the west would wake up and see what is right there.

If only the western world would, as an NPR report in December acknowledged, devote perhaps more than 1% of its media coverage to what’s what.

If only these politicians and the media could confront, would at least acknowledge, the bias and the flat-out racism. Because all human beings deserve a common measure of dignity. Everyone.

As the president of the International Judo Federation, Marius Vizer, said in opening arguably that sport’s preeminent tour event, the Paris Grand Slam, over the weekend, “War and politics cannot divide sport and cannot divide us. Sport and religion bring the most important values of society, which promote principles of respect, solidarity and peace. Sport is the last bridge, which today in the world’s confrontations can be a messenger for peace and unity and can work for reconciliation.”

It's about the Russians, again. But it's so not. Wake up, people: our world is about China

It's about the Russians, again. But it's so not. Wake up, people: our world is about China

The Paris Olympics are due to open in July 2024. That’s 17, 18 months from now. Already, though, it seems to be all about Russia. 

For the past 10 years, it seems like it has been about Russia: Sochi 2014 and the matter of the country’s laws. The seemingly endless doping controversies. Then, of course, the invasion of Ukraine just days after the close of the Beijing 2022 Winter Games.

The International Olympic Committee’s overarching mission is to try to “unite the entire world in peaceful competition.” The entire world means everyone, no exceptions, and this is why already, 17, 18 months away, there’s so much discussion, to and fro, about the notion of getting the Russians to Paris as neutrals.

Except, the focus on the Russians, 17, 18 months away entirely misses the point.

Again: less screaming, less vitriol. Kamila Valieva is just 16

Again: less screaming, less vitriol. Kamila Valieva is just 16

From the get-go, it has been entirely unclear why so much vitriol has been directed at Kamila Valieva. 

She is still just 16. 

Here is yet another call for everyone — repeat, everyone — to dial down the rhetoric, the anger, the urge to put Valieva front and center as proxy for everything Russian or Putin and the war. She is none of those things.

She is a 16-year-old figure skater who, when last seen, was performing at the Russian national championships with a charming down-to-the-move celebration of Jenna Ortega’s viral Wednesday Addams dance from the hit Netflix series.

May Grant Wahl’s memory be a blessing … and many owe Qatar an apology

May Grant Wahl’s memory be a blessing … and many owe Qatar an apology

In Jewish tradition, when someone dies, we say, may his — in this case, his — memory be a blessing. 

Grant Wahl’s sudden death at the World Cup in Qatar came as a devastating shock. May his memory be a blessing, in particular to his wife, their family and their many friends.

Now, as your Jewish friend, because — without getting too deep into theology here — the Jewish way is to concentrate on the life we are living here and now and, especially, as arguably the most significant of events in our calendar reminds us, to think about how we can do better … all of you who were so quick to rush to judgment, to publicly speculate about, suspect, accuse or, worse, condemn the Qataris of the very worst in connection with Wahl’s death, you owe them, the Qataris, an apology. 

The Russians (still, again) and Salt Lake (again, still) -- the gifts that keep giving

The Russians (still, again) and Salt Lake (again, still) -- the gifts that keep giving

Twelve things about the flurry of pronouncements and announcements over the past several days about the Russians and whether they will or won’t be at the Paris Summer Games in 2024.

OK, 11 about the Russians and one about Salt Lake City.

The Russians and Salt Lake. They’re the Olympic gifts that keep giving.

1. Don’t delude yourself. Don’t be naive. Don’t be a hater, either. The Russians will almost surely be in Paris in 2024. Except they won’t be identified as Russians. They will be neutrals. The way they typically had been at World Athletics meets — something like ANA, or Authorized Neutral Athlete.

Ten thoughts (and a bonus) about the 2022 men's World Cup

Ten thoughts (and a bonus) about the 2022 men's World Cup

Ten thoughts — and a bonus extra, too — about the World Cup, now that the United States team is headed home.

1. The U.S. team made it through to the round of 16. So what?

This does not, looking toward 2026, when the World Cup will be (largely) played in the United States, herald some crazy breakthrough for soccer in this country.

If you’re a soccer geek, you’re already a soccer geek. The rest of America mostly cares about world-class soccer only when it’s a big event, like the World Cup. Americans like big events. This is why the Olympics draws big ratings, too.

What America really cares about is football. American football.

Concerned about water sports at LA28? Fear not, for to the left: the Pacific Ocean

Concerned about water sports at LA28? Fear not, for to the left: the Pacific Ocean

The life cycle of an Olympic organizing committee is utterly predictable. Here in SoCal, it’s five-plus years to go until the opening ceremony in July 2028. Thus came the tone and tenor of the inane question directed at a Thursday news conference at LA28 chairman Casey Wasserman, which carried the grievance-laced, fix-this-now hallmark that attends these sorts of queries at this point, Olympics organizers somehow expected to fix every problem under the sun when the job description is delivering a Games on time and under budget.

In a startling fit of obviousness, a local NPR reporter noted that Los Angeles has a homelessness problem. He asked: “So what’s your response right now?” Then, after some remarks from the head table, this follow-up: “Are you prepared to put policies on the table or to put remedies on the table …”

Is an Olympic organizing committee a government entity? No. Is the city of Los Angeles, the county of Los Angeles, the state of California — are all these entities wrestling with the maddening complexities of this issue? Yes. Has there been a long-running lawsuit in federal court in Los Angeles over this exact matter worth literally billions of dollars? Yes.

And yet an Olympic organizing committee is supposed to wave the five rings in the air or something, and summon a magical fix? What next? Solve climate change? Cure cancer? Achieve a breakthrough in cold fusion?