I have been over the Olympics for many cycles now. Corruption played a part. NBC never not showing figure skating, even during the summer games a part. But another aspect was the fringe competitions that popped up and then disappeared. I’m looking at you, flag football.
Ever since Dodgeball the Movie introduced us to ESPN8, The Ocho, it seems your cornhole, your darts, your curling are now considered athletic competitions. Now before you say I am clinging to an outmoded way of sports thought, they are competitions sure. It takes skill to throw a dart with pinpoint accuracy but it also is more math as you need to know where to throw it to get the right point total.
Flag Football is a competition but it is more an anti-concussion one. And curling is literally sweeping meets ice Bocce Ball. What’s next, axe throwing as sport? I know that the streaming platforms are desperate for sports content because unlike the Harry Potter movies that have been on every platform, sometimes at the same time, sports are unique individual events. But they are not going to boost the subscriber base with a mega niche offering like Quidditch.
I have to say that these outliers may be fun, but you will never see Usher playing the halftime show of the Cornhole Super Bowl.
This is an easy beer pairing because we won’t be pairing these psedo-sports with beer. The next time a dodgeball contest is on and you are watching because you were intimidated by the nearly three hour run time of Part 1 of Mission Impossible, grab yourself a hard seltzer or a smoothie beer that pours like a slurpee from 7-11 and enjoy the weirdness that is the “sports” landscape in 2024. Or you could really zag and find a beer/wine hybrid, that would be the classy way.
