LIVIGNO, Italy — The original concept for the Winter Olympics was simple. In the early 1990s, a movement began within the International Olympic Committee to designate a week to celebrate the sport of ice and snow. By 1964, the number of athletes had grown to more than 1,000, participating in 34 events.
Thirty years later, the Winter Olympics have adopted a new schedule and are no longer held in the same year as the Summer Olympics. Recently, they have added more modern, youth-focused sports like snowboarding and freestyle skiing.
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However, all these changes fail to solve one of the major problems inherent in winter sports: the Winter Olympics lack diversity and star power except for a handful of athletes primarily from European mountainous countries. Even in America, athletes like Lindsey Vonn or Shaun White who can break into the mainstream conversation are rare.
That’s why the Winter Olympics need to adjust its standards and include the world’s most popular winter sports.
It’s time to take basketball out of the Summer Olympics and put it where it belongs.
More than 20 million viewers tuned in to watch Team USA capture the gold medal in the men’s basketball finals at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. (Photo by Aytac Unal/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(Anadolu, Getty Images)
Of course, basketball is not a winter sport as defined by the International Olympic Committee because it is played indoors without ice or snow. But the rules can be changed when it is convenient for the IOC. Heck, the organization has recently hosted the Winter Olympics in places like Sochi, Russia (a seaside resort where temperatures rarely dip below 40 degrees) and Beijing, where the weather is so dry that snow has to be made.
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If they wanted basketball to be a Winter Olympics sport, they could easily change the rules to make it happen. Is this sport played and watched in the winter? OK, you can go!
The IOC should push for this as it would significantly enhance the appeal of the Winter Olympics to a worldwide audience without diminishing the excitement of the Summer Games, where basketball seems to be an afterthought.
As exciting as the basketball tournament is, especially in the past two Olympics, where countries like France and Serbia have posed significant challenges to the U.S. team, competing for attention in track and field, gymnastics, swimming and other events has been tough. There is just so much going on, especially with the Summer Olympics becoming so much more.
Two years ago in Paris, there were 329 medal events in 32 sports, and more are being added all the time, such as sport climbing in 2024 or flag football in 2028. This year Milan Cortina will have 116 medal events in 16 events. If the Winter Olympics are limited to sports that require ice and snow, then its development will be limited.
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Maybe this works for the IOC now, but is it a sustainable strategy for the future?
If the IOC doesn’t care about TV ratings, especially in the United States, they should. NBC’s average reach across all platforms in 2022 was 11.4 million viewers, down from 19.8 million in 2018. This is already about 7% lower than Sochi 2014.
There may be some statistical noise in this trend line due to time zone issues (the last two Winter Olympics were held in China and South Korea were a disaster for American viewers) and the bad vibes of Beijing still being in full COVID lockdown in 2022. Americans were tired of talking about it by then, but it was impossible to watch the empty stands as the event unfolded and not think about the pandemic.
Interest has reportedly picked up and ratings are up due to a more traditional Winter Olympics in the Italian Alps and a timing of events more conducive to U.S. viewers. NHL players returning to men’s hockey for the first time since 2014 also helps a lot.
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But in the long term, the Winter Olympics are too limited, both conceptually and geographically, to increase viewership among younger demographics.
Outside Europe, the United States and Canada, participation is low. The addition of action sports has attracted some athletes from Australia and New Zealand, while Japan, China and South Korea often feature prominently in skating. But South America, Africa, the Middle East and even some populous countries like Spain (14 athletes at the 2022 Olympics), Brazil (10) and Mexico (4) are effectively absent.
This is always a challenge for the IOC. It’s hard to build an audience for winter sports in a place where there aren’t many winters.
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But that’s also why, at this time of year when fans are used to watching the NBA and leagues around the world, it makes perfect sense to give basketball, a sport played in every corner of the globe, its deserved showcase at the Olympics.
Suddenly, Argentina was interested. Australia and Greece are also involved. The story of South Sudan made waves in Paris, and in this context its impact is even greater because of what it means for the perception of the Winter Olympics across the continent.
Also, no disrespect to any of the athletes preparing to compete in Cortina, Milan, but the Winter Olympics don’t have as many world-class superstars as the Summer Olympics. Yes, every speed skater is famous in the Netherlands, the Germans love their sleds, and cross-country skiers are popular in Norway. But these are niche sports and niche markets. Having Giannis Antetokounmpo, Nikola Jokic or Kaitlyn Clark bring mainstream appeal to the Winter Olympics would be transformative.
Of course, such a dramatic change would require significant cooperation from the NBA and European leagues to suspend the season in February. It might be hard to find many NBA owners willing to keep their star players away for a few weeks and risk injury before the playoffs.
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Granted, there are many questions to ask. But the NHL has managed to do this, and the benefit is that it doesn’t require NBA players to commit as much time during the Olympic-year offseason to training camps and participating in exhibition games before actual games. If the NBA were willing to adjust its schedule to allow it to happen every four years, the Olympics would generate significant momentum and maybe even re-engage some casual fans ahead of the playoffs.
At the end of the day, the Summer Olympics don’t need basketball at all. There is already so much to consume that you could remove it entirely but few would notice. However, it would turn the Winter Olympics into a more global event that could easily compete with more traditional popular sports like figure skating and hockey.
The Olympic movement is always evolving. Its next big move should be to include the world’s most popular winter sport in the Winter Olympics.
