THE UPS AND DOWNS OF THE OLYMPIC GAMES

While NBC executives have gone on record saying the ratings for the Beijing Winter Olympics are significantly down, it’s worth talking about what it’s been like for some of the reporters at the games.

NBC, CBS, ABC all have skeleton crews on the ground at the Olympics this year. NBC sent a couple of NBC LX reporters to Beijing to cover the major of the games along with host Mike Tirico. Tirico returned on February 10.

But for those there, it’s not all fun and games. In fact, it’s just life in a very small bubble with almost nothing to do but cover races and do hits — some are races they see in person, others are not.

All breakfast, lunch and dinner places are controlled. Press are not allowed out of the bubble at all. They undergo repeated COVID tests, daily.

The drop in ratings in attributed to a number of things including the lack of audience members and energy at the actual races, COVID, China… and more.

NBC executives went on record telling staffer the following about the Olympics this year.

“For us, it’s been difficult. There’s no way around this,” Pete Bevacqua told The Hollywood Reporter. “The fact that we’ve been able to bring these Games to life during a pandemic with only a six-month window between the two [Olympics], the ratings are — of course we always want to have the ratings better — but the ratings for these Games, as I said, are about where we thought they’d be.”