Plenty of things that are barely sports are being added to the Olympic games. And as such apparently the ones that don’t garner enough television ratings, despite being thousands of years old and staples of the modern and original Olympic movements, are getting the ax. Olympic Wrestling will be disappearing in 2020, apparently, and this is part of a plan by the IOC to reinvigorate the games and such.
“This is a process of renewing and renovating the program for the Olympics,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams said to many outlets. “In the view of the executive board, this was the best program for the Olympic Games in 2020. It’s not a case of what’s wrong with wrestling, it is what’s right with the 25 core sports.”
This is a huge blow to the combat sports world; a large chunk of MMA is comprised of guys who spent extensive time on the mats.
Kubryk’s Analysis: As someone who wrestled for nearly a decade and counts it among the best experiences of my life I can only think that is the IOC officially becoming a commercial enterprise as opposed to having some sort of ennobling purpose to it still. This is about bringing in sports that are more television draws as opposed to anything else; this is purely and simply a cash move to get rid of sports that don’t draw as much and get in sports that could.
If there ever was a reason to avoid the Olympics like the Plague, this is it.
