Wednesday, February 16, 2022

Johnny Weir is angry.

And you've never seen anything like it. 

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• We're going to start tonight with the medal round for Men's Aerials Freestyle Skiing. Everything's pre-recorded, so this should go quicker than a live event. Like diving in the summer games, all I know about scoring is whether someone sticks the landing. The first American does not. The second American does not. Only two skiers nail their landings, China's Qi Guangpu and Russia's Ilia Burov, and they win gold and bronze respectively.
• And now we are LIVE for more coverage of America's favorite communist traitor, Eileen Gu, skiing in the Women's Halfpipe qualifying round. The top 12 skiers advance.
• An actual American, Hanna Faulhaber, goes first and sets the mark to beat. Eileen Gu goes two skiers later. She skis a clean run and takes over first place. Uyghur slaves start manufacturing merchandise that celebrates her impending victory.
• Brita Sigourney of the US, who at age 32 is old enough to remember when Americans were loyal to their country, moves into sixth place.
• A LIVE curling update. The US men are taking on Denmark. The winner moves on to the medal round. It is currently tied.
• Mike teases the one story that everyone is talking about. Well, it’s at least the story that NBC is talking about. It’s the Russian Crime Syndicate skater Kamila Valiyeva, who gets to skate even though she tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir are in the studio to talk about it. Johnny looks furious. His whole persona for NBC has always been so joyous that it’s really shocking to see him angry. Tara has empathy for Kamila, since Lipinski was 15 when she won the gold medal. She clearly thinks it’s the adults in charge of Kamila’s training that are guilty, but neither she nor Johnny excuses Valiyeva’s positive test. This is all fluff, but Tara and Johnny are really showing why they’re the best commentators NBC currently has. They’ve always presented themselves as the happy promoters of figure skating, but this interview really shows the depth of their knowledge of how the sport works. I sort of joked the other day that they should be the co-hosts of the Opening Ceremonies. I’m not joking as much any more. NBC should really consider it.
• More LIVE Halfpipe. Devin Logan of the US skis clean and takes 12th place. Uh-oh. Then she gets bumped down to 13th. She’ll have to improve on run two.
• Curling update! US is ahead 5-2 in the 5th end. That’s a good sign.
• We are LIVE on the mountain for the Women’s Combined. Oh wait. No we’re not. We’re in the studio talking about the Women’s Combined. Guess who is in it? Lindsey Vonn, Ted Ligety, and Steve Porino get to talk all about Mikaela Shiffrin. They do this for four minutes. Fluff!
• So NOW we are LIVE for the Women’s Combined. Every skier will make one downhill run and one slalom run, then add each race’s times together to get a winner. First up, American Bella Wright making her downhill run. She’s in first! Because she was the first skier. Don’t get excited. Keely Cashman is the eighth skier and she finishes in second. The next skier is Mikaela. Shiffrin is stronger at the slalom than the downhill, so if she makes a strong showing here, she’ll be in good shape. She finishes about a half-second back. That’s great news for her.
• Steve Porino is back with some fancy equipment. The skiers’ one-time use suit costs $1,000. Why do they only use it once? Steve doesn’t say. Cut-resistant underwear. A helmet. And finally, a crash vest with an airbag in it. Yes! An airbag! It’s full of sensors and deploys 17 milliseconds before you crash. If the spandex suit costs a thousand bucks, I don’t even want to know how much an airbag costs. Fluff.
• Mikaela was interviewed at the bottom of the hill about using fellow skier Sofia Goggia’s skis. She sort of rambles. I’d count it as fluff, but I guess it is race-related, so I’ll allow it. The slalom events will be after this broadcast, so you’ll either have to stay up late or wait until tomorrow night to see the final results.
• We end the night with some Women’s Hockey fluff. The United States and Canada will be playing for the gold medal later tonight. AJ Mleczko and Angela Ruggiero, former US hockey players, are here to tell us all about the rivalry and the evolution of the sport. I think the rivalry is strong. The evolution of the sport… meh. It’s Canada and the US almost every Olympics. If the sport was evolving, shouldn’t there be some other countries that are competitive?

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It's a short night tonight so NBC can let your local news make some money before they broadcast the Women's Hockey gold-medal game. Stay up and watch it! It should be good. See you tomorrow!

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