LA’s Olympics: Major League and weird

By BRUCE LOWITT

The Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games, desperate to generate some buzz by having Major League Baseball players compete in the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Games, has moved its entire schedule from July to December.

SCCOG Chairman Gene Salomon said he believes ballplayers from Milwaukee, Kansas City, Cincinnati “and other boring cities who have nothing but golf to keep them from going crazy in the offseason would love to be Olympians and hang out with Jessica Alba, Halle Berry and whichever other movie stars we can round up.”

Cleveland Guardians outfielder Josh Naylor said baseball in L.A. in December, with temperatures in the seventies, “beats the crap out of ice fishing in Mississauga,” his Canadian hometown. “You freeze your ass off there for half the year. Honestly, I’m thrilled just to be able to spend the rest of it in Cleveland.”

Salomon said most southern Californians “are either out of town or at the beach in July. This way, our schedule pretty much guarantees sellouts at the Olympic events. And speaking of the events, we’re adding a bunch of stuff besides previously announced flag football, cricket, squash and lacrosse to attract a more diverse crowd.”

The schedule now includes medal competition in Frisbee Golf, Slip-and-Slide, Twister, Potato Sack Racing, Cornhole, Mud-Pit Belly Flopping, Wood Chopping, Axe Throwing, Sepak Takraw, Quidditch, Ferret Legging and both classic and freestyle Døds.

And because the International Olympic Committee limits the number of sports to 28 in the Summer Games, Salomon said, the SCCOG is doing away with “dumb stuff nobody cares about, not to mention TV ratings that suck when they’re on. So forget wrestling and weightlifting. Who wants to watch sweaty, musclebound, fat-necked people – and I’m including the men, too.

“And distance races, anything longer than 800 yards, or meters or however the hell they measure them? Gone. You sit around for hours waiting for the skinniest bastards I’ve ever seen wobbling across the finish line. Oh, please! And equestrian? You want horses? Go to Santa Anita.”