Olympics

Despite the recession and a soft advertising market, CBS is very optimistic about bringing home the gold with its mammoth coverage of the Winter Olympics from Albertville, France, which started Saturday and runs for 16 days and nights."

BEIJING - Filthy air. Undrinkable water. Natives hacking wads of phlegm on the sidewalks. Roads crammed with incessantly honking cabbies who can't speak English and refuse to run their air conditioners on blistering summer days. Sure sounds like a place to hold an Olympics. For a moment, set aside the human rights problems in the world's most populated nation. Forget about the Tibetan Buddhists and Chinese Catholics, both of whom have seen the Communist regime take over their religions and install leaders of their own. Ignore the fact that 150 million people live on the streets because, having been born in the countryside and being thus prohibited from ever living in the cities, they've flocked there anyway, undocumented, to find work.

They range from a shooting specialist to one of the great sprinters of his generation. The former Maryland Summer Olympians who have won medals are listed below. Despite exhaustive research, it's possible we left someone out, so let us know at sports@baltsun.com. Theresa Andrews 1984 Swimming The two-time gold medalist was the first Olympic star to come from the North Baltimore Aquatic Club. After winning the 100-meter backstroke, Andrews presented the medal to her brother, Danny, to honor him for his courage after he was paralyzed at the age of 19 in a bicycle accident.

IN BETWEEN Chevy commercials and Coke commercials and commercials for the Capital One "no-hassle" credit card, NBC continues to give us occasional glimpses of the Winter Olympics. For instance, as I type this, women's figure skating is on and ... oops, there's the Friends commercial again, where what's-his-name, the mopey guy who's not real bright, is falling in love with Rachel. Well, while we have a moment, let's throw this out: What do we have to do to get rid of ice-dancing? Please, someone tell me. Because whatever it takes - petitions, call-in campaigns, bursting into the offices of key Olympic officials and holding them hostage - I'm willing to do it so that we never, ever have to sit through that again.

Turin, Italy-- --Used to be we'd gather around the water cooler the next day and talk about what happened last night. "Did you see Bode bomb?!" "Kwan couldn't land a triple if you spotted her two spins and the landing!" "Gretzky says Canada will cover, so why would I bet against them?" Not anymore. These Turin Games mark a whole new chapter for the Olympics. The way we consume the Olympics has been revolutionized. I don't buy the talk that the sky is falling on the sacred Games. Sure, Americans don't understand all of the sports, attendance is sparse and television ratings are down.

ATHENS OLYMPICS Prime-Time coverage. TV: Ch. 11, 8 p.m. to midnight

TURIN, Italy-- --The athletes flooded the stadium in a pack, and you could see the flags poking above a sea of heads. There was no real order. The closing ceremony at the Olympics is a celebration of unity. So you watched the flags and followed the country names on the JumboTron. Hungary ... Iceland ... India ... Iran ... But wait. ... Ireland ... Israel ... Italy ... Wasn't one missing? ... What happened to Iraq? You laugh because these are the Winter Games, and Iraq sees about as much snow each year as my dining room.

After watching almost every hour of Olympics television on all the various NBC broadcast and cable channels this weekend, here's the verdict: I hate the coverage, but I'm hooked on watching. The question for NBC: Could I have more of the games and less of Bob Costas and his self-important, pseudo-sociological mumbo jumbo? Wait, wait, I take it back. I'll live with Costas, and Katie Couric and Hannah Storm, too, if only NBC will quit running those endless promotional ads for Watching Ellie, the new Julia Louis-Dreyfus sitcom premiering later this month.

Somehow, in its wisdom, the IOC (and no, that doesn't stand for I Overhype Canada) failed to award medals to those high-performing competitors in the world of Olympic television. So let's go to the podium, as top marks are presented for the less-heralded contests that played out on the air over the past few weeks. Gold for best camera work: Saturday night's touching footage of American figure skater Sarah Hughes, spinning furiously as she completed her routine on Thursday, also captured the simultaneous exultation of her coach, who registered that she was likely to win a medal.

LAKE PLACID, N.Y. -- Some days, Angela Ruggiero is a "D." Other days, she's a "C." She's even, on occasion, been an "F." Chances are the defender-center-forward on the U.S. women's hockey team would take tickets, wash uniforms or even run the Zamboni machine between periods to win another Olympic gold medal. "Yeah, there's unfinished business," Ruggiero says. It has been eight years since the U.S. women's team wore the gold and four years since dejected team members could barely stand to look at the silver medals around their necks.