While most of the problems and criticisms of NBC's 2018 Olympic coverage to this point have been either due to NBC's traditional over-production of their Olympic broadcasts and considerable use of tape-delay, as well as some things that were largely out of NBC's control, such as multiple alpine skiing postponements due to high winds, NBC managed to pull off an embarassing, disgraceful, and Olympic-sized Heidi moment last night, nearly half a decade after the Heidi moment. However, unlike the Heidi moment, which, to my knowledge, did not feature anyone at NBC prematurely declaring a winner in that infamous 1968 gridiron football game, NBC originally declared the wrong person the winner in the women's super-G in Pyeongchang.
After a relatively major on-course error cost American Lindsey Vonn any chance of a medal in the super-G, Austrian Anna Vieth posted a very fast time among those that NBC considered to be medal contenders, and Vieth was the leader when NBC cut away from the women's super-G to air, not Heidi or any other movie or non-sports programming, but the conclusion of the men's figure skating free skate.
However, in cutting away from the super-G, Dan Hicks, NBC's play-by-play announcer at the Pyeongchang Games for the alpine skiing events, declared that Vieth had won the gold medal, although there were numerous skiers who had not yet completed their runs down the piste. While NBC was airing the dramatic conclusion of men's figure skating, unheralded Czech skier Ester Ledecka, a former world champion snowboarder who converted to alpine skiing recently (in fact, she had only competed in one super-G alpine skiing World Cup event prior to the Games), posted a faster time than Vieth did to win the gold medal using skis that Ledecka borrowed from American women's giant slalom gold medalist Mikaela Shiffrin, with Vieth winning silver and Liechtensteiner Tina Weirather winning bronze.
NBC did bring Hicks back on-air after the figure skating concluded to issue a correction and show Ledecka's gold-medal run. However, NBC was not going to escape the inevitable criticism that it received of prematurely declaring the wrong person the winner, such as this take from San Diego Union-Tribune sports editor Jay Posner:
While I can certainly understand why NBC cut to figure skating instead of airing the conclusion of the the women's super-G alpine skiing event in Pyeongchang, nobody at NBC should have even comptemplating Vieth or anyone else the winner until the event had officially concluded. At this point, I could envision the IOC stepping in and stripping NBC of its broadcast rights of future Olympics (if they're even permitted to do so, which I doubt that they are), although I sincerely doubt that they'd do that.
After a relatively major on-course error cost American Lindsey Vonn any chance of a medal in the super-G, Austrian Anna Vieth posted a very fast time among those that NBC considered to be medal contenders, and Vieth was the leader when NBC cut away from the women's super-G to air, not Heidi or any other movie or non-sports programming, but the conclusion of the men's figure skating free skate.
However, in cutting away from the super-G, Dan Hicks, NBC's play-by-play announcer at the Pyeongchang Games for the alpine skiing events, declared that Vieth had won the gold medal, although there were numerous skiers who had not yet completed their runs down the piste. While NBC was airing the dramatic conclusion of men's figure skating, unheralded Czech skier Ester Ledecka, a former world champion snowboarder who converted to alpine skiing recently (in fact, she had only competed in one super-G alpine skiing World Cup event prior to the Games), posted a faster time than Vieth did to win the gold medal using skis that Ledecka borrowed from American women's giant slalom gold medalist Mikaela Shiffrin, with Vieth winning silver and Liechtensteiner Tina Weirather winning bronze.
NBC did bring Hicks back on-air after the figure skating concluded to issue a correction and show Ledecka's gold-medal run. However, NBC was not going to escape the inevitable criticism that it received of prematurely declaring the wrong person the winner, such as this take from San Diego Union-Tribune sports editor Jay Posner:
Believe it or not, this isn't the first time that NBC prematurely declared someone the wrong winner of a sporting event. In 1955, NBC, which carried only one hour of coverage of that year's U.S. Open golf championship in California, declared Ben Hogan the winner of the U.S. Open and ended its broadcast of the U.S. Open despite the fact that multiple golfers, including then-unheralded Jack Fleck, had not yet completed their final rounds. Fleck birdied two of the final four holes of the Lake Course at San Franscisco's Olympic Club to tie Hogan and force an 18-hole playoff. NBC didn't even bother to air any portion of the playoff, which Fleck won in a major upset.Wow, NBC left women's Super-G having anointed an Austrian the gold-medal winner because didn't think anyone outside of top 19 could win. And someone outside of top 19 just won.— Jay Posner (@sdutPosner) February 17, 2018
While I can certainly understand why NBC cut to figure skating instead of airing the conclusion of the the women's super-G alpine skiing event in Pyeongchang, nobody at NBC should have even comptemplating Vieth or anyone else the winner until the event had officially concluded. At this point, I could envision the IOC stepping in and stripping NBC of its broadcast rights of future Olympics (if they're even permitted to do so, which I doubt that they are), although I sincerely doubt that they'd do that.
Stipping NBC of its broadcast rights? That's one of the dumbest things I've read in a long time.
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