Man, was I excited about these Olympic Games.

The summer games in Australia -- what could be better?

No more of that soft white winter stuff featuring 28 trillion hours of figure skating and ice dancing and cross country skiing in some dainty little place like Lillihammer. Nay, this was going to be the real deal: a sheer, raw, sweaty, testosteronic clash of a competition, carried out in a place known for doing things big and brawny, and well ... manly.

There is very little pink lace going on in Australia.

Men wrestle crocodiles in Australia.

Spokesmen for the tourist industry walk around with swords they call knives.

Beer comes in 64 oz. cans.

And as I recall from one of my favorite childhood cartoons, even the mice are bigger, and they know how to box. Just ask Sylvester The Cat.

Yes, Sport was about to finally swing back away from the heart wrenching thrill of the nordic combined to the mano-a-mano tension of track and field. Heck, the NFL might even take a back seat while the flame was burning this time. Life, she was going to be good.

The week before the competition I began to read up on the events to come: archery, baseball, basketball, kayaking, fencing, handball, judo, pentathlon, rowing, soccer, high jump, long jump, triple jump, pole vault, discus, shot put, hammer throw, (ah, the hammer throw!), javelin, decathlon, triathlon, weightlifting and last but certainly not deserving of such: Greco Roman wrestling!

I was in heaven; a 9 year old, one week before Christmas. This was surely Sport's finest hour and it was to happen in a place where not even NBC could muck it up! Right?!

WRONG!

I knew something wasn't quite right that first night during the opening ceremonies when some little pixie of a girl was tethered about the waist and swung all around Stadium Australia, trailing star dust from her feet. It didn't exactly set what I considered to be the appropriate mood for the hammer throw - much less Greco Roman wrestling.

I didn't see a single crocodile on the floor. Just a bunch of skipping and dancing and bad pop music played by Australian versions of whatever the heck is popular in the States these days. But the athletes all showed up on cue so hope was held out.

It proved to be very short lived.

The following four to five nights, I sank deeper and deeper into an Australian sized Olympic depression, as it became clear that women's gymnastics and synchronized swimming were going to carry the day at NBC.

My wife knows something's up when I walk the dog a lot.

"What's wrong," she asked on several occasions, "You don't seem to be taking the usual amount of interest in the Olympics this year?"

"Oh, I don't know dear," I finally replied, but not nearly so nice: "I guess I've seen about 48 too many heart warming background stories on women gymnasts, while large burly men are somewhere nearby doing the stuff of Olympic Sport. I'd kill about now for five minutes of shot put coverage. Hell, even a little high jump would do."

"It'll come," she said compassionately, "it's just not time for those events yet. Probably in a day or so..."

And you know what? She was right! It did come! One night while I was drifting off to sleep during some equestrian event I saw two men "shoot the put" or "put the shot" or whatever it is they do ... and they did it two times each! It was remarkable!

Then it was back to beach volleyball or something. Its all kind of shades of gray at this point.

They finally extinguished the Olympic flame and the ceremony was nice enough, I suppose -- lots of color and music and lights. The athletes were all mostly there, save some of the members of the American men's basketball and 4 x 100 meter relay teams. Their absence wasn't such a bad thing.

If you missed their post-competition performances, I won't go into detail here. Just know that you were represented by some of the most classless thugs on the planet, possessing about as much sportsmanship and grace as a pack of pit bull terriers.

Maybe that's what has become of the "heartier" side of sports in America.

I hope not, but if so I'd like to thank NBC for showing less of it.

The reality, of course, is that the unknown competitors are for the most part the ones that demonstrate what true Sport is all about -- regardless of the competition in which they compete. Not the favored gymnasts who rip their silver medals from their necks because they feel they deserve nothing less than gold. Not the ones who refuse to acknowledge the efforts of their competitors in lieu of their self described "sub-par performance." And certainly not the ones whose self-centered celebrations deny others the dignity and respect they, too, have earned.

For my money, the two individuals who I'll remember long after the marquee names have faded are wrestler Rulon Gardner and platform diver Laura Wilkinson. Those two unlikely and unsung Americans thanked God and their lucky stars when they miraculously found themselves atop the podium.

Thank goodness for real people. I wish more of them were better athletes ... or visa-versa.

Think they'll show any of the bob sledding in Salt Lake City?

Probably not, but thanks to folks like Rulon and Laura I'm looking forward to it.