Time - Man of the Year/Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso/moy/081092/08109936.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 6KB | 131 lines

                                                                                OLYMPICS, Page 50

1992 SUMMER GAMES

BARCELONA: The Win-Win Games


In these so far happy Olympics, even losers seem to count
themselves fortunate

By PICO IYER/BARCELONA


    The shadow Dream Team was working its magic in a rickety,
almost empty country stadium. There were Roman numerals on the
scoreboard. Black-and-yellow butterflies fluttered around the
net. The few sportswriters in attendance were sitting
cross-legged on the ground, to avoid the blistering sun. The bus
driver hadn't even known how to find the place.

    The number of fans supporting the perennial world
champions was approximately zero. And though this was their
national day, no flags were flying in their honor. Nonetheless,
the Cuban baseball team went out and polished the diamond till
it sparkled, showing off all the sports-for-sports'-sake swagger
of a team that has won 63 of 64 international games in recent
years. All but unknown prodigies with names like Omar and
Orestes and Lourdes gave a master class not only in the
fundamentals but also in the finer points of flamboyance --
bunting one-handed, stretching singles into triples, chiseling
the plate like jewelers. According to many Americans, at least
seven of them could command multimillion-dollar salaries in the
U.S.

    Afterward, the opposing coach, Rafael Avila, was exultant.
"For us it's a victory," he said. "I'm very pleased with our
kids." The Dominicans had, after all, come within eight runs of
tying the Cubans. The Cuban pitcher, for his part, complained
that he'd had a bad day. And the smiling Cuban centerfielder
Victor Mesa (a.k.a. "El Loco") bubbled over with noblesse
oblige: "The Dominican Republic should be very proud to lose
only 8-0." Across town that afternoon, where another dominant
Dream Team was on display, the responses were almost identical.
"Our objective has been to keep them within a 45-point range,"
said the coach of the Angolan basketball team, Victorino Cunha,
after playing the U.S. True, he had lost by 68, but that seemed
a minor victory after being 48 points down at halftime. "For
us," said an Angolan, "it's good to lose by 60 points."

    There was no shortage of winners as the Olympics
loudspeakers began playing national anthems last week: Fu
Mingxia, the poised Chinese diver who was not even born when El
Loco began hitting home runs for Cuba; the Maldivian swimmer who
became the first in his country's Olympic history not to finish
last (in part because that position was already occupied by
another Maldivian swimmer).

    But as a Tibetan monk (on hand for Buddhist duties in the
Olympic Village) noted, "More will lose than win." And the
losers were already finding reasons for reassurance, ways of
measuring themselves against the insuperable, sources of
delight. The Angolans, for example, seemed almost flattered when
American Charles Barkley jabbed an elbow into one skinny
Angolan. It suggested to them that Barkley was taking them
seriously, treating them as roughly as he would his professional
opponents.

    For those expected to win, like the Cubans, it was harder
to trump expectation. In their second game, they dispensed with
Italy 18-1 and were probably distraught about giving up a run.
Then they trounced Japan 8-2. One day later, to vary things a
little, against an uncommonly strong U.S. team, they spotted the
Americans five runs in the first inning and calmly breezed past,
9-6. Yet as they continued their imperturbable strut toward the
first Olympic gold medal in the all-American pastime, the Cubans
were carrying on their shoulders all the ambiguities of the
Games. Were they an ideal embodiment of the Olympic spirit --
spurning cash to play for country -- or in fact its
desecration, mere public relations puppets with which the Cuban
government could show off its prowess to the world (while the
rest of the island starved)? Were they the most professional
amateurs you could ever hope to see, or an aging, Potemkin
example of a state-sponsored system of shamateurism?

    The U.S. Dream Teamers were up against other kinds of
obstacles. Weren't they just All-Stars, coach Chuck Daly was
constantly being asked, or merely Hollywood Globetrotters? Why
did they dominate the spotlight here? Why did they not stay in
the Olympic Village? One reason was that 7-ft. millionaires are
not easy to hide, and everywhere they went, the American players
were mobbed by the stars of a hundred nations eager to have
their picture taken with them, or just to catch a touch of
sympathetic magic. Even El Loco, when asked why he wore the
number 32, referred to Magic Johnson.

    That was why, perhaps, so many competitors spoke of the
court -- or the field, or the pool, or the gym -- as the one
high clear space where they could be themselves. On the court,
no one asked Magic about AIDS; on the court, Michael Jordan
could scowl and stick out his tongue. On the field, the Cubans
could leave revolutionary issues behind them and let their
running speak for itself. On the board or on the bars or between
the lines, the questions ended and the answers began. The
public arena, before 10,000 spectators and 2 billion viewers,
may be the one place where today's stars can at last be free,
and alone.

    The Olympics reflect issues, yes, but they also offer a
refuge from them, a way for symbols to become people again, and
for struggles to be replaced by no-lose propositions. After
playing against the Dream Team, Croatian coach Petar Skansi was
smiling like a champion. Not just because he had come within 33
points of tying the U.S. Not only because, briefly, he had been
able to ignore the bloodshed in his homeland. But mostly, he
said, because "I was impressed with the way Mr. Jordan and Mr.
Daly pronounced our names. They know about us. That is very
important to us. That means we are something in the world of
basketball!" The winners counted their medals last week; the
losers counted their victories.