Our house is no fan of some of the more outspoken athletes

but we are a big track and field household and watched as much as we could. My wife was also watching the Filipina weight-lifter who got gold. Tokyo being 13 hours ahead of NYC is not going to help the ratings. You'd wake up in the morning and the events were pretty much all over, except in certain cases where NBC had altered the schedule.

There is no one single cause: time-zone differences; a key US gymnastics athlete is largely sidelined; mediocre performance by the US men's track and field team; no fans in the stands, and so on. The Paris ratings will be significantly better.