Fun fact: The Summer Olympics are just over 2 months away. Personally, I haven’t thought about the Summer Olympics once until this Flava Flav x USA Women’s Water Polo collab dropped. I just never see the Olympics coming. But every couple years I’ll randomly open Twitter to find some country I’ve never heard of proudly parading through the opening ceremony in their finest Halloween costumes and think, “Oh cool it’s Olympics time”.

I treat the Summer Olympics (especially events like water polo) as a nice little biennial treat. Like a tasty snack you get to enjoy a 3-6 times per day for a couple weeks in a row. 

“Aww look it’s Chinese Badminton extraordinaire Biewen Zhang. She’s cute as a button. Such grace in her movements. It’s adorable how much this lawn game means to her …… Ok well that was a fun 10 minutes. Time to do anything else. I’ll be back in a couple hours to watch some Dutch guys row a canoe.”

But it appears as if notable celebrity Flavor Flav is out to change the minds of people like myself who treat the Olympic games like they’re a Swiss Cake Roll they stumbled upon at a gas station. Flavor Flav has taken it upon himself to bring Women’s Water Polo to the masses. You might not know them now, but by the end of the summer, names like Denise Mammolito, Emily Ausmus, and Maddie Musselman will ring out loud from sea to shining sea.

I love what Mr. Flav is doing here. It’s really something we should be doing this with Olympic athletes and teams across the board. All Olympic events should be assigned at least one celebrity. We still have a couple of months until the Olypmics. There’s still plenty of time to make it happen. So for any Stoolies out there who happen to have pull with the Olympic committee, here are some pairings I think would be fantastic. 

---

Handball – LeBron James, Patrick Mahomes, Christian Pulisic

This combination of the best athletes in our country’s far more popular sports will reignite the narrative that always surrounds Olympic Handball: “If our best athletes wanted to, they could easily be the best handball players in the world.” 

That will motivate our handballers to prove the world wrong. And conversely, if Team USA Handball starts looking like they might lose a match, they can just go the opposite direction and say, “Fuck it… Get your ass in there LeBron we want that gold medal.”

---

Weightlifting – Mark Wahlberg

The only people in the world Mark Wahlberg wants to be associated with more than professional weightlifters are first responders and the troops. But I’m pretty sure weightlifters are firmly third on his list. And if Marks gets to be the face of professional weightlifters who represent America, then in his mind, in some roundabout way that technically makes him a war hero. Either way, he’ll get Team USA in tip top shape. He’ll have them all waking up at 3am for Instagram workouts. He’ll feed them whatever combination of supplements he just so happens to be hawking at the time of the Olympics. The supplements will almost certainly result in the entire team testing positive for banned substances. But up until that point, it would be a match made in heaven. 

And if for some reason weightlifting doesn’t want him, I think Mark would be great for fencing as well. The Vietnamese wouldn’t stand a chance. 

---

Katt Williams – Rowing

An obvious choice if you ask me. For one, Katt Williams is hysterical. Rowers are notoriously uptight, seeing as they’re all from wealthy, high-pressure Ivy League families who’s parent’s expectations they will never live up to. But maybe… just maybe… if they can win a gold medal at the 2024 Olympics their fathers will give them an approving nod and a pat on the shoulder. Those guys could use some comedic relief to loosen them up.

Better yet, Katt Williams is wee enough that he can actually be a member of the team. He can act as the cockswain who sits on the front of the boat and shouts obscenities to help keep the rowers in rhythm.

I can’t think of a more perfect cockswain than the 5-foot-nothing, always agitated, permanently sweating Katt Williams. Just picture Katt sitting at the front of the boat.  Cruising through the waters at 20 mph with perfectly still hair. Leading a crew of rich white trust-fund kids to Olympic gold. It would be incredible.

---

Archery/Shooting – Suge Knight

The only problem is that Suge Knight is in the midst of a 28 year prison sentence for voluntary manslaughter. Convincing a Las Vegas judge to allow Suge furlough to hop on a plane to Europe and root on a team of Olympians might be a tough sell. But I can’t think of a better celebrity to pair with a team of shooters than Suge. Technically, Suge Knight is in prison for killing someone with his vehicle. But the man knows his way around a gun. Our Olympians would respect his experience in the field of shooting. Plus he would he scare the living shit out of our athletes to the point that they would be too scared to dare miss the bullseye. . 

---

Karate – Steven Seagal

People often forget that Steven Segal, at 72 years of age, is still the greatest hand-to-hand combat fighter on the planet. Technically, he practices the art of aikido, but that’s close enough. To 99% of Americans Aikido is the same thing. Just in case you don’t believe me about Seagal’s prowess on the mat, here’s video proof of his capabilities.

The wisdom he’d impart on Team USA would prove to be extremely valuable, and would surely result in a gold medal finish.

---

Canoe – Jeff Probst

Fun fact: Canoe and Rowing are actually different events. 

Jeff Probst has made a career out of shouting encouragement (both positive and negative) at competitors as they compete in beach/water sports. If the American canoers aren’t canoeing up to their potential, Jeff is gonna let them hear about it in a condescending way. He’ll have no problem insulting and berating our Olympians into giving their best performance.

“TANNER IS ROWING LIKE A WOMAN RIGHT NOW!!! ARE YOU ON YOUR WAY TO A PICNIC OR THE FINISH LINE!?!! YOU HAVE TO WANT IT MORE THAN THAT!!! THIS IS SURVIVOR THE OLYMPICS!!!! THERE’S A MILLION DOLLARS $37,500 ON THE LINE!!!!!

---

Gymnastics – Livvy Dunne

Nothing will motivate our girls more than a different girl who is significantly less talented than them, but due to her attractiveness was able to parlay her gymnastics skills into millions upon millions of dollars and a career that will set her and her family up financially for generations, while the real Olympians make a limited amount money for a short period of time in a career that will come to an end before they’re old enough to rent a car. On top of that, they’ll especially love how Livvy Dunne takes 150% of the attention away from the competition, which will allow our gymnasts to better focus on the task at hand. The Instagram post Livvy makes of herself standing front and center on the podium with The USA behind her is going to go so fucking viral.