Jim Litke: The Russians got caught running the biggest state-sponsored doping operation in history in 2016, and despite being busted twice since, never really shut it down.
Pigs will fly before we see an Olympics without doping. Fantastic as that sounds, it’s practically a guarantee. Let’s be clear: The Olympics, and all big-time sports for that matter, were never really “clean.” But with the establishment of anti-doping agencies worldwide, there was at least the hope they would be “cleaner.” Yet even that modest aspiration got tossed out the window Thursday, when the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) decided to halve what would have been an already lenient four-year proposed ban on the serial-doping Russian Federation. “So they can’t fly their flag or sing the anthem at the Games for another two years?” said Travis Tygart, CEO of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. “Big deal.” Competitors who got caught cheating at the Games in ancient Greece had their likeness carved into stones placed on the pathway to the Olympic Stadium. Apparently, though, shaming folks doesn’t carry the sting it once did. The Russians got caught running the biggest state-sponsored doping operation in the history of the planet in 2016, and despite being busted twice since, never really shut it down. And why would they, given their disciplinary history? The first time the International Olympic Committee caught on, it ordered the Russians to keep their flag, anthem and junket-loving officials – but not necessarily their athletes – out of the 2018 Winter Games in Pyeongchang. This is the kind of impression that made: Yet another Russian anti-doping lab got busted soon after – for tampering with the very data that was supposed to prove things had changed. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) responded this time around with a proposed four-year ban, though just like the earlier one, it was more symbolic than stinging, basically another “in-name-only” punishment.
