Please Explain.

I have two questions:

1) Now that the press has gotten the vapors all over again because Mark McGwire actually showed up to do the job he was hired to do, I'm reminded about the question I had when it was announced that the Cardinals had hired McGwire as their hitting instructor: Why did the Cardinals hire Mark McGwire as their hitting instructor?

I'm not talking about the whole steroid thing. To be honest, I'm bored silly by that stuff. I just don't quite understand why, of all people, they hired McGwire to do that job. Yes, he could hit home runs. About that there is no doubt. But he was a career .263 hitter. He hit over .300 three whole times in 16 years, and one of those was when he played all of 27 games in the 1993 season. McGwire always had power, but he never seemed to be a very good hitter.

Now, look, I recognize that there are plenty of people who can teach things that they weren't particularly good at themselves. And there are people who were great at what they did that can't teach a lick. I just don't see where Mark McGwire ever demonstrated that he has enough of a thorough knowledge of the technique and strategy of hitting to justify hiring him for such an important position. There was really no one else they could have hired who was better?

I'm not trying to be a jerk, here. I'm genuinely curious about the answer. I assume there's something I just don't understand.

2) I don't have a television. I watch pretty much everything online. And I'm not alone, I'd guess that I know more people at this point who watch their television either mostly or exclusively on their computers than who still use their televisions.

So why in the world is NBC not broadcasting the Olympics online? I love the Olympics. I want to watch them. I was floored when I found out that NBC opted not to show them live online.

What's the reasoning? Money? Almost certainly. But it's not like they're just keeping my eyes off the internet and on the television. No, they're keeping my eyes off the Olympics entirely. I'm just not watching them, because I don't have the opportunity. And I'm not at all alone. How much more money could they be making off of added internet advertising from online broadcasts? Plenty.

Sure, I get that my friends and I are not exactly representative samples of the general population of Olympics watchers. At this point, we are nowhere near the majority. But to a person, we all love the Olympics. And we are absolutely right in the thick of the coveted 18-35 age demographic. Watching live sports online is a regular part of our lives now, and I can't see how that's going to change in the future. It's not like people my age are just some strange blip in the history of TV broadcasting and we'll all go back to the way things were soon enough. Television online is the future.

I can watch every single game of the NCAA tournament live online. I can watch the Australian Open, Motocross, and German Bundesliga at the click of a button. So why not the Olympics?