Last Monday, the International Olympic Committee announced that more sports would be added to the 2028 Los Angeles games. These sports were flag football, baseball, softball, lacrosse, cricket, and squash. This marked the first time flag football became an Olympic sport and the return of other sports such as cricket.
Adding these sports to the Olympic games had been proposed by Los Angeles officials earlier this month. In a meeting in Mumbai, India, all of the sports were voted together with two International Olympic Committee members voting no out of the 90 in attendance.
Flag football is an interesting addition to the Olympic games. While football was used as a demonstration sport in the 1932 Olympics, it never became an official sport. This will put NFL players on the international stage, a rarity for a sports league that is seen as domestic.
Baseball, softball, and lacrosse will have similar impacts for their players. They will now have the chance to represent their country on the biggest level. Baseball and softball have rotated from being included to eliminated from the Olympic games. While they were part of the schedule for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, this will not be the case in the 2024 Paris Olympics.
This vote was a major victory for lacrosse players and spectators. The sport had not appeared since the 1908 Olympics in London and many wanted to see it brought back. In the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, lacrosse will be played in a six-a-side format.
Although many Americans are happy with the news, the biggest story around the world is the return of cricket. While the sport has not made an appearance in the Olympics since the 1900 Summer Games in Paris, its revival had been advocated for by many diehard fans. Reintroducing cricket to the Olympic stage could also help garner a fanbase in the United States.
However, cricket will not be played in its traditional format. A new format called Twenty20 (T20) helps accelerate the pace of cricket. With this format being used for the Olympics, matches will last between three to four days instead of multiple days. The Indian Premier League was the first to use this format in 2003, gaining widespread popularity which ultimately led to a group of broadcasters paying $6.2 billion for a TV rights deal in 2022.
The popularity of this format caught the attention of the United States. This led to the formation of Major League Cricket, a T20 cricket league that just completed its first season earlier this year.
The addition of these sports to the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Olympics will greatly benefit everyone. Sports that have been left out of the games for so long such as cricket and lacrosse will now gain more public attention than before while domesticated sports such as flag football and softball will give athletes a chance to perform in an international setting.
