LOVERRO: Washington dodged disaster by losing the Olympic Games

The plan was for you to watch the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Olympics on the National Mall with the Lincoln Memorial as the backdrop.

It would have been interesting to watch, given what we saw in Paris a few nights ago, how the opening ceremony might have dramatized, say, the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Thomas Jefferson in a tutu, maybe?

The biggest part of the plan, though, was a shiny new Olympic Stadium at the RFK site — a state-of-the-art facility that organizers envisioned as the eventual new home of the Washington NFL team.

Having the team as a tenant in the stadium would help the city down the bills that are always left behind after the circus leaves town — because bleeding hosts dry is the real Olympic legacy.

But you would have your football stadium, the one that you dreamed of when you sat in as a young Washington fan screaming “We Want Dallas,” or, if you missed those good times, watched the stands shake on YouTube videos and wished you had been a part of it.

Of course, there is no resurrecting the RFK football atmosphere. But there was a plan that would have delivered the Washington NFL franchise a new District stadium, without complications like leasing the land and paying for the stadium.

That plan was Washington’s proposal to host the 2024 Olympics, and it had the backing of Maryland, Virginia and the District, all pulling in the same direction for a change.

And the end result would have been the return of the Washington football team to the city.

It would have been a costly, painful process, because that’s often the Olympic way — financial ruin that has at times wrecked entire nations (see Greece 2004, Brazil 2016) while lining the pockets of those business leaders who champion the cause at the expense of citizens who carry the burden of this corporate self-indulgence.

But you would have had your football stadium.

The DC2024 Committee was led by businessman Russ Ramsay and Transparent Ted Leonsis, who may have wound up with a new arena for his Wizards and Capitals teams in the deal.  

Potomac Yards might have just been a lousy Metro stop instead of another blot on his resume.

In an appearance on 106.7 The Fan in November 2014, Transparent Ted compared their bid to landing on the moon. 

“And I liken this to our moon shot,” Leonsis concluded. “We should be able to bring together all of the D.C.s: federal D.C., the great city that we’ve become, this European city people will definitely want to come and enjoy.”

I guess it’s a good thing Transparent Ted wasn’t in charge of NASA.

The Washington bid failed — the second time this century the region had been passed over by the United States Olympic Committee charged with selecting the American representative to submit a bid to the crime family known as the International Olympic Committee.

The winning bid? Boston, whose residents revolted like a Tea Party.

A few months after Boston was named, the USOC put the kibosh on the entire effort after taxpayers let local elected officials know they wanted nothing to do with hosting this fiasco.

“The USOC does not think that the level of support enjoyed by Boston’s bid would allow it to prevail over great bids from Paris, Rome, Hamburg, Budapest or Toronto,” USOC CEO Scott Blackmun said in a statement. 

Shortly after, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, who was one of the main backers of the bid, issued his own statement that said, “No benefit is so great that it is worth handing over the financial future of our city and our citizens were rightly hesitant to be supportive as a result.”

It’s a bad, bad deal. Los Angeles may be able to shoulder it, like they did in 1984, because they have the infrastructure in place, for the most part. 

But it’s become more difficult for the IOC to find suckers to buy into this scam. How long before Qatar winds up with the Games?

It would have been interesting to see how the dynamic of Washington football, the Olympic stadium, and then-owner Dan Snyder unfolded. Snyder came out publicly in support of DC 2024 (of course he did — why wouldn’t he).

“We look forward to assisting the Washington Olympic Committee in presenting the nation’s capital and fabulous surrounding region to the Olympic sporting world,” Snyder said in a statement. “We are fortunate to have most of the venues needed in an internationally recognized city that is accustomed to staging high-profile events.”

But he was not a member of the DC 2024 Committee, likely because he was considered a liability amid the continuing criticism of the Redskins name. How would that have played out? 

If the sexual harassment scandal had surfaced as it eventually did, would the NFL still have been able to force the toxic owner out if he was about to be handed a new football stadium? Snyder very well might have seen that as a battle worth fighting.

So, given the choice of a new Washington football stadium on your beloved RFK location, or the departure of the venomous owner of your beloved football team, where do you fall?

I’m betting the view of the 2024 Games — from Paris — looks a lot better than the view would have been of the 2024 Games — from Washington.

• You can hear Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.