Distinguished Member Smith joins NBC broadcast team
NBC has announced that two-time Olympic champion and National Wrestling Hall of Fame Distinguished Member John Smith will join NBC Olympics as an analyst for this weekend’s U.S. Olympic wrestling trials and the Rio Games in August.
Smith, who took 62kg freestyle gold in 1988 and 1992, is currently the head coach at Oklahoma State. He became the first wrestler to receive the James E. Sullivan Award as America's outstanding athlete in 1991, and was inducted into the NWHOF as a Distinguished Member in 1997.
He will team with Jason Knapp for NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra‘s coverage of the Olympic trials on Saturday and Sunday.
NBC Sports Network will provide five hours of coverage from the wrestling finals from Iowa City, Iowa, beginning Saturday, April 9, live at 7 p.m. ET.
Coverage continues the following evening, Sunday, April 10, at 10:30 p.m. ET, following NHL coverage. Disciplines include men’s freestyle, women’s freestyle, and Greco-Roman.
Headlining the men’s freestyle competition is London gold medalist and three-time world champion Jordan Burroughs (74 kg). The 97 kg weight class will feature 2015 World Champion Kyle Snyder and 2012 Olympic champion Jake Varner. In women’s freestyle, three-time world champion Adeline Gray (75 kg) looks to make her first Olympic team.