NBC intends to bring Al Michaels in for the upcoming Paris Olympics… but not in the way you might think.
As Awful Announcing, among others, wrote this week, NBC plans to use an AI version of the venerable and well-regarded sportscaster.
Per the release, the recaps “will provide fans with their own customized playlist featuring highlights of the events most relevant to them from the previous day” and are labeled as “Your Daily Olympic Recap on Peacock.” The recaps feature “a high-quality A.I. re-creation of Michaels’ voice” narrating the clips. The AI Michaels “was trained using his past appearances on NBC and matches his signature expertise and elocution.”
Indeed, this news is a bit odd. The use of AI has been criticized thoroughly. AI opponents have dinged it up persistently, sometimes due to its barrenness and sometimes because of its soullessness. We’ve yet to really see this hit the sports world, but the film, TV, and even the music industry are dealing with the effects. Nevermind the workforce.
Still, NBC will trolly on anyway. But you can imagine that people were both weirded out and certainly against this happening.
True story: back in 2010 someone high up at NBC tried to ship a full-sized stuffed moose back to New York from the Vancouver games. The AI Al Michaels thing has now surpassed that as the dumbest thing they’ve done with the Olympics.
— Craig Calcaterra (@craigcalcaterra) June 26, 2024
[Awful Announcing]
About Chris Novak
Chris Novak has been talking and writing about sports ever since he can remember. Previously, Novak wrote for and managed sites in the SB Nation network for nearly a decade from 2013-2022