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    Al Trautwig, a Mainstay in the TV Booth at Madison Square Garden, Dies at 68

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    The Long Island native covered 16 Olympics, and had cameos in the movie “Cool Runnings” and the TV show “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.”Al Trautwig, who brought sports fans along with him to New York’s Canyon of Heroes, champagne-doused locker rooms and the medal podium at the Olympics over a broadcast career that spanned more than three decades, died at his home on Long Island on Sunday. He was 68.His death was confirmed on Monday by his son, Alex Trautwig, who said that the cause was complications from cancer.In the largest U.S. media market, one where no detail is too minute for newspaper back pages and sports talk radio, Mr. Trautwig was a familiar face on New York Rangers and Knicks broadcasts for a generation on MSG Networks. He also covered Yankees games before the team created its own cable network in 2002.Al Trautwig, right, after the Yankees won the 2000 World Series.Steve Crandall/Getty ImagesThe son of Long Island had a wider audience: he covered 16 Olympics, most recently for NBC and focusing on gymnastics. His work earned him four national Emmys and more than 30 New York Emmys, his son said. He was also named New York Sportscaster of the Year in 2000.Mr. Trautwig’s death was announced earlier on Monday by Alan Hahn, an ESPN Radio host and a studio analyst for MSG Networks, who described him in a social media post as a mentor and teacher.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Social Media Olympics

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      More lenient posting rules for Olympic athletes have helped spark a deluge of successful social media content. Some say that’s changing how we watch the Games.Just moments after the American wrestler Sarah Hildebrandt won a gold medal at the Paris Games, she let the whole world know what she was thinking:“Oh my gosh I just won the FREAKING OLYMPICS hahahahah DUUUUDE,” she wrote on social media from the event venue.The post may seem like something athletes always do. But at the Olympics, it’s part of a new twist — and one of the keys to returning to the sense of a shared national experience that defined the Games of yesteryear.For the last decade or more, it has seemed like the Olympics have struggled to capture relevance the way they did a generation ago. Blame was assigned to a fracturing media landscape and a long string of asterisks (pandemic restrictions in Tokyo, time zone issues in Beijing, a Zika outbreak in Rio de Janeiro, geopolitical tensions in Sochi).But the reason may have been simpler: The Olympics has largely been missing from social media. The closely guarded intellectual property of “the Olympic rings” meant video from the Games was posted only in limited ways, with broadcasters worried that they would run afoul of strict rules or anxious that they would cannibalize their own broadcasts.New, more lenient social media rules for athletes announced ahead of the Paris Games and a rethink among broadcasters — as well as the ability of social media companies to geofence certain content — appear to have changed virtually everything.And audiences are cheering.Athletes can now “create personalities just like any influencer would,” said Apolo Ohno, the eight-time Olympic medalist in short-track speedskating. “It’s unlike anything before.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Snoop Dogg, NBC’s New Voice of the People

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      The network hired the rapper for an expanded role on its broadcasts of the Summer Games in Paris after posting record-low viewership of the Tokyo competition.Once Snoop Dogg had waded through electrical cords on the floor and ambled his lanky frame around the disorderly equipment in a partially constructed television studio in Paris, he was able to peer out over a balcony overlooking the Eiffel Tower and survey the city he hopes to conquer during the Olympics.“This is my home,” he said triumphantly to himself. Below, a handful of people flashed their phones.The man who NBCUniversal hopes will become the breakout star of the Paris Games was right where he wanted to be.The Olympics are always about the athletes, and as usual the focus this year will be on the brightest ones: Simone Biles, Katie Ledecky, Noah Lyles, Novak Djokovic, LeBron James.But the event’s billing as the pinnacle of athletic achievement has not been enough to prevent NBC’s Olympics television ratings from skidding amid a fractured media landscape, and the network hopes Snoop Dogg’s aura as one of the most recognized and beloved figures in pop culture will energize viewers of all ages.Ratings for the Summer Games have dropped steadily since an average of 31.1 million prime-time viewers watched the 2012 London Olympics. NBC executives cite pandemic-related restrictions and an unfavorable time zone for Americans as reasons the Tokyo Games averaged 15.5 million prime-time viewers, its lowest audience ever.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More