Tokyo Olympics officially postponed until 2021 due to coronavirus

In a move that was met with equal parts disappointment and relief among the world’s best athletes, the government of Japan announced Tuesday that the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo would be postponed for at least one year due to the global coronavirus pandemic.

Prime minister Shinzo Abe convinced International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach in a telephone call that further delay was pointless, and would actually harm the competitors as they prepared for the Games. The IOC, as recently as Sunday, said it would take up to four weeks to assess the need for a postponement.

“I have made a proposal of about a year," Abe said. “President Bach said he agreed 100 percent, and we agreed to hold the Olympics by summer 2021.”

Although the IOC and the Japanese organizing committee acted long after all the major sports leagues and events were put on hold, common sense finally won the gold medal.

In a statement released after Abe announced the postponement, the IOC and Tokyo organizers said: “The leaders agreed that the Olympic Games in Tokyo could stand as a beacon of hope to the world during these troubled times and that the Olympic flame could become the light at the end of the tunnel in which the world finds itself at present.”

Literally and figuratively, the torch bearing the Olympic flame, which was delivered last week from Greece, will continue to burn in Japan as a symbol of the Games yet to be held.

United States athletes, while disappointed, seemed to unanimously agree with the decision to postpone.

On Twitter, Katie Ladecky, 23, the most decorated female swimmer in history, with five Olympic gold medals and 15 world championship gold medals, said: “As we stand together to meet today’s challenges, we can dream about a wonderful Olympics in a beautiful country. Now is the time to support all those working to heal the sick and keep us all healthy.”

Local athletes agreed as well. Carli Lloyd, from Delran, N.J., who has played in three Olympics for the U.S. women’s soccer team, said in a televised interview: "It’s bigger than an Olympics. I definitely think it’s the right call. Disappointed, but I think for the safety of everybody, it’s definitely the best thing.”

While the Games of the XXXII Olympiad have been tentatively pushed to 2021, the fondest hope is that the world will be safe enough to hold them when that time arrives. It is possible the Olympics will next year be able to perform their mission – bringing the world together – in a very real way after a desperate time of coming apart.

“What better platform is there going to be than the Olympic Games when the world has pulled through the virus," former IOC marketing director Michael Payne told the Associated Press. “You’ve got a dynamic that will be even more powerful for Japan and the rest of the world. But you are going to have a tough road getting there.”

Villanova basketball coach Jay Wright, an assistant coach on the men’s national team, tweeted that the call "was a difficult decision but the right one. Now is the time to support our healthcare workers, those in our community who are ill and those who are at risk!”

The Tokyo Olympics is scheduled to hold 339 medal events in 33 sports and a total of 50 disciplines. More than 11,000 athletes will take part, and another 4,500 will compete in the Paralympics to follow.

Organizing and paying for an Olympic Games is a massive undertaking, and no country has ever faced the challenge of maintaining its venues – there are 43 for Tokyo – for a full year after construction. The budget for the 2020 Games was announced at $12.6 billion (U.S.), although internal audits indicate it could be twice as much.

The cost of life is much dearer, of course, and the economic realities that have rocked the globe in the last month can be ameliorated over time, including those that may transform the 2021 Games into a more austere affair. A total of 4.48 million tickets were on sale for the events, and as many as 500,000 spectators were anticipated. How many of those seats will be empty, and how many will no longer be able to afford such a trip, is unknown.

Across the United States, athletes hoping to qualify for the 2020 Olympic team are recalibrating their preparations. The U.S. sent 554 athletes to the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro, and came home with 121 medals, including 46 gold medals, the most of any nation.

For some, the new timing of the Olympics, if it holds up, will come a year too late. For some, it will be a year too early. And for some, athletes who might have fallen through the four-year gap between Games, the 2021 event will come at a time when their talent and experience combine at just the right moment to forever become an Olympian.

That is the reality of an athletic career. It isn’t always fair. But that is also far from the first consideration at the moment as the Olympics buy time for the world to heal.

“Relief for all the athletes and coaches," said Philadelphia native Dawn Staley, who is the head coach of the women’s Olympic basketball team, “knowing and praying that is enough time and distance to see COVID-19 end."

Penn senior Nia Akins, a middle-distance track specialist who was scheduled to run in the U.S. Olympic trials in mid-June and was considered a favorite to make the team, said: “I think for right now – without having a vaccine – that traveling like that, especially the Olympics, bringing people from all over the world together, and more importantly sending them back out to wherever they came from, is a huge risk.”

After a delay that probably should have been avoided, common sense did take the gold medal on Tuesday in Japan. As the coronavirus pandemic continues, with nearly 400,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and nearly 18,000 deaths, the world doesn’t need to come together. It needs to remain in isolation.

Inquirer staff writers Mike Jensen, Damichael Cole, Jonathan Tannenwald, Joe Juliano and the Associated Press contributed to this article.

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