Although the 2012 Summer Olympics in London will be broadcast in the U.S. on NBC Universal's family of networks, could a network other than the "Peacock" be broadcasting the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia and the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro?

The Associated Press reports that FOX Sports Chairman David Hill led a 6-man delegation to Lausanne, Switzerland today to make their pitch to the International Olympic Committee in hopes of landing the U.S. TV rights for those Olympics, as well as unnamed cities that'll host the 2018 Winter Games & the 2020 Summer Games. Hill and FOX officials met for about 2 hours today in making their pitch to land the network's first Olympics for parent company News Corp.

NBC Sports & ESPN/ABC will also make their respective presentations as soon as tomorrow with the IOC. Those networks will then submit their sealed bids, and the IOC would like to have a deal in place by the time their General Assembly convenes July 4th in Durban, South Africa.

This is the first such open bidding for the Olympic TV rights since NBC won the rights to broadcast the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver & 2012 Summer Olympics in London at a price of about $2.2 billion in 2003. The IOC would like to surpass the rights fees this time, and the winning network could pay between $4-5 billion for the next 4 Olympic games. FOX Sports officials plan on submitting 4 separate bids, but Hill prefers a longer-term deal for about 8 years total.

As for NBC, they've aired every Summer Olympic games since 1988 and every Winter Games since 2002. With Dick Ebersol stepping down as NBC Sports' Chairman recently, Comcast officials aren't interested in the "Peacock" losing money like they did on the Vancouver Olympics a year ago. Thanks to a rough economy, NBC reportedly lost as much as $200 million on those games, and likely will lose even more money when they air next summer's Olympics in London. It remains to be seen how much money NBC and their new management team plans on bidding to keep the Olympics on their air for 2014 and beyond.

So much for that! NBC will continue to remain as America's Olympic Network. Details can be found here:

http://www.chicagobreakingsports.com/sp ... 2362.story