Who’d have thunk the Conan O’Brien versus Jay Leno debacle was just a precursor?

NBC is having a very bad start to 2010.

A month after the fourth-place network went through a public relations nightmare with its late-night line-up, NBC once again finds itself in the midst of a firestorm, this time due to its lackluster coverage of the Winter Olympics.

The network paid $820 million for the right to broadcast the Vancouver games, a 37 percent increase over the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino. Factor in the cost it takes to produce the games — from cameramen, producers, reporters and multiple top shelf hosts — NBC figures to lose $250 million.

Losing money for the right to broadcast sports is nothing new. Networks have been doing it with the Super Bowl and other marquee events for ages. It’s what’s known as the halo effect. The network can shamelessly promote other, more-profitable shows (See: the horrible concept of The Marriage Ref, the always awful Celebrity Apprentice and the could-be-decent Parenthood), which in the end will result in more viewership and eventual profits for the network.

Where NBC went wrong this time around was just how far it was willing to go to save a buck, ultimately destroying everything we enjoy about watching the Olympics.
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