(Sports Network) - If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

So goes part of the saying.

It was foolish to think that Chicago was the favorite to be awarded the 2016 Summer Olympics simply because we decided it should be. Remember when the Windy City wasn't supposed to get the Games?

I do.

But we talked about it enough, sent enough American star power to Copenhagen on Friday to warm the Danish capital, and for what? So we could discuss how Chicago was upset in its bid, and who was to blame for such an offense?

When will we learn that the International Olympic Committee doesn't care what we think? Its relationship with our own U.S. Olympic Committee is icier than a bobsled track.

In reality, this was probably never Chicago's Olympics to lose. And the fact that it was eliminated in the first round of Friday's balloting process probably means the competition was lost long ago.

Rio de Janeiro, that sunny Brazilian metropolis, was a likelier choice. And its selection as the first South American city to host the Olympics -- it beat Madrid in the final round of voting (Tokyo was the other finalist) -- should be the No. 1 story to come out of Friday's IOC meeting.

Not that Chicago lost.

News footage from Rio showed thousands of beachgoers celebrating the decision to bring the Olympics to Latin America for only the second time after the Mexico City Games in 1968.

It was a decision that followed the popular belief that the Olympics should visit every corner of the globe, a mantra that has surely helped successful bids by Australia, South Korea and China in the past.

Rio was a likelier choice than Chicago for that reason, no matter what obstacles may now lie ahead for the much-maligned Brazilian city.

And there will be obstacles.

The focus -- as it has to varying degrees this decade -- will shift toward the enormous task of ensuring a safe and successful Olympics for the thousands of athletes, media and visitors who will descend on the coastal city in seven years.

It isn't always a pretty task.

Five years ago in Athens, the No. 1 fear was terrorism. You couldn't walk anywhere without seeing a white security blimp or hearing the whirr of helicopter blades overhead. Security forces armed with machine guns greeted you everywhere you went, and a soldier walked past my bedroom window as I unpacked my first day.

Athens also struggled in its preparations for the Games even while officials insisted things were on-track. Plans to build a roof on the swimming venue were scrapped, leaving an outdoor pool, and much of the landscaping went unfinished, but all the important bits were there and the Games went smoothly.

Rio, of course, has the unfortunate reputation of a crime-ridden city, fair or not. And there are plenty of statistics available to suggest it's a fair designation.

Having never visited, I cannot attest to its "feel" as a safe city one way or the other. But I did once read a travel magazine article in which the writer described a mad dash from assailants as he exited a bar one night.

And it's exactly that type of story that can kill attendance numbers for an Olympics, the way the "Athens is unprepared" news cycle left that city's venues threadbare for at least the first week in '04.

Rio organizers will need to work hard to reverse the notion that the city is unsafe -- certainly not an impossible task to accomplish in seven years, but a requisite task nonetheless.

And they will need to ensure that the city's venues and accommodations are ready on schedule, which will guarantee the type of good press Sydney received ahead of the 2000 Summer Games while avoiding the boondoggle doom-and-gloom press Athens was handed.

Organizers would also be wise to follow through on their post-Olympic plans for any newly-constructed venues.

The Bird's Nest in Beijing has gone mostly unused since last August -- not how I'd like to remember the stunning (albeit smog-shrouded) building.

On the other hand, one of my clearest memories of the 2006 Winter Games in Turin, Italy, is of the dozens of construction cranes that hung over the city as it used the Olympics as a catalyst for revitalization.

In the end, the biggest struggle for Rio may be in avoiding the type of financial trouble that has befallen previous host cities, while putting on the type of show we've grown accustomed to: safe and spectacular.

It may very well be that Chicago, that toddling town, has dodged a financial bullet.





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