Because of the Costas factor, I tend to mute or just block out a lot of NBC’s Olympics commentary, but hiring David Remnick, longtime Russia expert, for its coverage of the Sochi Games was a smart move by the network. Remnick tells Richard Deitsch, in his steadfastly excellent Sports Illustrated “Media Circus” column, what his role will be. An excerpt:

“[Jim] Bell said Remnick’s role for the opening ceremonies will come during what NBC calls the ‘creative part of the broadcast,’ where the host country usually tells a story about itself. Remnick served as a Moscow bureau chief for The Washington Post and earned a Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction and the George Polk Award for excellence in journalism in 1994 for his book Lenin’s Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire.

‘I have an interest in sports and I grew up in a time where the Olympics were highly charged events,’ Remnick said. ‘I’m 55 so I have pretty vivid memories of Mexico City. I remember Bob Beamon, as apolitical an act as there could be, and John Carlos and Tommie Smith. I think that everyone would have benefitted in 1968 from understanding what a gesture of black power meant in the context of a sporting event because not everyone was paying attention to the splits between the Black Panthers and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. What happens invariably at every Olympics is there is a kind of non-athletic aspect to it that gives it dimension.’

Remnick said he had been given assurances by NBC Sports that he would have editorial independence with his commentary. Among the topics he will surely address: LGBT issues within Russia, the relationship between Russia and the Ukraine and the nature of post-Soviet Russia.

‘There is nothing in the world — and I know they don’t intend to hinder me in this way — where I would not be honest in my analysis,’ Remnick said.”