Now that the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris have officially ended, some are already looking ahead to the next summer Olympics, which will be held right here in the City of Angels.
But besides the change of host cities, venues and cultures, will there be anything new in the Olympics competition itself in 2028?
The answer is yes.
Five sports were proposed by the LA28 Organizing Committee as a package for the L.A. games only, according to Olympics officials.
Each sport was reviewed and supported by the International Olympic Committee’s Programme Commission and Executive Board.
“The choice of these five new sports is in line with the American sports culture and will showcase iconic American sports to the world while bringing international sports to the United States,” IOC President Thomas Bach said. “These sports will make the Olympic Games LA 28 unique…Their inclusion will allow the Olympic movement to engage with new athlete and fan communities in the U.S. and globally.”
The five new sports you will see in 2028 are:
Flag football
Flag football — a no-contact sport — will be making its debut at the 2028 Olympics. Flag football contains most of the same rules as tackle football but with some modifications, namely a smaller field, less players (5-on-5 from 12-person squads), two 20-minute halves and no kickoffs (play starts at the team’s own five-yard line).
According to Olympics officials, America is the “preeminent nation” in flag football, having won the last four men’s world championships and the last two women’s world championships. In the women’s game, Mexico is considered to be a team that could surprise the Americans; they beat the U.S. in the final of the 2022 World Flag Football Games.
Baseball/Softball
While not entirely new to the Games, (baseball was included as a medal event at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona and softball at Atlanta 1996) both baseball and softball make their returns in 2028.
On the men’s side of things, Cuba won the gold medal in baseball’s Olympic debut and went on to win it three times in total before the sport was nixed for the 2008 Games in Beijing.
Softball, on the other hand, was dominated by American women; the U.S. won the first three gold medals for the sport and enjoyed a 22-game winning streak before losing to Japan in the final in 2008. Neither sport was featured in this year’s Olympic Games.
Originally considered separate sports at the Olympics, baseball and softball returned as a combined sport with two distinct events (men’s baseball and women’s softball) at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, where hosts Japan won both gold medals.
Cricket
Cricket has only made one previous appearance at the Olympics, and that was over a century ago at the first Paris Games in 1900. There are three official formats for cricket, according to the International Cricket Council: test matches, One-Day Internationals (ODI) and Twenty20 Internationals (T20).
While test cricket is considered the “traditional form” of the game (and can take up to five days to determine the winner) and ODI is the preferred format for the ICC Cricket World Cup, the L.A. Olympics will feature the Twenty20 Internationals format, which is considered the “newest, shortest and fastest form of the game,” usually taking about three hours.
The only difference between men’s cricket and women’s cricket is that the women use a slightly smaller and lighter ball.
The full rules for cricket at the 2028 Olympics can be found here.
Lacrosse
Often considered to be America’s oldest team sport, lacrosse will be back in 2028 after a 120-year hiatus; the sport was part of the 1904 St. Louis Games and the 1908 London Games before making appearances as a “demonstration sport” in 1928, 1932 (the first time L.A. hosted the games) and 1948.
A whopping three nations have ever competed in Olympic lacrosse, and in the two Games it was included in, Canada took gold twice.
At the next Games, a slightly modified version of “lax” will be featured; regular lacrosse — known as field lacrosse — consists of two teams of ten players with faceoffs occurring at the start of the game and after each goal. In 2028, players will contest in World Lacrosse Sixes, which is played on a smaller field with less players and, like the Twenty20 Internationals format in cricket, takes less time than a regular match.
Squash
Squash is the only other sport besides flag football making its debut in 2028, although it was featured as a demonstration sport at the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires in 2018.
There are no caveats to the squash event; it will be squash as you know it.
Even though it’s four years from now, Los Angeles officials are already looking ahead to 2028 Olympics; Mayor Karen Bass recently outlined her vision for a “car-free Olympics” with an increased effort on getting attendees to use public transportation.
2028 will mark L.A.’s third time hosting the Olympics (1932 and 1984) and the first time the city will host the Paralympic Games. The City of Angels is set to be the third three-time host city in Olympics history (London in 1908, 1948 and 2012; Paris in 1900, 1924 and 2024) and the first non-European city to do so.
In addition, to reflect on L.A.’s ever-changing culture and importance in the world, there are more than 30 different LA28 logos, including ones designed by artists, celebrities and athletes themselves.
For complete coverage of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, click here.