PAN AMERICAN GAMES : Old Concerns Gone as U.S. Team Looks to Renewed Dominance

After months of concern about whether the venues would be completed in time for the XII Pan American Games and whether enough athletes could be assembled in the winter for a multisport event traditionally held in the summer, the U.S. Olympic Committee’s interim executive director said that he was relieved to awake here recently with only one pressing problem.

“I need four tickets to the USA-Argentina soccer game,” John Krimsky said of Sunday night’s match. “I expect to win by two goals.”

Although the quadrennial Pan American Games involve about 6,500 athletes in 34 sports from 42 North, South and Central American and Caribbean countries, seldom in recent years has the emphasis been on athletic competition.

Better remembered are clashes at San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 1979 between basketball Coach Bob Knight and a policeman; at Caracas, Venezuela, in ’83 between drug testers and drug users; at Indianapolis in ’87 between anti-Castro demonstrators and Cuban athletes, and at Havana in ’91 between democratic and socialistic political ideologies.

But most of the discussion within the region this year, once it was established that the organizing committee could borrow enough money from the Argentine government to open the 16-day games tonight in this seaside resort of 500,000, the capital of Buenos Aires and six other cities, has focused on whether the United States can reclaim its dominance in the medal standings.

Not since the first Pan American Games in 1951 at Buenos Aires had the United States failed to win the most gold medals until 1991, when Cuba used its home-island advantage to finish with 10 more.

The United States outwardly accepted its defeat graciously. But when asked about it at a news conference this week, Krimsky said, “I think it’s important to remember that we won the most overall medals.”

Enjoying the sight of the giant to the north humbled, the president of the Pan American Sports Organization, Mexico’s Mario Vasquez Rana, said, “For the United States, Cuba has become a great headache.”

Thus, Vasquez Rana suggested, the United States is fielding not only a large team--the most athletes it has ever had at any international competition--but a good one. Among the more than 750 athletes are 159 Olympians, including medalists such as gymnast Shannon Miller, hurdler Roger Kingdom and swimmers Tom Jager, Greg Burgess and Angel Martino.

But USOC President LeRoy Walker said the United States is not motivated to beat Cuba so much as it is to prepare for the 1996 Summer Olympics at Atlanta.

“We’re looking ahead, not behind,” he said.

The United States is not as well represented in all sports as it will be next summer, primarily because of the awkward dates for this event. Because Argentina is in the Southern Hemisphere, the games were scheduled for late in its summer, instead of July or August.

Although athletes in some sports had fewer scheduling conflicts than normal because these games do not interfere with other international championships usually held in the summer, the United States was forced to seek alternatives in sports such as basketball and baseball that traditionally rely on college all-star teams.

In baseball, college teams were asked which would be willing to use their spring breaks for experience against teams such as Cuba and Nicaragua before St. John’s of New York was selected. Players from the CBA have been selected in basketball.

The United States chose professionals for its women’s basketball team but the event was canceled because only three other countries entered. One team, Puerto Rico, withdrew because several of its players are playing at U.S. colleges.

Economic crises in other countries, such as Cuba and Mexico, forced them to cut their numbers, leading to PASO’s announcement this week that there were not enough entries for some events in track and field, rowing and wrestling. But the USOC successfully lobbied to have them reinstated as exhibitions so that its athletes in those events would not have wasted their trips.

The USOC, bracing for its own budget constraints after the ’96 Olympics, has discussed limiting the number of athletes it sends to future international competitions, including the Pan American Games.

But Sandra Baldwin, the USOC treasurer who is leading its delegation here, said that the United States’ commitment to the games will remain strong, if for no other reason than because it is mandated by Congress in the Amateur Sports Act of 1978.

“We would like to maintain a harmonious relationship within the Americas,” she said. “It’s a sports issue, but a political one as well.”