Brennan: Could Rio prove us all wrong?

No Olympic city in memory has fared worse in the run-up to a Summer Games than Rio. There were grave worries about Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008, among others, but those two cities would manage only the silver and bronze to Rio’s gold in the “We’re scared to death of the Olympics” competition.

Rio has taken a pounding, deservedly so. This city of 6.5 million has struggled mightily to put on what is known as the largest regularly scheduled gathering of the world. The economy is in recession, bordering on depression. The president has been impeached. The budget for the opening ceremony has been slashed. The traffic is as bad as advertised.

But there’s a question wafting through the pleasant winter evening air along the majestic beaches of Copacabana and Ipanema and into the hills that surround the athletes village and Olympic venues of Barra, and it goes something like this:

What if they pull this off?

What if Rio turns out to be ready, or at least ready enough? What if it all somehow comes together? What if all the apprehension across these many months has been just another one of our quadrennial false alarms? What if the first sports upset of these Games is that they actually begin without a hitch?

There’s absolutely no way to know what’s in store for Rio and the 10,000 athletes of the world and the many more thousand spectators and others who have gathered for the Games, but the days leading up to the opening ceremony can give us a clue.

In the 17 Olympic Games I have covered, I’ve never seen a more ubiquitous military and police presence than I have in my four days here. This is not frightening. This is good. If Rio succeeds in keeping the Olympics safe in this turbulent summer of 2016, it will have succeeded, period.

What if the most depressing story line about these Games ends up coming not from Brazil, but from Russia? The International Olympic Committee embarrassingly allowed the worst state-sponsored doping machine this side of East Germany to enter these Olympics, and enter they will, 271 Russians out of an original team of 387.

This means that Vladimir Putin will have 70% of his athletes here, casting a shroud of doubt over every event they enter, especially those in which they win a medal. Can you imagine what the fourth-place finisher will think when that happens? And it will happen, over and over again.

The Russian stain on these Games will last long after they are over, but there are other athletes here, athletes from countries who are, by and large, playing by the drug-testing rules.

Interestingly, the complaints in the athletes village (many of them coming from those notoriously grumpy Australians) have been replaced by what appears to be an outbreak of genuine happiness. Perhaps the athletes are just sick of being asked about Rio’s problems on the eve of the most important moment of their lives and are simply toying with us now.

But it doesn’t sound like it.

“I personally think everything’s super convenient,” decorated U.S. swimmer Missy Franklin said the other day.

“We’re really close to the dining hall, we’re really close to the transportation. We’ve had no issues with buses or anything like that. Everything seems to be running really smoothly so I hope it’ll continue going like this and regardless, we’re going to be the best that we can be with whatever comes up, but so far it’s been a wonderful experience.”

A wonderful experience, Rio? Oh, but how about the water?

“The water is a lot cleaner than everyone expected,” said U.S. rower Gevvie Stone, who also happens to be a doctor. “People who were here last year for the junior worlds say that the water is significantly cleaner than it was a year ago. … That’s a pleasant surprise.”

While we know the history of the next 17 days is yet to be written, you have to admit we didn’t see that one coming.

Follow columnist Christine Brennan on Twitter @cbrennansports.