D-O-Double-G is in the house!

Snoop Dogg may be new to the sports stage, but he has quickly put himself in the conversation as well.

The dude’s a natural. This should come as no surprise. He’s been doing what he does since Kristi Yamaguchi won figure skating gold in the 1992 Winter Games, the same year Dr. Dre’s “The Chronic” album was released with Snoop Dogg the breakout rookie on lead vocals. It was KRS-One who said a dope MC is a dope MC, and Snoop is one in both respects — a Grammy nomination for his first sole composer credit, “Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ Thang,” then winning two Emmys in his Olympic debut as NBC’s ubiquitous face of the 2024 Summer Games in Paris.

I was fortunate to cross paths with Snoop in the sports world years before he became an Olympic sensation. In fact, it was exactly 10 years to the day prior to the Opening Ceremony of these 2026 Winter Games.

Feb. 6, 2016, College Heights Stadium, on the gridiron at College of San Mateo. It was an event put on by the Wounded Warrior Project, a charity football game featuring the Wounded Warrior Amputee Football Team playing against an NFL alumni/celebrity team. Snoop was the celeb headliner.

It was a fun and inspiring day, including a little magic in the air, as I arrived at the field and bumped into one of my all-time favorites throughout all my sportswriting career, longtime Belmont Joe DiMaggio League baseball manager Ken Ray, who refereed the game.

While I didn’t exactly get to meet Snoop, he still topped my personal highlight reel in a story I like to call: The Day Snoop Nearly Died — Right in Front of Me.

Covering the event for the Daily Journal, I was patrolling the sideline until I found a great spot at the corner of the field. The back of the end zone was lined with a wooden partition, about waist high, so I took advantage of the bird’s-eye view at the back corner, and hunkered down to take pictures.

I was right up against the partition when the NFL alumni/celebrity team sent Snoop deep. It was a long corner route. I don’t remember who threw the pass, but it was a pearl, fading Snoop to the back corner of the end zone. As he got closer, I dropped the camera around my neck; since I was using a zoom lens, he was suddenly way too close to get in frame. Instead, I readied to catch the ball in case the pass overshot him. It didn’t really dawn on me that not only had Snoop not given up on the play, but he was sprinting right at me.

A thing like that puts the lyrics of “1, 2, 1, 2” — “Thought you knew, we cold crushin’, bum rush the chef” — into an entirely new focus, believe me you, nephew.

Had it not been for the partition, the D-O-Double-G would have run right over me. I hardly had time to react as the ball hit Snoop in the hands. “Bang!” He hit the wall, then dropped right to the turf on the other side of the partition, suddenly out of sight. But in the time the words “Snoop’s down! Snoop’s down!” echoed through my head, the great Snoop Dogg hopped to his feet, ball in hand, holding it to the sky, as though he were the Statue of Liberty, to celebrate what ended up being one great touchdown catch.

Six years later, Snoop won his first Emmy after showing up on another football field, this time for the halftime show at Super Bowl LVI. A groundbreaking halftime performance featuring an ensemble of hip-hop legends, Snoop both opened and closed the show.

Now, after taking the 2024 Summer Games in Paris by storm, Snoop Dogg is larger than life, keeping it real in snowy northern Italy. Unlike two years ago, everyone now from TV audiences to the crowds of the Olympic villages in Milan, Cortina, Anterselva, Bormio, Livigno and Predazzo are expecting greatness from the man. And he’s delivering.

That’s why it was so cool, of the many Olympic events he’s so visibly attended, to see him in the audience at Wednesday’s men’s speed skating 1,000 meters finals to witness US powerhouse Jordan Stolz win gold. He wasn’t there to film a TV spot. In fact, in the long candid clip they showed of him in the crowd, he wasn’t talking at all.

It was an interesting moment where you could see why Snoop Dogg is a dope MC, both in music and in sports media. There he was, sitting alongside one of my childhood heroes, five-time speed skating gold medalist Eric Heiden. What impressed me was Snoop let Eric Heiden do all the talking. And what was the D-O-Double-G doing the whole time? Listening. Learning. Content to soak it all in.

Indeed, a picture of greatness.