Which sports will be added to the 2016 Olympics?

On Monday, seven sports will bid for inclusion on the 2016 Olympic program. Later on this summer, the IOC will select two of those sports to present at the organization's October meeting in Switzerland. The IOC will then vote on whether to include both, one or neither of the sports on the program for the '16 Games.

The IOC is notoriously difficult to read when it comes to votes (just ask Parisians), so it's no surprise that there is little general consensus as to which sports have the best chance to advance to the final round of bidding. We'll take our shot though.

Below are the seven sports that will be making their bids tomorrow, ranked in order of most to least likely to be added to the 26-sport Olympic program. Let it be said that the difference between first and last is razor-thin.

1) Golf -- The IOC loves its stars and Tiger Woods is one of the biggest in the world. Seeing as how golf has already been an Olympic sport (last competed in 1904) and adding it wouldn't require much new infrastructure (golf's bid says that exisiting courses in each bid city can be used), it's a good bet that we could see a medal stand on the 18th green at Medinah (or its Brazilian equivalent) in seven years.

2) Rugby Sevens -- There are three team sports bidding tomorrow and only one of those wasn't dropped from the Olympic program four years ago. That fact, plus the Euro-centric tilt of the IOC (in 2005, 53 of 117 voting members were from European countries) provides a huge boon to the bid of seven-on-seven rugby.

3) Roller Sports -- Call it a hunch, but roller sports (basically, inline skating races) seems to have the makings of an IOC-friendly sport. It will attract younger viewers (at least, that's the thinking), it's cheap (the bid calls for road races) and it's competed over a short time period (three days). The pedigree of rollerblade racing can't touch any of the other six bidding sports, but that didn't stop BMX and trampoline from getting the nod to join the cycling and gymnastics programs, respectively, earlier this decade.

4) Squash -- A member of squash's bid team is Prince Tunku Imran of Malaysia. He also happens to be an IOC member. (So much for putting a stop to conflicts of interest.)

5) Karate -- Q: What's the difference between judo, taekwondo and karate? A: Both you and I don't know, and I doubt IOC members will either.

6) Softball -- The fact that the American women lost this competition in Beijing for the first time in Olympics history can only help the sport's bid. I don't think it will help enough.

7) Baseball -- Unless Major League Baseball can promise that its players will compete in 2016 (a huge stretch), it's difficult to imagine that the IOC will want to reverse its 2005 decision to kick baseball (and softball) off the Olympic program.

Handicapping the 2016 Olympic host city bids

Last August, we handicapped the odds of which city would get awarded the 2016 Olympics. With each of the four bidding cities making presentations to the IOC today, we've updated those odds. Four months from now, before the IOC makes its final vote, we'll make our final predictions:

Chicago: 3-2 (Last time: Even) -- Though Chicago is still the favorite to land the '16 Games, its lead seems to have narrowed in recent months.

No U.S. Olympic bid has ever received an underwriting guarantee from the federal government, so it's no surprise that Chicago's bid won't receive one either. In today's financial climate though, that might be a bigger deal than it was when Atlanta received the 1996 Olympics. (This despite the fact that Jacques Rogge says finances shouldn't be a consideration in determining a host city, which is sort of like saying that Freddie Mac shouldn't take into consideration a person's finances before handing out mortgage loans. Hmmm ... Perhaps that's not the best example.)

Barack Obama's symbolic creation of a White House office of Olympic, Paralympic and Youth Sport yesterday only further highlights the lack of government financial support.

Madrid: 20-1 (Last time: 20-1) -- We said it in August and we'll say it again today. It's hard to imagine the IOC going back to Europe for back-to-back Olympiads. It's only 1,000 miles from London to Madrid. The last time two consecutive Olympics were held so close together was in 1948 and 1952 when the sites went from London to Helsinki.

Rio de Janiero: 2-1 (Last time: 3-2) -- Rogge's statement about legacy being more important than finances could also be read as, "we're going to South America, money concerns be damned." The best thing Rio's bid has going for it is the fact that the Olympics have never been held in South America. The chance to open up that continent to the Games could be a huge selling point with the IOC.

Tokyo: 5-2 (Last time: 5-1) -- For all the talk about how money isn't important, it is. It always is. And Tokyo has the most of it. The Japanese bid has secured $4 billion in financing for the Games, something that could make IOC members forget that they just left an Asian host city one year ago.