Greased-up Tongan flag bearer loses 16-1 in taekwondo

He entered with a bang, but unfortunately for Tonga's Pita Taufatofua, his performance in taekwondo ended with a whimper.

Two weeks after the 32-year-old stole the show at the opening ceremony with his glistening muscle-bound upper body, he was ousted in the first round of taekwondo, falling 16-1 to his Iranian opponent Sajjad Mardani. Taufatofua entered the event ranked 87th in the world, so his early ouster comes as little surprise.

Taufatofua parlayed his entrance into a brief celebrity turn, appearing on the Today Show set in Rio to receive a rubdown from the hosts.

Regardless of his result, Taufatofua's extravagant opening ceremony entrance will go down in Olympic history. There will likely be duplicators of some kind at Tokyo 2020, but nobody will forget the originator from Tonga.