OLYMPIC DOLLAR GAMES BEGIN : ATHLETES JOSTLE FOR ENDORSEMENTS.

Byline: Skip Wollenberg Associated Press 

You watched them go for the gold, silver and bronze during the 17-day Summer Games. It will take a little longer before you see the results of the Olympian scramble for the green of endorsement contracts.

Marketing experts rate gold medal sprinter Michael Johnson as a favorite in the post-Olympic dash for dollars. Gymnast Kerri Strug, who injured herself while helping clinch a team gold medal, and decathlon gold medal winner Dan O'Brien are other top contenders for commercial riches.

All three will appear on Wheaties boxes scheduled to hit the stores next week. The General Mills Inc. cereal brand opted to go with five different boxes featuring Olympians this year rather than the usual single honoree.

Strug appears with the women's gymnastics team, while Johnson, O'Brien and gold medal swimmers Tom Dolan and Amy Van Dyken each get their own boxes.

``It indicates nobody stood out - there was not one definitive Olympian,'' said Nova Lanktree, a sports celebrity broker from Chicago.

Others said the multiple boxes reflected shrewd marketing, especially as cereal makers have recently been driven to cut prices to stimulate sales. Five boxes helps Wheaties appeal to the widest possible audience and gives collectors a reason to buy extra cereal.

Johnson won in the 200- and 400-meter races as he had been expected to do. In the past, he had been faulted for failing to project warmth.

Stan Becker, chief creative officer for the ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising, said the image of Johnson shedding a single tear on the medal stand after the 400-meter victory endeared him to the television audience.

Johnson's ad career could be hurt, however, because the spotlight in the United States typically moves away from track after the Olympic Games.

Strug vaulted unexpectedly onto the world stage when she appeared as the final U.S. performer in the team competition and hurt her leg on her first jump. At the time, it appeared she needed to score well to assure a U.S. gold medal. She came through before collapsing to the mat with torn tendons.

``She is young and fresh-faced, and her moment was the moment of the games,'' said Bob Dorfman, a senior writer at the ad agency Foote Cone & Belding in San Francisco. He likes her for soap, cosmetics and jeans ads.

But critics say she lacks the appeal of Mary Lou Retton, and may wear thin with her tiny voice.

O'Brien offered a remarkable comeback story.

He was favored for a decathlon medal four years ago, but failed to make the U.S. team because he missed clearing the bar in the pole vault. He won this year by a comfortable margin, becoming the first American since Bruce Jenner in 1976 to lay claim to the title ``the world's best athlete.''

Jenner has enjoyed a long career in commercials and personal appearances.

``Over the long haul, O'Brien could be the biggest winner. Decathlon winners seem to have an enormous shelf life,'' said Arthur Kaminsky, president of the entertainment management firm Athletes & Artists Inc.

American women seized the moment in the Atlanta Olympics, with women's teams capturing gold medals and huge audiences in softball, soccer, gymnastics and basketball and in track and swimming relays.

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Photo: (Color) U.S. Olympians will adorn five Wheaties boxe s: top left, swimmer Tom Dolan, runner Michael Johnson and swimmer Amy van Dyken, and bottom left, decathlete Dan O'Brien and the women's gymnastics team.

Associated Press