The first question to be addressed in discussing the Olympic Flame's tour of the planet is a simple one:

If the flame's already nearby Athens, why does it have to go anywhere? In fact, given the Athens 2004 Olympic Committee's difficulties in preparing for the fast-approaching 2004 Athens Games, isn't it prudent to keep the Torch right where it is so that it doesn't get lost, extinguished, or cut out of the budget?

	The longest line between two points stretches 48,600 miles from Ancient Olympia to Athens, a distance normally only 180 miles.

But hey, the Olympics does its stuff its way, which I suppose is part of its whack-job charm. There is probably an entire gaggle of blazered yay-hoos on the Torch Committee who have spent months on the route the flame will take, and to their credit, they haven't gotten the thing lost yet. Of course, it's only Day 1 of a 78-day journey that will take it 46,800 miles around the globe, the ultimate scenic route in what is otherwise a Sunday afternoon drive from the Berkshires back to Manhattan.

This is a more troublesome world in which we live in, though, and with the greater international tension and the fear of terrorism at the Games themselves, the Torch needs a very carefully constructed route.

Obviously, you'd like to avoid any place where people are shooting each other, but since that would rule out every place but Switzerland, the Vatican City and Nunavut, some accommodations have to be made.

The Torch is scheduled to pass through only a handful of U.S. cities -- Los Angeles, St. Louis, Atlanta and New York -- alleviating the temptation of, say, Allen Iverson to run it by Chris Ford's house, car or office outside the locker room at the Wachovia Center. The same rules about children and matches should apply to AI and the Torch.

You'd want to avoid places where controversy, vicious backstabbing and assorted unpleasantness would damage the image of the Torch, which means it should steer clear of the Staples Center, Madison Square Garden, and anything within a 100-mile radius of BALCO.

Skipping highly flammable places is obviously preferred, so that rules out Yankee Stadium, or any room that contains Bud Selig, Don Fehr and Sen. John McCain.

On the other hand, you'd want it to go through places that have enough bystanders so that the Torch wouldn't have to be used for heat, which would take care of Olympic Stadium, Philips Arena and the room where Bob Goodenow and Gary Bettman will negotiate the new NHL's collective bargaining agreement.

Fortunately, it won't be exposed to people who just aren't in the mood for it, like Lexington, Ky., or the home of the loser of the Billy Packer-Phil Martelli game in the God Almighty Can We Just Shut Up About It Now Regional.

You don't want it running up the West Side Highway in Manhattan, where the momentum for a new stadium for the Jets is proceeding at the pace of traffic on the West Side Highway in Manhattan.

You don't even want it run by the Olympic pool, because if it rains, there's no roof to keep the wick dry.

And you don't want to run it by the World Figure Skating Championships, where an angry fan upset by the weird-ball judging might want to grab it and set the panel on fire.

Or maybe you do.

In fact, we can't think of a lot of places the Torch SHOULD go, although we are partial to that figure skating judge flambé idea. Yes, it's a neat P.R. trick and all, and it may even raise a little extra money to cover the cost of toner and press center gyros, but given everything else the Olympics has been through the last couple of years, maybe just keeping it in a bank vault until the opening ceremonies is the smartest thing to do.

That is, if the bank vault has been finished.

Ray Ratto is a columnist with the San Francisco Chronicle and a regular contributor to ESPN.com