I stayed up late with Snoop Dogg at the Paris Olympics

When NBC announced its intention to bring the rapper turned everyman to the Paris Games, I wasn’t sure what to think. Savvy business? Digital era desperation? An old person’s idea of what young people want? All of the above?

Turns out Snoop had a little Jim McKay in him all along. The 52-year-old hip-hop maestro, real name Calvin Broadus Jr., is a sports television natural and viral sensation, stirring the network’s coverage with a mix of sui generis analysis, cheerleading and Snoop-out-of-water segments.

There’s Snoop in equestrian gear at dressage. There’s Snoop on the bus with LeBron and Team USA basketball. There’s Snoop fencing. There’s Snoop kicking comfortably on the couch with NBC’s Mike Tirico—and old pal Martha Stewart—in the heart of U.S. prime time.

Tirico is a Snoop fan for life.

“When we mentioned it, people were like, ‘What are you doing?’" the veteran host says. “Now they’re like, ‘Wow, how come we weren’t doing this before?’"

I went to see Snoop late-night in Paris at NBC’s glam studio overlooking the Eiffel Tower. He arrived via a sleek SUV, sunglasses on, entourage deep, big-shouldered bodyguards clearing a path as fans shouted “Snooooooop!"

“Remember, this is my everyday life," Snoop says of the fuss. “Anytime I come to Paris, it’s always like that."

After taping a pair of breezy segments, including one in which Snoop and Stewart clinked flutes of Veuve Clicquot—“I’m so proud of him," Stewart says of Snoop, walking off set—Snoop takes a seat in the makeshift NBC green room.

Snoop is lanky and tall—6-foot-4. He’s soft-spoken and funny, making a Muhammad Ali joke as he unsuccessfully swings at a moth that keeps buzzing his head. He’s wearing a windbreaker with the NBC Peacock logo on the back and, on the front, the face of the evening’s athletic star, Noah Lyles, who just won the 100 meters by 0.005 seconds.

Snoop was in the stadium, of course. He’s everywhere. Paris has been a two-week Snoopcathalon.

“I’m getting minimal sleep," Snoop admits. “This ain’t the time to sleep. It’s the time to be on it like you want it."

The raves back home, for his NBC work? The world-class athletes mobbing him at arenas? The chase for Snoop’s coveted Olympic pin, the one Coco Gauff showed off on social media, depicting Snoop puffing Olympic smoke rings into the air?

It’s like the fans shouting his name outside the studio. This doesn’t surprise Snoop Dogg.

“This opportunity wasn’t nothing but a chance for me to show the world what it’s supposed to look like when you put the right person in the right environment," he says. “Sports, entertainment, the globe, this is what I do. I do it every day."

He adds: “I want to give a shout out to all of the executives, because the first thing they did was tell me to be me."

I want to give a shout out to all of the executives. I’m not sure that’s a line Snoop imagined delivering when he arrived on the scene in the early ’90s, his indelible, sotto voce flow in outlaw anthems like Dr. Dre’s “Nuthin’ But a ‘G’ Thang" electrifying West Coast hip-hop and turning Snoop into a phenomenon.

In the decades since, Snoop’s sold tens of millions of albums, but he’s also pivoted—into, well, almost everything. He’s done television, movies, and commercials, holding down a beach chair for Corona for years. He’s made investments in tech companies and cannabis products. He coached youth football. He rebooted the “Joker’s Wild." He did commentary for a night of exhibition boxing featuring fights with the ancient Mike Tyson (who fought Roy Jones Jr.) and YouTube goofball Jake Paul (who flattened former NBA player Nate Robinson). It was mostly two hours of my life I will never get back, but Snoop’s ringside analysis was rivetingly fun.

Gliding effortlessly into middle age, the hard edges of his early life long ago sanded away, Snoop occupies a rare approval space held by only a handful of celebrities. Pretty much everyone loves Snoop. Grandmas love Snoop. Gen Z loves Snoop. Toddlers love Snoop. Athletes who weren’t even born when “Gin and Juice" dropped via Snoop’s 1993 debut—they adore Snoop, too.

“He’s truly connected with the athletes and their parents in a way most people don’t," says Tirico.

It helps that Snoop is a sports obsessive himself. He was just a kid when the games came to Los Angeles in 1984. “Carl Lewis, Edwin Moses…wasn’t Mary Lou Retton in that?" he asks. One cute SoCal connection made in Paris: Snoop chilling with tennis queen Billie Jean King, a fellow graduate of Long Beach Polytechnic High School. (“LBC forever in our hearts," BJK wrote on Instagram.)

In Paris, Snoop has seen…basically everything. He adored gymnastics. He loved the fencing. A Bruce Lee obsessive, he was amazed by judo. “I grew up in the martial arts era where we love imitating that," he says.

There are still a few days of competition left in Paris, but it’s clear Olympic Snoop was a smash. Will there be Snoop 2028, the Games returning to his hometown? It feels like a lay-up. Snoop is fired up to hear touch football will be added as an L.A. sport. “We should have an advantage in America," he says, chuckling. “Come on man. Don’t send the wrong people out there."

It’s time for Snoop to go. He lifts his long body from his chair. The entourage reassembles. Security moves. They walk to the sleek SUV, the crowd again chanting Snoop’s name as he slips inside the back. The sunglasses never come off.

This is what it’s like in Paris for Snoop Dogg. But it’s always like this for Snoop Dogg.

Write to Jason Gay at Jason.Gay@wsj.com