In case you missed it, Bryant Gumbel said on the latest edition of his HBO show, "Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel," last week that he would not watch the Winter Olympics because there were not enough black athletes included.
Gumbel, somehow, missed the point that these were the Winter Olympics and included biathlon, curling and speed skating.
Had he waited, he also would have witnessed Shani Davis, the first African-American to win a gold medal in speed skating.
During a quick segment, Gumbel went on a diatribe about the Winter Olympics, criticizing the racial composition and citing it as a reason why he wouldn't watch them.
"... So try not to laugh when someone says these are the world's greatest athletes, despite a paucity of blacks that makes the Winter Games look like a GOP convention," Gumbel said. "Try not to point out that something's not really a sport if a pseudo-athlete waits in what's called a kiss-and-cry area, while some panel of subjective judges decides who won."
I agree - there aren't enough black athletes involved in the Winter Olympics, but that's not anyone's fault. People in Sudan or the Congo are not going to take time out of their day to lace up their Nike Air Torino luge spikes and hit the ice. If anything, that's the fault of dominance in these sports by Norway, Germany, Russia and Austria - nations with black populations so small, they're not even listed in the CIA's World Factbook.
That's not even a fault of the United States, who - despite our large minority populations - have very few minority athletes. Last time I checked, the United States isn't very good in the Winter Olympics. Our 13 medals in Torino are the most we've ever had when the winter games weren't held on our soil. If people want to criticize the American Olympic committee, they should first find enough interest in winter sports such as the Nordic combined or freestyle aerials before they can pick and choose which members of which ethnicities should be on the team.
But for Gumbel to make a claim of that caliber is an insult to any black athlete around the world trying to make a name for themselves in sports dominated by white Europeans.
Has Gumbel ever heard of the Jamaican bobsled team? Sure, it's an overused point anymore with the release of "Cool Runnings" (which, by the way, is filled with inaccuracies - but that's not the issue at stake), but everyone told those four bobsledders in Calgary in 1988 they couldn't cut it - and they did.
Has Gumbel ever heard of Robel Teklemariam, the only Ethiopian to come to the Winter Olympics in Torino this year and the first-ever Ethiopian skier? Although he's lived in the United States since he was 12, Teklemariam established the Ethiopian National Ski Federation and the Ethiopian Ski Team - although, so far, he's the only member.
Has Gumbel ever heard of Philip Boit, a Kenyan athlete who is making his third trip to the Winter Olympics? A cross-country skier, Boit made his debut in the 1998 Nagano games, and although he finished in nearly twice the amount of time as winner Bjorn Daehlie of Norway, Daehlie waited at the finish line for Boit and congratulated him, a gesture so touching that Boit named his first son Daehlie Boit. Boit finished 92nd out of 99 skiers in this year's 15 km classical.
By now, Gumbel has to have heard of Davis. Even if he hasn't, Davis' performance will inspire hundreds, if not thousands, of young African-Americans to lace up ice skates, possibly for the first time, and hit the local ice rink to try to follow in his footsteps. Growing up in Chicago, Davis faced dozens of hurdles en route to try to accomplish his ultimate dream.
Now that he has, maybe others will as well. And maybe then Gumbel will finally turn on the television once every four years and give some of the world's best athletes, regardless of race, the respect they deserve.
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