Bryant Gumbel hung himself out to dry when he recently made comments about this year’s Winter Olympics, and the astonishingly apparent fact that everyone there is white.

Here is the complete text which contain the comments:

Finally, tonight, the Winter Games. Count me among those who don’t care about them and won’t watch them. Because they’re so trying. Like, try not to be incredulous when someone attempts to link these games to those of the ancient Greeks who never heard of skating or skiing. 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. 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. So if only to hasten the arrival of the day they’re done, when we can move on to March Madness, for God’s sake, let the games begin.

Duh!

Gumball, who hosts the HBO show “Real Sports with Bryant Dumbbell,” referred to the Winter Olympics as resembling a “GOP convention,” I guess because of all the white faces. I guess Gumbo has a problem with white people, or maybe he just hates himself because he isn’t one? In any case, Gumby said some racist stuff.

All this comes from a black guy who lives, looks, and feels more white than some white people!

If The Foot Were In The Other Mouth

Can you imagine if another sports commentator, say John Madden, referred to the Super Bowl as the “NAACP Convention,” or the “Black Panther Party.” Whoa!!! Madden would be fired promptly after the show. ABC would have released an apology that would have only rivaled the Unibomber’s manifesto, in terms of length. In short, the shit would have hit the proverbial fan.

A case of “foot-in-mouth” of that proportion would have made Jimmy The Greek and Howard Cosell’s blurbs look like Hallmark greeting cards.

He Don’t Got Game

The real truth is that African Americans are not involved with the type of sporting events being held in the winter Olympics. Period. There is no great conspiracy. There is no underlying racial component. Simply put, African Americans don’t like to ice skate, ski, or play hockey. I have no idea why that’s so, but it is.

Part of the reason may be that those are all very expensive sports to get kids into. Equipment, training and other aspects of those sports lend themselves to the better off and well-to-do amongst us. Since a disproportionate amount of African American families grow up without one parent, mainly the father, it’s hard for a single mother to pay for such sports.

If Gumbel wants to talk about anything, he could have said that African American kids don’t get the same opportunities to compete in those sports, which would be quasi-true, as they can’t afford to get started.

Color Me Bad

There is a BIG double-standard when it comes to white vs. black people commentating on sports. Gumbel’s comments, as stupid as they were, barely showed up as a blip on the radar. I think what he said was racist, however true it was.

You would never hear a white guy on TV say that the NBA is over 90% black. You just would never hear that. And if you did, you wouldn’t hear it from that guy on that network ever again. It’s as if whites can make no comparisons when it comes to race. God forbid you say a guy is faster because he’s black. Well, I’m here to set the record straight. The fastest athletes on this Earth of ours are black. That’s just the reality. Crucify me if you want, but it’s truth. Kenya doesn’t represent winners of marathon after marathon because they’re good dressers.

Shoot The Messenger

I’m stick of people being scared to say the truth because they may be branded racist. If Gumbel can say something racist and true, then so can I. He didn’t see any black faces this time of year. Wait until the Summer Olympics. He’ll see his share, and they’ll be winning the sports mostly that involve speed.

That’s just a fact, so shoot me.

This article was written by Bryan Los on Friday, February 17th, 2006 at 10:40 PM and is filed under In The News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.