Get a load of Jillert Anema, the guy in charge of a juggernaut Dutch speedskating team that just racked up 21 medals in Sochi — which was approximately 21 more speedskating medals than the no-show Americans. He sat down for an interview with CNBC’s Michelle Caruso-Cabrera and was asked about the United States’ god-awful performance:
“You don’t ask why a basketball team comes and beats the [expletive] out of us in the summer Olympics,” he said. “It’s because you have so many teams.”
Anema singled out American football for criticism. The sport isn’t played anywhere else in the world and is one that he clearly doesn’t care for.
“You have a lot of attention on a foolish sport like American football and you waste a lot of talent, athletic talent, on a sport that is meant to kill each other, to injure each other. … You’re so narrow-minded, and then you want to compete against the world [in other sports] when you waste a lot of time, good talent on a sport that sucks,” he said.
Pretty sure the question was about speedskating, but thanks for sharing your thoughts on American football. However, he did bring up this salient point:
“American speedskating depends on gifted skaters—very few,” he said. “They have to work their own way and they have a lack of competition. They have a lack in support. Once in four years America will all go and watch skating and then you need to bring medals home, but in the few years before [that] they are not supported and you need the support, you need the competition, and I think that’s what went wrong.”
Okay, fine, I’ll give him that one, but lay off the football smack talk, k? Do that, and I’ll stop making fun of wooden shoes and the fact the Dutch are associated with a method of payment that is commonly employed by cheapskates.
[Uproxx]
