I just appeared on a New York television show, where two other men and I discussed several current events. For the third time this week, Byrant Gumbel was a centerpiece of the conversation. Gumbel’s comments regarding the winter Olympics have turned the normally innocuous journalist into the center of public controversy.

Finally, tonight, the Winter Games. Count me among those who don’t like them and won’t watch them … Because they’re so trying, maybe over the next three weeks we should all try too. 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.

As always, conservative pundits dissed Gumbel for playing the “race card” and many people, including ESPN radio commentator Dan Patrick, called for his firing. Personally, I find it absurd that Gumbel is being made into some sort of hate-mongering race hustler who is using his television show as a bully pulpit for divisive politics. Such a representation conveniently allows us to shift our collective attention away from Dick Cheney’s recent “cap bustin’” incident, as well a myriad of other pressing social issues that deserve our concern. I can’t imagine a worse scapegoat than Gumbel, who has been consistently dissed with the Black public sphere for his “acting white” demeanor as well as the “paucity of Blacks” in his own current marriage.

Besides, let’s not forget that GUMBEL WAS RIGHT. The Winter Olympics are boring and largely uneventful. When granted equal access, Black folk range from highly competitive to dominant in the sporting arena. Unfortunately, the Winter Olympic Games are racially policed by the sports that comprise them (Sidenote: curling is a SPORT???????). The fact of the matter is that many of these “extreme sports” require country club memberships, expensive equipment, and social networks that are inaccessible to many Blacks and Latinos, as well as poor Whites. (Think it’s just a coincidence that speed skater Shani Davis is the first Black person to EVER win a winter gold medal?) For this reason, calling Winter Olympians the best athletes in the world is just as ridiculous as calling pre-integration Major League Baseball players supreme athletes without considering Negro League players like Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson.