Turin – Americans. You can’t take us anywhere these days without causing a stink.
Why do the Olympics always have to be all about us? At the Winter Games, the USA never fails to win gold for self-absorption.
Fifteen minutes ago, nobody back home could have identified Chad Hedrick and Shani Davis if they laced ’em up on the ice at Rockefeller Plaza in New York City and skated naked.
Now, they’re Tonya and Nancy with tighter suits and toxic levels of testosterone.
The last men on the same team who behaved so badly were NBA millionaires Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, who shared a silent contempt that ripped apart the Los Angeles Lakers.
“Shaq and Kobe talked more than Shani and I have,” Hedrick said.
Meow. Let’s hope the cats in this fight have had their shots.
On Tuesday, there was a beautiful story at the Olympics. An underdog named Enrico Fabris won the 1,500-meter race in speedskating on his home Italian ice, erupting with such spontaneous joy that he tried to give everyone from Rome to Milan a group hug.
Too bad Hedrick and Davis bickered so profusely and backstabbed so brutally that it not only poisoned a sweet moment, you walked away feeling the urge for a shower to wash away the stench of self-indulgence.
The ugly Americans stood on the podium as angry men who finished second and third, their enmity split by the smiling face of Fabris. Hedrick and Davis previously won individual gold medals at these Games. But what we will remember is how they painted the Olympics red, white, blue and green with envy.
“We both tried to prove to each other we were going to win the race, and somebody else slid in there and took it from us,” said Hedrick, who suggested if he had skated in the same heat with Davis, they might have killed each other.
Hedrick is a cowboy whose boots jingle jangle jingle with a don’t-mess-with-Texas attitude. A black man on white ice, Davis is a defiant rebel from the tough South Side of Chicago.
Taken separately, they both have American success stories to tell. Put Davis and Hedrick in the same room, however, and the chill grows bigger than Antarctica.
Not only do they fail to see eye-to- eye, these two U.S. teammates can barely stand the sight of his rival’s face. It has nothing to do with race. This is a personality clash so intense Don King should be hired as the promoter.
Davis, whose whole life has been the lonely, endless circles of speedskating, seems offended Hedrick never took this sport seriously until three years ago and brags about Hollywood movie dreams.
“It would have been nice if after the 1,000 meters he could have been a good teammate and shook my hand. Just like I shook his hand, or hugged him, after the 5,000 meters,” griped Davis, before turning his back on Hedrick and walking out in a huff from a room packed wall-to-wall with journalists and tension.
Hedrick, genuinely ticked when Davis last week bagged on an Olympic race by the U.S. team to do his own thing, cringes at his rival’s sensitivity as fussiness more apropos for a figure skater in sequins.
“We had a great opportunity to win the team pursuit race. And I felt betrayed in a way. Not only did Shani not participate in it, but he didn’t even discuss it with me. As a leader of the team, I felt like we passed up a medal,” said Hedrick, quick on the draw with the finger of blame.
The 24/7 media churn demands heroes and villains, so the whole nation can take sides. Hedrick and Davis skated blindly into a Winter Games begging for a controversy and discovered the price of fame can be your good name.
“Americans at home want to see a battle,” Hedrick said.
“This is not heavyweight boxing fight,” Davis replied, who resents being a punching bag of controversy. “I totally disagree.”
In a race that goes by in a blur, with the world’s fastest men covering 1,500 meters in less than two minutes, America lost something far more precious than gold.
Davis and Hedrick escalated a petty feud that could have been halted with the simple decency of a handshake. How does it look when the world’s most unbeatable country starts believing the Olympics are all about the USA, even when we begin inventing ways to lose?
There’s a new cold war being fought at the Winter Games. And the enemy is us. When bad sportsmanship wraps itself in the flag, we all look like ugly Americans.
Staff writer Mark Kiszla can be reached at 303-820-5438 or mkiszla@denverpost.com.
