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The Biden administration introduced on Monday that the United States will stage a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Beijing Winter Olympics in protest of China’s human rights abuses.
On CNN Tuesday, Michael Smerconish referred to as the hassle, which doesn’t prolong to Team USA athletes, “half-assed.” Smerconish is appropriate, the boycott is meaningless. However, former Olympic broadcaster Bob Costas mentioned he believes that NBA gamers will see the symbolic boycott as a menace to their relationship with China.
“The NBA is up to its neck in China,” Costas mentioned. “China is a big sports activities market. Basketball is particularly fashionable there. But they’ll put up with not even the slightest criticism.
“Back a few years in the past when Daryl Morey, then the GM of the Houston Rockets, tweeted ‘Stand with Hong Kong,’ Rockets video games have been all of a sudden off the air for an prolonged interval in China. And the Rockets are one of the crucial fashionable groups there as a result of Yao Ming was the primary large Chinese star within the NBA. More lately, Enes Kanter, who grew up in Turkey, spoke out in opposition to China. Same factor: Celtics video games are gone.
“I guarantee you that the feed of this conversation [on CNN] is gone.”
Olympic broadcaster Bob Costas unloads within the Olympics. “What is with the IOC and their affinity for authoritarian nations?”
He and Michael Smerconish then name out the NBA for being in mattress with China. pic.twitter.com/qayvD6zrgf— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 8, 2021
Costas then turned his focus to Colin Kaepernick and LeBron James:
“By the way, a lot of Nike’s goods that benefit the likes of Colin Kaepernick and LeBron James is made in China. And those outspoken individuals — and in many cases, I think millions of Americans would agree with their positions on domestic issues, but they are conspicuously mum when it comes to China, and no matter what the issues are here, and they are serious issues, they pale alongside what’s going on there.”
Costas was one of many first and final sportscasters to talk out in opposition to China. In 1996, Costas, whereas internet hosting the occasion for NBC, mentioned China was the one nation that had the means and the motivation to copy what the previous Soviet Bloc and the Eastern Bloc did with their sports activities machine. Costas mentioned there was then an effort, “orchestrated from Beijing,” to have him fired.
Credit to Costas and Smerconish for talking out on this matter. No one at ESPN, CBS, The Ringer, Bleacher Report, or NBC Sports will cowl LeBron, China, or Kaepernick truthfully — so the cable information trade has to. And, surprisingly, CNN is doing so proper now.
Related at OutKick: CNN’s Jake Tapper Blasts NBA, Hollywood and Wall Street Over Relationships with China
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