Former NFL quarterback Boomer Esiason called freestyle skier Eileen Gu “insufferable” on his WFAN radio show.
“She’s a very, very attractive woman and she’s extremely smart — she went to Stanford — but if you listen to her post-participation interviews, she’s insufferable,” he said as co-host Gregg Giannotti laughed. “It is. It’s hard to listen to. But again, it’s an individual sport where an individual person talks about herself, rather than about her teammates or the support she received.”
The Winter Olympics concluded Sunday as Gu appeared to leave quite an impression on the former New York Jets quarterback, who led the Cincinnati Bengals to a Super Bowl in the 1988 season and was the league’s MVP.
Gu won gold in the halfpipe on the final day to further cement her as the most decorated freestyle skier in Olympic history. She has now won three golds and three silvers in two Games.
And that’s a problem for conservative critics because she collected the medals for China, where her mother was born, rather than her native US.
Gu’s relationship with China is reportedly filled up her income by millions, Esiason noted. But supporters suggest that much of the resentment toward Gu is rooted in racism. Several U.S.-born athletes competed for other countries at the Milan Cortina Games with much less controversy.
China News Service via Getty Images
Esiason made headlines earlier during the Games by telling American athletes to “eradicate” their anti-Trump views.
He suggested a similar sentiment about Gu, but with entirely different comments.
Giannotti brought up her recent conversation with The Athletic’s Charlotte Harpur.
“This isn’t a rude question, but do you think before you speak?” Harpur asked. “Because you answer questions so quickly and so extensively, whether it’s about geopolitics, your sport or aerodynamics. Can you take us inside your brain?”
“I’m an introspective young woman,” Gu replied. “I spend a lot of time in my head, and it’s not a bad place to be. I journal a lot. I break down all my thought processes. I guess I apply a very analytical lens to my own thinking, and I adapt it. Because it’s so interesting, you can control what you think. You can control how you think, and therefore you can control who you are. And especially as a young person, I’m 22, so with neuroplasticity on my side, I can literally become exactly who I want. How cool is that? How powerful is that?”
“I will say she is exceptionally smart and she has her answers,” he said. “She knows how she’s going to answer things, that’s for sure. But no one really asked her a difficult question. But that answer she gave was just unbearable.”
After Sunday’s victory, Gu defended her alliance with China by reiterating her intention to grow the sport and inspire the youth there.
“There are girls in China whose lives will be touched by the beautiful and wonderful power of sports.” Gu said. “That in itself is an absolutely measured impact that I think I always wanted.”
