Shaun White's gold-medal coronation in the halfpipe finals at the Winter Olympics was marred Wednesday by vulgar statements made by coach Bud Keene and aired on NBC live to the East Coast before White's final run. White was the last to go, but since nobody had beat his score from the first round, he was the automatic winner. There was much joy and celebration atop the run, as there should have been. Unfortunately, a few of those words were picked up by NBC cameras.
At first there were whoops of celebration. But then things got a little R-rated. Keene: What do you want to do? White: I don't know, man. Ride down the middle? (Chorus of noes.) Keene: No, have some fun. White: Drop a double mick? Keene: Yeah, drop a double mick at the end. Do whatever you want and [expletive] send that thing. Make sure you stomp the [expletive] out of that thing.
It went downhill from there if you can read lips, at which point NBC announcers Pat Parnell and Todd Richards apologized for the language and defended it by saying that a lot of energy was running through White and his coaches. The apology was necessary (even if it did draw more attention to the curses they were tough to hear without rewinding), but NBC was apologizing for the wrong people. They shouldn't be apologizing for Bud Keene; they should be apologizing for the network showing it in the first place.
Shaun White and Bud Keene
