Kerri Walsh Jennings Lost Her First Olympic Beach Volleyball Match Ever, Showed A Little Too Much Grace Afterwards
“My weakness tonight was passing the ball. And then we never gave ourselves breathing room. When you’re shanking balls, and you’re up a point or two and you shank a ball …”
Walsh Jennings paused.
“We can squash that team. We have in the past. I say that with so much respect for them. They’re very, very good. Tonight, they rose to the occasion. I certainly did not. There’s no excuse for it. Just terrible execution. They outplayed us pretty much in every way. Not out-hustled us, not out-hearted us, not out-teamworked us. Just outplayed us.”
First off, pretty wild that Kerri Walsh Jennings has barely ever even lost a set of Olympic beach volleyball before let alone a game. 2004, 2008, 2012, all undefeated. I guess all good things have to come to an end at some point but the fact that it was a Brazilian team to hand Walsh Jennings her first Olympic loss ever when the games are being held in Rio just seems a little fishy. Was she threatened into throwing the match in order to be able to leave the hell hole that is Rio de Janiero alive? I’m gonna go ahead and say yes.
Now as for her post-match remarks? Well it’s a damn shame. Because it sounded like she was so close to going there. If she had just stopped after “we can squash that team. We have in the past”, it would have been a brilliant way to go out. Almost makes people forget you even lost in the first place. Hope Solo has already opened the door allowing American athletes to verbally assault their opponents after defeat. I still don’t fully understand exactly what she meant when calling the Swedish team a bunch of cowards, but that’s okay. Because it used to be called Patriotism. Putting down every other nation in the world because you think that America is the best used to be called taking pride in your country. But now? Well now it’s a “hot take”. Now it’s “being one of the least liked athletes ever which is an even more impressive feat to get people to care about women’s soccer players one way or the other”. Kerri Walsh Jennings is the greatest Olympic beach volleyball player ever. She shouldn’t have to lie and say she respects her opponents just because she doesn’t want the negative headlines the next day.
