In several stories about the swimming events at the World Championships in Melbourne, Australia, which are essentially Olympic games between the quadrennials, you’ll see the name “Michael Phelps” a lot, but I’m not reading this man’s name in any of them:
This is Cullen Jones, a Bronx native who swam collegiately at North Carolina State University, and recently turned pro, and is literally swimming in endorsement money, as corporations seek to paste their logo on the only decent black competitive speed swimmer in history.
What happened to the Great Black Aquatic Hope this year?
UPDATE 8/11/2008: Because of the Olympics, this post is receiving a lot of hits at the time of this writing. Last night (U.S. time), the Americans won Gold in the 4×100 Free Relay. Michael Phelps swam the first leg, and was slower than his usual self. By the time Cullen Jones finished the third leg, with the slowest split among all four Americans, by the way, we were way behind the French. It took Jason Lezak swimming like grease lightning to beat the French by 0.08 seconds.
Nevertheless, Jones got a gold medal just the same, and more than that, the imagery of a black swimmer with an Olympic Gold, when most MSM stories about blacks and swimming usually end up badly for the swimmers, is going to be too good to pass up. Expect to hear a lot about him, by the time the media’s done, he’ll be almost as good as Michael Phelps.
After these Olympics, when Michael Phelps has walked away with multiple golds and/or others, and Cullen Jones has not that many, I’m just wondering if USA Swimming’s ensuing efforts to find the next Cullen Jones will miss the next Michael Phelps.
