Olympics Day 14: Who is Kobe?

On most evenings, US athletes and gold medal winners were invited to our studio as guests on the Morning Show program. There have been countless instances where we would stare at each other and ask, “Who is that?” “Is it worth taking a picture with him?”

As close as we were to the action, the names and faces of athletes do not stick in our heads. I remember an intern asking me to get her Kobe Bryant’s autograph if I happen to see him at a press conference. But first, we had to print out a photo of Kobe for him to sign on. The real question is: What does Kobe look like? None of us could tell. Is this him or Michael Jordan? I laughed. I guess I can ask any black basketball player to sign it and she can’t tell the difference.

On day 14, I finally got to get up close with an Olympic gold medalist – Stephanie Brown Trafton, gold winner for women’s discus. Unlike high profile athletes like Michael Phelps or Kobe Bryant, it didn’t feel like I was interviewing a celebrity.

She was tall. At 6-foot-4, she towered over me as I tried to hold the mic up for her to speak. As discus ranks pretty low in the America’s games priority, a gold medal discus thrower does not exactly attract a lot of attention on the street. At the end of our interview, we took a picture together for memorabilia. At least I got to take a picture with a gold medalist.

Its probably the same kind of mentality for autograph hunters. As long as I get a signature of someone with a gold medal, its worth something. And it was also at that moment that an autograph hunter showed up. He got Stephanie’s autograph, then turned towards me and asked, “Who is she?”

No comments:

Unblock Your Internet