Eileen Gu Shouldn't Be Surprised That Americans Are Mad at Her for Competing for China

Plus: How to win the medal count, and how Free Agent readers want to fix the Olympics

Hello and welcome to another edition of Free Agent! Don't be afraid to make a big sports prediction about something 15 years in the future—if you're wrong, no one will care; if you're right, you'll look like a genius.

We've got a jam-packed newsletter for you all this week, covering everything from Eileen Gu to winning the medal count through economics and closing with a podcast appearance from yours truly. Somewhere in between, you'll find the word Yukigassen. Enjoy!

Locker Room Links

• President Donald Trump went on Josh Pate's College Football Show podcast for about 10 minutes. (Here's a brief written summary if you'd rather read about it than watch it.)
• It was a great Olympics for the cheaters (in and out of competition).
• International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry apparently didn't consider it might be awkward if Germany hosts the Olympics in 2036, a century after Adolf Hitler's Olympics.
• I understand why, but this might surprise you: Winning coaches don't get medals at the Olympics.
• The Florida Senate passed the "Teddy Bridgewater Act," which would let high school (and lower) head coaches spend up to $15,000 of their own money on their student-athletes.
• ESPN is replacing Sunday Night Baseball with Women's Sports Sundays.
• Elsewhere in Reason: "Can You Trust Wikipedia?"
• Michigan is the best country in the world:
  

  someone said the US state with the most athletes in the Olympics and I said well I've got a Canva pro account. THE NATIONS OF THE WORLD WISH THEY HAD THE ATHLETIC PROWESS OF THE BEST AND MOST DISTINGUISHED STATE IN THE UNION, MICHIGAN pic.twitter.com/PJAntCsUgK

  — Lily Catherine Guiney (@LilyCGuiney) February 21, 2026

American Woman?

Eileen Gu is an extraordinary all-American success story. She was born in San Francisco and raised by a dedicated single mother who had moved to the U.S. for a demanding postgraduate education career at Auburn, Rockefeller University, and then Stanford's business school. Gu started skiing on the mountains towering over Lake Tahoe when she was just three years old, and won a national championship at age nine. She was fortunate enough to be educated in prestigious private schools and gained early admittance to Stanford, where she joined a sorority. She's attractive and incredibly successful, enough to have a celebrated modeling career on her impressive résumé, including glamorous campaigns with iconic American brands like Victoria's Secret and Tiffany & Co.

Yet after all the U.S. helped her accomplish, she chose to compete under the Chinese flag instead of the American one. And she can't seem to figure out why Americans are so mad about it.

China helped Gu too, of course, with its own long list of sponsorship campaigns (including with state-owned companies) and the small matter of millions of dollars in taxpayer funds. Don't forget the special exception she seems to have to China's ban on dual citizenship.

Yet when Gu talks about this controversy, she's either playing dumb or, for some reason, can't figure out why people are mad. "So many athletes compete for a different country," she said in response to Vice President J.D. Vance. "People only have a problem with me doing it because they kind of lump China into this monolithic entity, and they just hate China." Gu does the same act when she's asked about 1.5 million Uyghurs in Chinese concentration camps. "I'm not an expert on this," she told Time magazine. "I haven't done the research. I don't think it's my business." (In an interview with Reason, one concentration camp survivor described sexual torture and other unspeakable horrors.)

For all its flaws, America is still a wonderful country. People love it here, and many foreigners want to be here. We pride ourselves on being the best at everything, because it's feasible for America to be the best at most things. All of the American pride shown during the Olympics is a clear example of this—a pride in our athletes that unified Americans of all backgrounds (except for a few miserable libs) and ended in one of our best finishes at the Winter Olympics ever.

Of course, most people are proud of where they personally come from and where their ancestors came from. That usually has little or nothing to do with government policies (directly, anyway).

So it's natural for Americans to feel betrayed by someone who could represent the United States but chooses not to—especially when they pick a country whose values are nearly diametrically opposed to ours. America's freedom and wealth made Eileen Gu who she is today, not Chinese communism.

How To Win the Olympics

Speaking of communism, you know what makes it hard to win Olympic medals? Central planning.

"It takes experience, population, and wealth to make a successful soccer nation," as journalist Simon Kuper and economist Stefan Szymanski wrote in the 2022 edition of their book Soccernomics (which I highly recommend). After home field advantage, they found that a long history of playing international soccer was the most predictive factor in explaining a country's international winning percentage. The next two most important factors were income and population size. "In other words, being large and rich helps a country win matches, but having a long soccer history helps a lot more."

It's reasonable to think those factors apply to most other sports, too (though perhaps at differing rates for each variable). The emphasis on experience is probably a proxy for local interest in specific sports as well as expertise in training, coaching, and innovation (such as "crotchgate"). That explains how Norway, population 5.7 million, can win more medals than the United States, which has 60 times as many people. As I pointed out last week, the distribution of those medals across various sports probably helps Norway pad the medal count too.

In addition to their long soccer histories, one thing that Europe has over American soccer is a localized network that's constantly exchanging ideas. In soccer, America is missing out on the best hub of information. In other sports, our wealth and history have probably helped to ensure that their respective hubs are placed in America—a large, prosperous country where networks can thrive in metropolises that are easily connected by highways and airports. (For example, almost every time I watch a Detroit Red Wings game, the announcers point out that some player or coach on the other team grew up in the Detroit area, or participated in USA Hockey's National Team Development Program that's based in the suburbs, or played college hockey in Michigan).

As I wrote back in August, there's another thing that's unique about America's Olympic success (besides all the winning): a lack of taxpayer funding. "Our fruited plains (or our populous cities and economic system) are perfect for the development of freaks of nature like Simone Biles, Noah Lyles, and Michael Phelps," I wrote. Taxpayer funding might create an Olympic system of political favor-trading, where the athletes with the best potential get pushed aside for the athletes with the best political connections. Important decisions behind coaching and rosters might get tainted by political considerations. "Do we really need coaches hauled in front of Congress to explain why Caitlin Clark didn't make the team? Executive branch inquiries into tactical decisions and training regimens? Political favor-trading so that someone's favorite breakdancer or donor's niece can make the roster?"

Freedom, not central planning, is the way to success—in sports and economics.

Fixing the Olympics

I have to say, when I asked you all for ideas on how to fix the Olympics, I did not expect so much hatred for them. But almost a quarter of the people who responded said something like "Get rid of them" or "Get rid of it completely." None of those responses expanded on that thought, so I'm left wondering why they'd rather cancel the Olympics instead of just ignoring them.

Thankfully, those of you with more constructive ideas kept it interesting. 

Several of you want to have the Olympics in a permanent location. As one of you suggested, "You can still have a nation act as the 'host' with cultural displays and things like that, but the physical locations should not change." No one suggested where to do that, but Western Europe makes sense given the quality of the facilities and how the time zones work fairly well for the rest of the world. My crazy idea, though, is for a worldwide Olympics: Host rugby in Australia, table tennis in Japan, the track and field events in South Africa, the marathon in London, soccer in Brazil, and swimming in Los Angeles. Most people are watching on TV anyway, and then we get to watch the Olympics all day long. (I also wouldn't mind having the events spread out over more than two weeks, so it's easier to pay attention to more events.)

Another popular idea that several of you suggested was splitting up the subjective sports into a new category, including sports where judges are the primary determinants of the winner, such as gymnastics and figure skating. One of you even suggested giving those sports their own separate Olympics.

Lastly, what about new sports? I'm fully on board with the person who suggested adding dog sled racing, snowshoe racing, and Yukigassen (an organized form of snowball fighting that was invented in Japan in the 1980s). Someone else called for ultimate frisbee to be added to the Summer Olympics (probably my colleague Phillip Bader), and someone who said lacrosse sixes isn't good enough and that the 10 on 10 version needs to be in the Olympics instead. One of you is fully embracing the "root for chaos" mentality, suggesting that biathlon should be a James Bond-esque ski hunt and that figure skating should have four groups performing at the same time, trying to avoid hitting each other.

And at least one of you is probably looking forward to the Enhanced Games this May, considering your simple response: "Allow doping."

Lastly, I was surprised to see two-thirds of you prefer ranking countries by total medals instead of gold medals. I thought more of a "Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing" mentality would prevail among my American readers. Fortunately, the official count doesn't matter (in the sense that the Olympics doesn't name the country with the most medals that year's overall "winner") so we can play around and create our own medal tables based on various factors, as The New York Times' Ben Blatt did. (The Summer Olympics version was even wonkier.)

Freed Up

On Friday, I joined my fellow Michigander Robby Soave on Reason's Freed Up podcast to talk about tariffs, the Olympics, Gu, Stephen A. Smith possibly running for president, and a very weird list of other topics, including way too much detail on high school cross country running in Michigan. It was fun to record, so I hope you'll watch the whole thing and leave a million comments that say Reason should have its own sports podcast with similarly nonexistent levels of preparation (if only so I can show off more obscure sports attire).

Replay of the Week

Beating other countries at weird sports that they've made up is a great American pastime. Did your country invent a sport where people strap blades onto their feet, glide around on ice, and try to use a stick to hit a rubber circle into a net surrounded by metal tubes? Great, our professional teams will keep your professional teams from winning the championship for at least 32 years, and one day our players, men and women, will beat your players at the Olympics. (By the way, we'll get more than twice as many gold medals as your country, even though your country is colder and snowier.)

We've had the newsletter going for almost a year, and I think these are my favorite replays so far.

Team USA is taking home the GOLD. Relive Team USA's golden moment in full. ???????? pic.twitter.com/eKIn0gbsdd

— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) February 22, 2026

A GOLDEN GOAL FOR GOLD! pic.twitter.com/oLDfElGnI9

— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) February 19, 2026

That's all for this week. Enjoy watching the real game of the weekend, West Virginia against Kennesaw State on Saturday in college baseball, which is already somehow in its second week of the season.

Comments

[Rick James]

Yet after all the U.S. helped her accomplish, she chose to compete under the Chinese flag instead of the American one. And she can't seem to figure out why Americans are so mad about it.

I'm finding all this discussion at Reason a little curious. I don't disagree with it, in fact, I kind of agree with it. I'm an old fuddy duddy who doesn't like the idea of professional athletes in the Olympics (number 1) and number 2, I really don't like the idea of Athletes (of any origin) country-shopping. But unfortunately, my old fuddy-duddy views on this force me to recognize old-fashioned ideas such as nation states, sovereignty, borders, unique cultures and other such things as a kind of prerequisite to maintain such provincial attitudes.

So again, I don't have any complaints on Reason's coverage on this Eileen Gu situation, but I do find it someone curious about the sudden departure from the notion that the world is just one big airport lounge with AI-generated World Music blaring on the overhead speakers.

So I guess, good on you, Reason, more of this, please.

[mtrueman]

I remember the speakers in China blaring out European classical music, Beethoven, Mozart etc. interspersed with lectures on the wisdom of the one child policy.

China doesn't think of itself as a nation state. They call it a 'peoples republic' and recognize many nations - over 50 - more if you get into sub groups like the Hakka, more still if you consider mutually unintelligible local dialects. The culture is hardly unique - chop sticks and calligraphy are shared throughout East Asia.

[Rick James]

China DOES think of itself as a nation state. I've been to China, I've worked in China, and trust me, they think of themselves as a sovereign state

[mtrueman]

The name says it all, it's a peoples' republic. They claim many nationalities - Tibetan, Hmong, Manchurian, Mongolian, Yao, Lahu, and at least 50 more. If you visited the eastern part of the country, the Han parts, that might have escaped you. It's a communist country, don't forget, and they take pains to give lip service at least to the minorities and avoid 'hanhua,' absorbing the minorities into the Han majority. That's evident in the autonomous provinces and counties in the west, and efforts to encourage literacy in hitherto non literate nationalities by introducing a Roman alphabet rather than hanzi, Chinese ideographs. Much the same could be seen in USSR, again, not a nation state, but a union of republics of varied nationalities.

" they think of themselves as a sovereign state"

It goes beyond that. The Han people of China see overseas Chinese like Gu, as Chinese. That's evident in Gu's decision, and also the overseas communities efforts to maintain their language and lifeways distinct from their adopted countries. Contrast with Africans who see Black Americans as Whites.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

No one cares. She’s a traitor.

[Bubba Jones]

"They claim many nationalities"
That sounds like something a Han would say.

I'll just leave this here:

The NPCSC has since released the full list of delegates, along with each delegate’s gender and ethnicity. (The list, like all official Chinese personnel announcements, treats Han men as the default and indicates only women’s gender and minorities’ ethnicities.)
https://npcobserver.com/2023/02/25/china-14th-npc-demographics/

[mtrueman]

"(The list, like all official Chinese personnel announcements, treats Han men as the default and indicates only women’s gender and minorities’ ethnicities.)"

That's par for the course. China is a Beijing-centric country. That goes for institutions of course but the whole country has only one time zone, that of Beijing. Go west, young man, to the autonomous regions of Tibet etc. They pay lip service to Beijing's official time but set their watches to suit the local situation. They take pains to maintain ethnic religions, languages and life ways, and Beijing tolerates it, even funding it to some extent. Maybe under Xi, things are different. It's been a while since I was there.

[charliehall]

I work with Chinese expats. Some are US citizens, some are permanent residents, some are on various temporary work visas.
Many have taken English names. They want their kids to learn English.

[But SkyNet is a Private Company]

Misconstrueman couldn’t be a bigger idiot.
It’s a Han ethnostate where racial minorities are represssed, often brutally.

[mtrueman]

Han people are brutalized too. Surely you are aware of this. Those brutalized in China are brutalized for their political opposition to the state. Not for their ethnicity.

Please refer to me as mtrueman, my name at Reason. I mute those who are rude.

[Isaac Bartram]

Yeah, I'll bet the Uyghurs feel right at home in the "Peoples Republic". And the Tibetans, and...? Some "people" aren't really "people", maybe?

[Rev Arthur L kuckland (5-30-24 banana republic day)]

Revoke her passport. She can go to chink town if they want her. (they don't)

[Ezra MacVie]

I (American) care about Eileen Gu EVEN LESS than I care about the Olympics.

[charliehall]

She is a natural-born US citizen. And your use of the c*** town phrase proves that you are a racist.

[mad.casual]

International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry apparently didn't consider it might be awkward if Germany hosts the Olympics in 2036, a century after Adolf Hitler's Olympics.

Uh, unless you're making a point about the Germans currently controlling all of Europe, it's only awkward if you hold racial/national/tribal determinism as a fundamental precept.

Cue Nick Fuentes "Too soon?" clip.

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

When will it not be “awkward “? 101 years? 120 years?
All the people that were involved are dead.

[mad.casual]

Even the perceived awkwardness of hosting it in "(Former) East Berlin" doesn't make any sense and feels more like concern trolling/virtue signalling rather than any sort of serious issue.

It *does* make sense as an out for a money-losing logistics nightmare. "Aw, gee, we'd love to host but, you know, with the ghost of Hitler wandering around... [shrugs] sorry. Maybe we'll put in a bid in 2136..."

[Dillinger]

>>Cue Nick Fuentes

please don't. ever.

[mtrueman]

" it's only awkward if you hold racial/national/tribal determinism as a fundamental precept."

That is the case. The athletes dress in gear that prominently displays the name of their country and their anthem is played at the awards ceremony. Perhaps a way around this is to follow the Olympic flag, 5 rings representing the 5 continents. Each continent can field a team dressed in new uniforms with new anthems.

[Isaac Bartram]

Interestingly enough, the original modern Olympics were based on the notion that the games were awarded to a city and not a country. and that athletes were individuals rather than representatives of any particular country. The idea that "your country's" medal count reflected some glory onto you, "Joe Sixpack", sitting at home watching the Games on TV came later, as did the idea that somehow holding the Games in your country brought some benefit to you personally.

[mad.casual]

Ctrl+f 'bears': 0 results.

Really?

[Bertram Guilfoyle]

Same result for "trunks". Jeff has a sad.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

Haven’t seen him around for a few days. Is he dead?

Here’s hoping.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"...China helped Gu too, of course, with its own long list of sponsorship campaigns (including with state-owned companies) and the small matter of millions of dollars in taxpayer funds..."

We already knew what she was, now we know the price.

[Neutral not Neutered]

Pfft. America has 10 times the population and far more money invested.

"(By the way, we'll get more than twice as many gold medals as your country, even though your country is colder and snowier.)"

Why did the USA have less medals than Norway? They have 80 times less people and funding and short mountains...

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

They have 12 months of winter. And the power of Thor.

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

Why are we still medal counting when borders are just like an artificial construct, man?

[mad.casual]

I can't even with the bigotry of having men's and women's records/events.

[mtrueman]

Why have men's curling, women's curling and mixed doubles curling? Just do the mixed doubles and have done with it. It's all the same sport, after all, and sub dividing by sex doesn't change that. I don't think it's bigotry so much as tradition, that goes the extra mile to segregate by sex.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

Yeah, that’s dumb.

[mad.casual]

[Idaho-Bob]

I'm still waiting for the American leftists so say something positive about the men's hockey team/gold. I've only seen bitching about USA! chants, choices of songs in locker rooms, and ahtletes declaring their love and appreciation of America.

[Michael Ejercito]

Almost as if they want to abandon patriotism to the Fascists®™.

[MollyGodiva]

It is none of our business which country Eileen Gu represents. Getting mad at her is very petty.

[Bertram Guilfoyle]

Glad to see you supporting a fellow chicom.

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

Poor china Tony.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

Yes, it’s none of YOUR business. So shit the fuck up Tony.

[charliehall]

Correct.

I remember when most of the Mexican women's soccer team was Mexican-Americans. IIRC, the coach didn't speak Spanish! The team was mostly dual nationals. The US has long approved of dual nationality and so does Mexico. China does not but apparently made an exception for Gu and the Olympics allow you to compete on any country's Olympic team for which you have a passport.

[Use the Schwartz]

⭕
You know, for kids!

[JFree]

Michigan is the best country in the world:

What nonsense. Colorado sent the most athletes (30). Followed by Minnesota (24), California (19), Utah (17) and then the little pinkie finger Michigan (15). Colorado also won the most medals - 3 gold and 2 loser colors. Vermont (2nd overall state with 4 silvers from 4 athletes) and Wyoming (1 gold, 2 silvers from 3 athletes) were the small state overachievers. Each of them won more medals than Michigan

[Don't look at me! ( Is the war over yet?)]

So for a state to be the best country in the world, they must win medals?

[JFree]

Yes. Participation awards don't count beyond kindergarten.

[JFree]

Team sports (apart from relays) shouldn't be Olympic events. They should have their own international events

[Dillinger]

Eileen Hu?

[Mike Parsons]

Have to admit, this chick is really hot, that counts for something, right?

Kudos to the lefty American figure skater though. Probably the most we could expect from someone with left wing views in terms of being respectful and not a complete cunt. This is a huge vibe shift from the likes of Rapinoe.

Skated really well, won the gold, draped in the flag, hand over her heart for the anthem, and some mild statements the next day.

Will say, the raccoon/skunk hair and frenulum piercing look really bad, and she looks like she was trying to make herself purposefully mildly ugly with those choices, but what can I say, girl can skate and good on her for getting the US more gold.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Gu did it for the millions China paid her; makes them both like shit, appropriately

[Winston in Wonderland]

She chose to represent China and not the U.S. We know where her allegiance lies, and it's difficult to fathom why Americans would be "proud" of her achievement.

[SCOTUS gave JeffSarc a big sad]

No. Democrats are ‘proud of her achievements. Not Americans.

[mtrueman]

"why Americans would be "proud" of her achievement."

Hate her, love her achievement. We should appreciate the achievement of an athlete winning a gold at the Olympics regardless of the country she represents. Anything else is petty chauvinism.

[Bubba Jones]

LOL at the racist nitwits pretending they wouldn't choose the route with 20 millions followers and $20M a year in global endorsements.

BUT CHICOMS

lol

Up next, hating McDonalds for opening franchises in Russia and China.

[charliehall]

Yeah it is a rather silly bigoted point. China hasn't been communist for a generation now.

[Isaac Bartram]

They might not be communist, but they've maintained the totalitarian thing in spades. I'm afraid that Milton Friedman might have been wrong. He believed that free trade would cause countries like China to become more liberal, but it seems like the more shit "we" buy from China the more repressive they become. There were people who thought that Hong Kong's freedom would rub off onto Mainland China, but we have pretty much seen the last of any vestiges of freedom in Hong Kong since the communists took control.

[Isaac Bartram]

"Host rugby in Australia,..."

Don't know why anyone would think that. Rugby Union is the version that's played at the Olympics and Rugby Union runs in last place behind Australian Rules Football, Rugby League and Association Football (soccer) in the number of players and followers in Australia. Those three are "working class" sports while Rugby Union is an "upper class" sport, which is kind of an interesting thing from a supposedly "classless" society.

If you want a Rugby Union-mad country, try New Zealand or South Africa.

[HarrietLi]

I liked watching the Olympics when it still felt like a fair sport. Now it's politics. The easiest way is to forget about this event and switch to national championships. In my province, Ontario, we adore hockey. I took the time to create an account on 1xBet Canada. Now I am an active hockey fan and a bit of a gambling person. This looks like the perfect replacement for the Olympics to me.