God help me, I love figure skating, especially the men’s competition. You can keep the girls — if I wanted to watch a bunch of under-fed 14 year olds twirl around to Tchaikovsky, I’d crash a suburban ballet recital. The men have…well, they have balls. Know what else I love? My country, so I was thrilled to death last week that the gold medal in men’s figure skating went to America’s own Evan Lysacek, a.k.a. the new Love of my Life (suck it, Michael Phelps). I felt ecstatic, emotional, elated…and then absolutely infuriated when Evgeny Plushenko, who won the silver, started shooting off his mouth and claiming that the gold is rightfully his. Are we going to stand for this, America?

After the last notes of our national anthem rang true and strong (you hear that Plushenko? That’s the melody of liberty, opportunity, and retail goods sold in bulk for a price you can afford!), this idiot made an ass out of himself by slamming Lysacek in the press. Here’s an example: “If the Olympic champion doesn’t know how to jump a quad, I don’t know.” Here’s another: “I was positive that I won…but I saw that Evan needs a medal more than I do.” Oh, really? That’s very kind of you, Evgeny, but you actually didn’t deserve the gold.

First of all, let’s look at the math (hold on, people, I’m about to geek out): Plushenko didn’t have as many technical elements in the second half of his free skate, so he didn’t earn as many technical points as Lysacek. As Skater Emeritus Scott (“Ohhhh!! “Juuuuust made it!”) Hamilton explained to us, the athletes are awarded bonus points for technical moves performed after the halfway point in his program, I guess because that’s when fatigue starts to hit and those jumps get harder to land. Rather than keep his program consistently chock-full of jumps, as Lysacek did, Plushenko crammed most of his jumps into the beginning of his program and basically spent the last minute and a half just shimmying his hips around the ice. He was cocky enough to assume that he didn’t need to take advantage of the new scoring system in order to win, that this magical quad jump he thinks can cure world hunger would automatically guarantee him the gold. Cheeky boy.

Second of all, what was up with that performance? I don’t care if the Dalai Llama himself took to the ice, anyone who blows a kiss to the judges is a loser in my book. Finally, Lysacek was just better. Better jumps, better spins, better footwork, better artistry. This kid is so damn good it’s scary. Also, not that this has anything to do with anything but he’s adorable. He’s humble, he’s hyper-focused and he just looks like he loves skating. It makes me want to pour him a glass of milk and send him $10 on his birthday. This is the kind of kid we want representing the U.S.A.

Compare that with Plushenko and the ‘tude he started throwing before the medal ceremony had even finished (get off our podium, jerk). This is not how an Olympic athlete should behave. He’s actually managing to somehow make Russia look worse. We need to show this little punk that we won’t let him get away with basically calling Lysacek a sissy boy for not trying a quadruple jump. When the quad is a required element, you feel free to talk all the smack you want, Evgeny. Until then, I’d cut that Hipster Haircut of yours and dial back on the sequins before you start implying that someone is less of a man than you are.

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