[color=blue][b][u]Letters to Leonce the Romantic Lion: #5[/u][/b][/color]

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Leonce speaks fluent English, so no translations were necessary.

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[i]Dear President Baudin:

I had written to your American counterpart about this, but somebody suggested I write to you as well, so I did.  Soccer star Neymar has been gaining worldwide attention, particularly when you consider the fact he has a net worth of $200 million when you translate it into U.S. dollars.  (I don't know what that is in Euro.)  And yet everybody is so sick of his antics, especially when he starts diving (pretending to be injured so he can stall for time).  I don't understand what his problem is; do you?  He has everything he ever wanted, and probably more money than a ton of soccer players put together.  So why does he have to dive and do all these antics giving us the impression he acts like a spoiled brat?  I'll never wrap my head around it.

Personally, I couldn't care less about him.  I do go to a few soccer games, but they are all Major League Soccer games, and the players are overall way more civilized than people who take it so seriously, it's essentially a religion to these people.  However, Argentina's people redeemed themselves when their squad won the World Cup last year.  This year we have the women's version of that, and the U.S. does win from time to time.  But when will the men ever win?  My fear is that the answer is never.  I know France has won it a couple of times.

What are your thoughts on Neymar?

Signed,

Joshua Yavitz, age 29 (human being)
San Diego, CA, USA[/i]

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Leonce's reply:

[color=cyan][i]Dear Joshua:

Currency exchanges are something you constantly have to watch because they're always changing, but at the moment, $200 million equals €183,950,000; you're right, though.  That's a ludicrous amount of cash.  That's more than many of us will make in a lifetime combined.

Neymar is someone we should respect, because he has the stats to prove it, and he's done a wonderful job playing for the team I typically support, Paris Saint Germain.  However, all of us are getting fed up with his antics.  He's a Pentecostal Christian, so there's no excuse for him basically being a real-life Peter Pan.  "The party's over!" people have said to him time and time again.  "It's time to grow up!"

In fact, recently I was out and about doing my business when a soccer ball came out of nowhere and hit me on the shoulder.  It turns out Neymar was arguing with the coaches.  Since I am a PSG fan, I decided to go check it out.  Not only did I rant out (within reason) about his diving, but I asked why it was even called diving.  I then did a bunch of martial arts moves I know, including a dive roll move, and then I said, "See that?  Now THAT was a dive!"  No response.  I put him in his place, and evidently, somebody was filming it and put it on YouTube, because it went viral.  Then all the news media of France was asking me about it, and now they're treating me as if I am this big hero.  All I did was tell it like it is, but you know how the media blows things out of proportion.  It doesn't just happen in the States; it happens everywhere.

My thoughts, then?  Neymar's a fantastic player, but until he starts acting is age, nobody is going to respect him (or so I fear).

Did that help?  If not, let me know what I missed.

Yours truly,

Leonce Baudin, a.k.a. Leonce the Romantic Lion
President of the Republic of France[/i][/color]