Feel Good Story Out of North Korea: The North Korean Table Tennis Team Might Be The Biggest Underdog Story of The Olympics

TERESA SUAREZ. Shutterstock Images.

One thing about the Olympics is that they're gonna feed you a shit load of feel-good underdog stories. Feel-good underdog stories are the backbone of the Olympic games. You've likely already heard the popular ones. USA Women's Rugby Sevens won their first ever medal by beating heavy favorite Australia on a miraculous no-time-left-on-the-clock-full-length-of-the-field-run to capture bronze.

The United States Women's Gymnastics team, in the face of great adversity (one former teammate saying she doesn't think they're going to win + some people on Twitter who said Simone Biles hair looked bad), redeemed themselves after their embarrassing 2nd place finish in Tokyo and cakewalked to a gold medal.

Even our male gymnasts, who are notorious for stinking at gymnastics, shocked the world in the Men's Team All-Around and took home a bronze medal of their own. A performance capped off by glasses-wearing, pommel horsing American hero Stephen Nedoroscik. 

And I would be remiss if I didn't mention the Seine River, who against all odds (with the help of $1.5 billion from French taxpayers), was able to overcome centuries of serving as France's toilet, and managed to convince 110 of the world's top athletes to submerge their bodies and go for a life-threatening 1,500 meter swim.

Those are just some of the feel-good stories the mainstream media will tell you about. But you might not hear so much about are the heroics coming out of North Korea (i.e. the bad Korea).

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The Olympic Mixed Doubles Table Tennis competition features 16 teams from 16 different countries. North Korea was one of those countries. They were the 16th seed. The last team expected to medal. But that didn't stop Kum Yong Kim and Jong Sik Ri from showing up in their government approved haircuts to drop their nuts (and tits) on the world's greatest ping-pongers. 

They cruised through the first two rounds, spanking both Japan and Sweden 4-1, respectively. The city-country of Hong Kong put up a fight in the semi-finals, but at the end of the day Doo & Wong were no match for Kim & Ri. North Korea put them away 4-3.

Unfortunately, in the gold medal match, North Korea ran into a table tennis buzzsaw in China, who's mixed doubles pairing consisted of the #1 ranked man in the world, Wang Chuqin, who played alongside the #1 ranked women in the world Sun Yingshaw. The announcers referred to Sun Yingshaw as "Little Bear". I happened to catch a replay of the match last night. Watched the whole thing from start to finish. It was a respectable showing from the North Koreans. They had the Chinese on skates at times. But Wang and Little Bear's prowess on the table proved too much in the end. The scrappy underdog North Korean's would have to settle for silver. 

Nevertheless, it was an inspiring showing from the People's Republic of North Korea's people. The last seeded team in any event taking home a medal of any sort is remarkable. And the good news is, when they return to their homeland, their supreme leader will without a doubt tell the citizens of North Korea that they won gold in dominant fashion. That they swept every country 4-0 and sent the #1 ranked players in the world back to China crying in their noodles. 

In all seriousness, I can't help but cheer for the North Koreans. As I understand it, life under Kim Jong-Un isn't all he cracks it up to be. I have my suspicions on whether or not he really invented the hamburger. And I've heard there's some not-so-cool things that happen over there. But it's not these athlete's faults they were born in the worst place in the world. It's nice to see the citizens of North Korea catch an extremely rare W. To be able to leave the North Korea at all and spend a week or two in the Olympic Village is probably the highlight of their lives. I'm willing to bet they aren't among the Olympians complaining about the food.

However, the most remarkable thing about the entire Mixed Double's Table Tennis competition happened after the match. The bronze medal was won by the pairing from South Korea. So on the podium, we had China, North Korea, and South Korea all standing together. While on the podium, they posed for a selfie together.

JUNG YEON-JE. Getty Images.

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Things between North and South Korea aren't necessarily great at the moment. For example, earlier this month, North Korea sent South Korea thousands of balloons carrying bags of garbage and shit.

The two countries are still technically at war. They've hated each other forever. North Korea is constantly firing off missiles in South Korea's air space. There was already a big to-do made this Olympics over the opening ceremonies, where South Korea was deeply offended when their athletes were accidently introduced as "The People's Democratic Republic of South Korea". Apparently "People's Republic" is strictly North Korean thing.

So the podium selfie was a nice, unexpected display of unity between the two countries. Now we just cross our fingers and hope that harmless selfie doesn't lead to Kim Jong-Un executing the silver medalists the moment they set foot back on The People's soil. Come to think of it, maybe Kim & Ri shouldn't go back home for that "heroes welcome" I mentioned earlier. Maybe you don't want to get on that plane home. Maybe sneak over to your new South Korean friend's dorm and have them sneak you out in a suitcase back to the good Korea. Just to be safe. 

Aside from the electric ping pong duo of Kim & Ri, North Korea won their first ever diving medal this Olympics as well. They won silver in the Women's Synchronized 10M Platform. There are 16 total North Korean athletes in this year's Olympics across the sports of table tennis, diving, gymnastics, judo, track & field, and boxing. So best of luck to the North Koreans. I know you won't be reading this, because nobody has told you the internet exists, but I wish you all a successful Olympics. And maybe consider that "sneaking out of Paris in a suitcase" idea. It might be your only chance.