Sounding sickly and unpracticed might be a problem in a high school speech contest but here he still gave an engaging talk that clearly a lot of people enjoyed

Sounding sickly and unpracticed might be a problem in a high school speech contest but here he still gave an engaging talk that clearly a lot of people enjoyed listening to. So it wasn't bad. Just an unconventional style. Try listening to political speeches from half a century ago and see how offensively arrogant they sound, or Chinese speeches today. Fashions change and it's not bad as long as people enjoy it.