Jose es muy siente

It's already been Deadspinned, but let's just say Jose Calderon did the right thing apologize for the Spanish team photo incident.

People might not have been so forgiving if it had been T.J. Ford, though.

Related:
Calderon apologizes for racist gesture; Pre-Olympic photo with Spanish team was 'a mistake, a bad mistake' (Doug Smith, Toronto Star)

Snark break... what is it with you kids, and that word?

Wikipedia is pretty well-policed, but not so well that it can catch every single act of sabotage that sports fans commit to the page of much-loathed teams like the Philadelphia Flyers.

This is a brilliant piece of saboteur work not so much for originality ("icefuckers?") but for the timing and the target (the Flyers have always been loathsome and some would say they have the fanbase that's least likely to catch this quickly).

The Wiki cops are running around like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to make sure no funny stuff happens with the pages of various U.S. politicians as the presidential election campaign builds up. That would leave the barn door wide open for a saboteur to sneak in and modify the Flyers' page. (It might be gone by the time you click through, but thankfully, fellow Epic Carnival writer DMTShooter was quick to pounce with a screengrab.)

Some would say that saboteur is a French word for "vengeful Montreal Canadiens fan," considering the Flyers' extinguished the Habs' Stanley Cup hopes last spring. However, knowing about the outsider art Flyers fans have created to mock Sidney Crosby, and seeing that a reference to the team's "many brawls" with the New York Rangers is high up on the page, Lower Manhattan and Western Pennsylvania are probably the first two places to look.

It's also entirely possible that a Flyers fan went the 8 Mile route and did it to themselves. You never know.

• Flyers winger Simon Gagné's training regimen this summer has involved running sprints while carrying bags of sand. Lugging around bags of sand? It's good preparation for what he'll have to do if Joffrey Lupul's on his line this season.
• Only Major League Baseball could ballyhoo adding instant replay some two decades after it was introduced in the NFL and NHL.
• Best headline ever, from a Washington Post story about the Washington Nationals' MLB-low radio listenership: "From the Basement, It's No Wonder Radio Reception Is Poor."
  
  The Nats, God love 'em, are on pace to have one of baseball's 10 worst offences since the 1993 expansion. This is better than having a team in Montreal how?
• If the CFL had an award for Injured Player of the Week, the Saskatchewan Roughriders would take it hands-down.

(Seriously, Gagné opting for prolotherapy to treat post-concussion symptoms certainly is worth exploring farther. Too many careers have ended too soon.

Conficius say: 'Tis better to toss out a medal, than toss out excuses

Online Videos by Veoh.com

Hey, if Ara Abrahamian of Sweden doesn't want his Greco-Roman wrestling bronze medal, can Canada please have it?

Canada's medal count is going to pick up by the weekend. Far be it to suggest this modest proposal: Canadian Olympians can only offer the "tried my best, happy to be close" line if they grapple Mr. Abrahamian first. It could be Greco-Roman, freestyle or thumb war -- his choice.

(Video via fellow Carnie The World of Isaac.)

Related:
Swedish wrestler Ara Abrahamian vows to quit after throwing away Olympic medal (London Telegraph)

Oh misunderstanding

It’s a bit silly to make the argument that sports and nationalism don’t belong together. They don’t, but they are. Undeniably. Whether it’s something as overt as the Olympics or World Cup, or something subtler like a CFL fans private glee that next month’s NFL game at the Dome is not sold out, it’s always there.

And in case we forget there is a reminder before the start of every game played in both Canada and the United States. I’m referring, of course, to the playing of the national anthem.

And if you play the anthems enough times they will eventually get booed. Usually it happens in the heat of a intense playoff battle between a Canadian NHL team and an American opponent. Other times Oh Canada has been shouted down by over extending péquistes in Montreal.

It’s never pretty. It’s never right. And, it’s never as big a deal as some would like to make it.

Last night during the MLS all-star game many in the crowd started to boo the Star Spangled Banner believing that organizers had neglected to include Oh Canada in the opening ceremony. The booing lasted about 15 seconds before many in the crowd started to sign Oh Canada over the US anthem.

This has led many in the Canadian media to make sweeping condemnations of TFC’s fans, suggesting that they are nothing but a bunch of drunk hooligan wannabees. In the US, those with an agenda to keep further Canadian expansion out of MLS are holding the incident up as an example of all that is bad with us Canucks.

Of course no one is putting it into full perspective—the US national anthem has never been booed at a TFC game before (when tension is actually high unlike last night’s exhibition match featuring a pop star midfielder). Actually you can often hear the Star Spangled Banner sung at TFC games.

It’s also not widely reported that the Canadian anthem was delayed about five minutes after the U.S. and British songs and that the Canadian flag wasn’t part of the opening ceremony colour guard. Organizers claim that they wanted the Canadian anthem and flag to be separate to honour the host country, but in the stadium it just seemed like an afterthought. One announcement letting the fans know that Oh Canada would be sung five minutes after the other two songs would have stopped everything. You see, the fans weren’t booing the U.S. anthem. They were booing the lack of Oh Canada.

Oh yeah, the game. MLS won 3-2. Toronto’s own, Dwayne De Rosario scored the winner.