Peyton Manning Would Like A Shot At A Gold Medal

Apparently, Peyton Manning did not enjoy seeing Michael Phelps win eight gold medals at the Olympics without being able to do something about it. Oh well, at least he performed better on Saturday Night Live.

Refusing to stand idly by Mr. Manning has decided to put his stamp of approval on a petition to get the Olympic Committee to include American football on its list of sports. And based on his words at weplay.com, it sounds like he's pretty damn serious about the whole thing.



And if you don't agree, then you're obviously being completely bogus.

(In the interest of disclosure, in the e-mail I received pertaining to this I was offered a $25 gift certificate to Eastbay for posting the "widget". However, putting this up for humor far outweighs any credit at Eastbay.)

Tim Montgomery Could Be Waiting In The Blocks For A Long, Long Time

A couple of years ago, Tim Montgomery was on top of the world as far as running track is concerned. He had won some medals participating in relay events, and had broken Maurice Greene's 100m world record. Thereby earning the title of the "Fastest Man on Earth". Due to that success he was eventually cast in a Nike commercial.



Ah, but if the Ben Jonson's, Marion Joneses, and Katerina Thanou's of the world have taught us anything it's that the life of a track and field star isn't always great. Unfortunately, Montgomery has shown that to be the case more than once.

The first big incident came in December of 2005 when Montgomery was hit with a two year ban for doping, and had all of his records since March 31, 2001 nullified. That included his 100m world record.

Less than a year later, he was arrested for cashing fradulent checks as part of a money laundering scheme. He plead guily to those charges, and is waiting to be sentenced.

Then, this past Monday Montgomery appeared in court to answer the accusations that he sold a confidential informant 111 grams of heroin. Montgomery entered a plea of not guilty, and his trial has been set for July 9. Allegedly, Montgomery made four seperate transactions with the informant while authorities recorded audio and videotaped.

Whether or not Montgomery really did deal heroin remains to be seen, but I imagine that he wishes he could throw on a pair of Nikes and haul ass like he did in his commercial.

Hello Olympics, Bye Bye Kittehs!

Obviously, when you're hosting a party you want your place to be relatively clean. Dishes washed, dirty clothes in the hamper, pizza boxes in the trash, porno mags tucked safely under the mattress. And when you're hosting a party the size of the Olympics you have even more to worry about. Like dangerous cats.

Though, the solution is easy. Just cage them up and transport them to death camps on the oustkirts of the city.

Thousands of pet cats in Beijing are being abandoned by their owners and sent to die in secretive government pounds as China mounts an aggressive drive to clean up the capital in preparation for the Olympic Games.

Hundreds of cats a day are being rounded and crammed into cages so small they cannot even turn around.

Then they are trucked to what animal welfare groups describe as death camps on the edges of the city.

The cull comes in the wake of a government campaign warning of the diseases cats carry and ordering residents to help clear the streets of them.

Yeah. That's not good.

I'm willing to bet that not every cat killed is disease ridden. Though, the government seems to have done a good job at scaring the citizens into believing that all cats must die. Even their pets that spend their days indoors, and are perfectly healthy. Hopefully, the rest of the cats don't band together and overrun the Olympic Village.

The Gold Medal That Might Go Unawarded

When you devote your life to training to become an Olympic athlete the highest honor is receiving a gold medal. Unfortunately, sometimes athletes engage in various methods of cheating, and those that are awarded the gold medal have to be stripped of them. You might think that just handing them off to whoever finished second is the best way to right the wrong, but that's not always the case.

The IOC postponed the reallocation of the five Olympic medals returned by Marion Jones following her admission that she began doping before the 2000 Sydney Games.

The International Olympic Committee had been expected to rule on the medal changes -- which could affect more than three dozen athletes -- during its three-day executive board meeting that started Monday.

But board member Denis Oswald said the IOC wants more information from the BALCO steroid investigation before deciding whether to upgrade doping-tainted Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou to Jones' gold in the women's 100 meters.

Yes, I'm sure that we're all aware that Marion Jones wasn't 100% clean when she won her gold medals. The IOC is taking them from her no doubt, but what isn't clear is who will get them. While we've all heard of Marion Jones, most of us might not have heard of Katerina Thanou or her weird story surrounding a missed drug test.

Normally when an Olympic medalist is disqualified, the standings are adjusted so that the next-place finisher moves up and those below also go up a spot. However, there is reluctance among some IOC officials to upgrade Thanou because she was involved in a high-profile scandal at the 2004 Athens Olympics.

"If we upgrade her we would have to be sure," Oswald said.

One option under consideration is leaving the gold medal spot vacant.

"This is an open question all the time," Oswald said. "We have to study the legal basis and the flexibility we have."

Thanou and fellow Greek runner Kostas Kenteris failed to show up for drug tests on the eve of the games and claimed they were injured in a motorcycle accident. They were forced to pull out of the Olympics and were later banned for two years.

Without evidence that Thanou was guilty of any doping violation in Sydney, the IOC would need other reasons for not awarding her the gold.

In October, lawyers for Thanou, Kenteris and their former coach, Christos Tzekos, said investigations have found no evidence that the three were involved in BALCO and that Greek prosecutors had dropped a probe into the case.

So, for now at least, the gold medal doesn't really belong to anyone, and there's a good chance that no one will end up with it. It will be interesting to see what the IOC finally decides, especially with the 2008 Olympics fast approaching.

Hopefully Arizona Residents Won't Name Their Kids "Super" or "Bowl"

Having your city or country host a major sporting event is pretty cool. Especially when it's as publicized as the Olympics. However, that really shouldn't encourage parents to name their kids after said event. Though, parents in China obviously don't care.

The upcoming Beijing Olympics is more than just a point of pride for China — it's such an important part of the national consciousness that nearly 3,500 children have been named for the event, a newspaper reported Sunday.

Most of the 3,491 people with the name "Aoyun," meaning Olympics, were born around the year 2000, as Beijing was bidding to host the 2008 Summer Games, the Beijing Daily reported, citing information from China's national identity card database.

Don't these parents realize that kids have it hard enough these days without a funky name? It's just an invitation to get beat up, become a recluse and end up confronted by Chris Hansen in a kitchen someday. It's sad really. Though, the sadder part might be that some parents have named their kids after the mascots of the Olympics.

Names related to the Olympics don't just stop with "Olympics." More than 4,000 Chinese share their names with the Beijing Games mascots, the "Five Friendlies."

The names are Bei Bei (880 people), Jing Jing (1,240), Huan Huan (1,063), Ying Ying (624) and Ni Ni (642). When put together, the phrase translates to "Beijing welcomes you!"

That's just great. If you have five kids you can have your very own Olympics welcoming committee. And in return for the ridicule you put them through probably your own death squad that will either take you out, or choose the worst nursing home possible for you to live out your final days in.

Do You Understand The Words That Are Coming Out Of My Mouth?

As a way to increase excitement about the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, Chinese organizers asked Jackie Chan to record a song. As a well-known actor, Chan seems to be a good choice for promoting the Olympics. However, there is one problem with the song, it's in Mandarin Chinese.

China has released a song to get the world excited about the Beijing Olympics, and organizers have tapped actor and martial arts expert Jackie Chan to do it.

Chan said in his blog that he recorded the song "We Are Ready," which is being used as the official one-year countdown song for the Olympics next summer.

Chan sings the song in Mandarin Chinese.

Beijing organizers are considering an English version.

Now, I'm not sure how many people worldwide speak Mandarin Chinese, but I would think that if the Olympic organizers wanted to drum up maximum support they would record more than one version.

Of course, they're still having problems providing fresh water, so the theme song might be pretty far down on the list.

Now This Is The Type Of Ski Jumping I Could Watch

Ok, so the ski jumping event is one of the best ones in the Olympics. However, seeing these guys roll car and truck tires off the slope at over 80 mph causing destruction is pretty entertaining.


Rolling Tires Down A Ski Jump - Watch more free videos

Yeah, that last one probably simulates what would happen if Eddie "the Eagle" Edwards weighed 500 lbs.

No, Those Aren't Gymnasts Making Your 2008 Olympics Gear They're Child Laborers

The Olympics sure have been taking some hits over the past few months. The 2012 Olympics have been blasted over their seizure inducing logo, and now the 2008 Olympics are receiving heat because some of the licensed products being made for the event are coming from child laborers in south China.

Investigators said that they found four factories in south China, who have been contracted to produce Olympic merchandise, using child laborers as young as 12 years old, and forcing other workers to work long hours for less than minimum wage. The organizing committee in charge of the Olympics has threatened to cancel the contract of any factory found practicing unsafe labor conditions.

Surprisingly, I haven't heard too much of an uproar over this discovery. Personally, I think that's an indication of how much people don't really care that much about the Olympics anymore. Though, maybe it's because the Beijing games are still a year away.

If they really want to make sure nothing happens they should put Kathy Lee Gifford on the case. Though, Dave Chappelle would be a far better choice if they wanted to run those factories efficiently.

Isn't This That Olympic Logo That Causes Seizures?

Will at Deadspin covered the unveiling of the 2012 Summer Olympics logo, but I wanted to post a follow-up.

Apparently, some people have experienced epileptic seizures after viewing the logo.

"Epilepsy Action, a British health charity, said 10 people had complained about the animation and some had suffered seizures from watching images depicting a diver plunging into a pool.

The Olympic group said it has taken steps to remove the animation from the Web site and will now re-edit the film."

Ten people in three days(the report was released on the 7th)? That's a little more than three people per day, and seeing how we're still five years away from the start of these Olympics that could result in over 5,000 epileptic episodes before the Opening Ceremonies. Yeah, great job on choosing that logo Olympic organizers. Though, with the TV ratings trending downward maybe this is a ploy to boost ratings. You know, induce seizures so that you can't change the channel and keep the ratings up.

Somewhere, Homer Simpson is thrilled with this logo choice.