PHELPS GETS THE BOOT

Gee, I thought Canada liked athletes who smoke dope. But I guess not.

Maybe it's the Harperization of Canada. Or maybe times have changed, but it's interesting that American swimmer/bong show boy Michael Phelps has been dropped as the keynote speaker at two events in Canada next week.

The promoter cited the Olympic champion swimmer's "widely publicized alleged use of marijuana," according to Associated Press.

Here's text from the AP story:

Power Within Inc. of Toronto, which organizes motivational speaking events, canceled Phelps' appearances at events in Calgary and Vancouver. Power Within initially stood by the swimmer, but has now booked actor Martin Sheen as its keynote speaker for the Calgary event. The Vancouver event will feature Mehmet Oz, a regular on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

"Due to widely publicized alleged use of marijuana by Michael Phelps, the decision has been made to present the program without Mr. Phelps' participation," the company said in statement released to several Canadian media outlets.

A British tabloid published a picture of Phelps smoking from a marijuana pipe at a party in Columbia, S.C., last November. Police said last week there was not enough evidence to charge Phelps, who won a record eight gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Phelps has apologized for his actions, acknowledging he used "bad judgment" after the photo appeared. Last Friday, IOC president Jacques Rogge said Phelps deserves a "second chance."

Guess the folks at Power Within don't agree.

Calgary we can understand. But Vancouver? Where you can shoot up legally on the street? Oh, I see. That's okay; you can light a crack pipe on the Downtown East Side or fill your arm with heroin, but you can't allow a guy who won EIGHT gold medals at the Beijing Olympics to speak in public because he might've taken a couple deep breaths on a bong filled with marijuana at a private party.

Yeah, that makes sense.

JUST IN TIME

It may not help, but you have to think the folks who are trying to get golf into the Olympics are thrilled to see Tiger Woods teeing it up on the PGA Tour in Arizona this week. Woods has suggested in the past that he wouldn't be keen on an Olympic tournament, but if someone could get him to change his mind it would be a huge boost to golf's chances.

LINING UP "FORE" A NEW SPORT

Apologize for the lame headline, but it's been a while since I checked in under my Olympic blogging umbrella and I'm a little rusty.

Taking a breather here between travel blog entries and twitter entries (hey, there's still a newspaper to put out, too) and ran into a Bloomberg wire item about a favourite subject; golf in the Olympics. As editor of the Star's golf magazine and an avid but lousy player, it's always fun to think about what will happen with plans to get golf into the five-ring circus.

According to Bloomberg, the International Golf Federation has submitted a 76-page document to the International Olympic Committee that outlines how 60 men golfers and 60 women players would compete ina four-round, stroke-play competition to determine medal winners if golf gets the nod for the 2016 Games, which could take place in Chicago.

"Never before, in both mind and spirt, have all levels of golf around the world been so united towards a single goal," federation officials said in a statement.

A friend of mine in the Olympic movement says she's heard the pleas from golf about sportsmanship and the Olympic ideals and how golf matches up with the Olympic movement and that she's impressed. But who knows what chance they have of success.

The plan calls for the top 60 players to be based on official world golf rankings. Generally speaking, it sounds like there would be a maximum of two players per country, although the top 15-ranked players would be automatically eligible and wouldn't count under the formula.

The U.S. has five men in the top 15, while England and Sweden both have two.

The federation said the golf schedule would be fixed so that there wouldn't be a conflict in dates, which might mean having to move the British Open from late July or, more likely, the PGA Championship from its usual August date. They also said the best players in the world would be available, although it's unlikely anyone could be forced to play.

Tiger Woods has sounded a little iffy on the idea. But Canada's Mike Weir, who jumped to number 17 in the world rankings after coming second at Pebble Beach on the weekend, has appeared eager.

The last time golf was in the Olympics was in 1904 in St. Louis, when George Lyon of Toronto won the gold medal - and walked through the clubhouse on his hands to celebrate.

Also trying to get onto the agenda for 2016 are baseball, karate, roller sports, rugby sevens, squash and softball. Softball appeared to pick up a solid head of steam when the U.S. monopoly on the gold medal was broken at the Beijing Games. If softball gets back in, that would leave baseball (which is having PR problems galore of late), rugby sevens, karate, roller sports, squash and golf to battle it out. Although there's no guarantee the IOC will even vote to add two more sports in the first place.

"We are confident that our responses to the IOC questionnaire will position our sport favourably as we move into the final run of the bid process," said International Softball Federation president Don Porter.

Said International Rugby Board chief Bernard Lapasset: "Sevens is already successfully integrated in major international multi-sport events such as the Commonwealth Games, the Asian Games, the Pan American Games and the World Games and it has a proven track record of filling stadia - the Commonwealth Games 2006 Sevens tournament was attended by 150,000 over three days, second only to track and field."

IOC voters will take up the issue at a meeting in Copenhagen in October. They'll also decide at that meeting where to stage the 2016 Summer Games. The four finalists are Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo. Some guy named Obama might be pushing for Chicago, we hear. But Madrid has former IOC boss Juan Antonio Samaranch in their corner.

HOCKEY LOGO ... BLAH, BLAH, BLAH

Don't know about you, but this big fuss over what logo the Canadian hockey team wears on its uniforms strikes me as really dumb. Sure, let's be historical. But isn't the point to win the gold medal and not to worry about what Canada's team is wearing when it finally competes?

Guess I'm just not enough of a hockey guy.

ANNIKA AND JACK GO TO BAT FOR GOLF

It's a good thing when you can throw around lobbyists who don't need to use their last names.

So it is for the International Golf Federation, which is trying to elbow its way onto the Olympic stage by signing up Annika Sorenstam and Jack Nicklaus as global ambassadors.

Arguably the greatest golfers ever on both the male and female sides of the equation, Jack and Annika will be tremendous lobbyists for the sport, which faces something of an uphill battle to get onto the Olympic calendar. But Sorenstam just retired, so at least she's got time on her hands when she's not designing golf courses. Ditto for Nicklaus.

"Golf truly embodies the Olympic spirit with a foundation built upon honour, integrity, dignity and sportsmanship," Nicklaus said in a statement.

Apparently, that doesn't include Stevie Williams, Tiger Woods caddy, but there you go.

Sorenstam said she's honoured and privileged to have a role in getting golf into the Olympics.

"A major objective of mine is to help grow the game around the world, and I can think of no better way to grow it than through the Olympics."

Several sports have been lobbying members of the International Olympic Committee (gee, you think they like the attention?) to try to get into the Olympics.

The IOC voted a couple years back to dump softball and baseball. Both are trying hard to get back into the Games, with softball having the best shot given the seeming fall of American dominance at the Beijing Summer Olympics.

That would leave golf, baseball, squash, rugby sevens, roller sports (be serious, please) and karate as the main contenders for Olympic status. The IOC will meet in Copenhagen next October and appears likely to vote on including two "new" sports on the Olympic program for 2016.

The IOC consistently has said it doesn't want to include any sport that won't send its biggest names. If golf really wants to elbow its way onto the Olympic dance floor, it will need more than Annika and Jack. They'll need a Tiger.