Stop me if you’ve heard this one before – a lady walks into a bar and she hates Lance Armstrong because she’s married to his former teammate and they both think he’s a lying dick. Wait, I don’t think I told that punchline correctly. Either way, Armstrong’s whistleblower, Betsy Andreu, is back in the news because she wants more attention believes that the shamed Tour de France champion is going to use tonight’s interview with Oprah Winfrey to sway public opinion back in his favor. Because when Oprah’s minge speaks, we listen.

However, Andreu – wife of Armstrong’s former teammate and close friend, Frankie Andreu – is really feeling the need to point out the obvious.

“I do not think he will ever fully admit or take responsibility for his drug taking,” the wife of Armstrong’s former teammate and one-time friend, Frankie Andreu, told Celebuzz in an exclusive interview.

“Going on Oprah is just a way to win public sympathy for him… I think it will be more crocodile tears from Lance – he chose Oprah because she is not known for hard hitting interviews.

“My husband and I just want him to go away.” (Via Celebuzz)

Apparently they want him to go away to prison, because Betsy also added that she believes that Armstrong is deserving of a full criminal investigation. And she might be on to something here, because if Armstrong admits to Oprah and her army of Bon Bon couch warriors that he used performance-enhancing drugs as he is expected to do, he could be facing all sorts of heck. Heck, I say!

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Lance Armstrong’s former teammate Tyler Hamilton appeared on Today with Matt Lauer this morning to promote his new book “The Secret Race”, which is sadly not about Blasian females. Instead, subtitled “Inside the Hidden World of the Tour de France: Doping, Cover-ups, and Winning at All Costs”, it’s a book about his cycling career, and the only thing more boring than watching cycling is reading about it.

But Hamilton, who is a proven cheater after testing positive for PEDs three times while a member of the U.S. Postal Service team, now conveniently claims that he has the “smoking gun” when it comes to proving that Armstrong cheated just like the rest of cycling’s biggest stars. Hamilton said that he knows why Armstrong has allegedly lied for so long, because he’s an expert liar and can smell his own.

“This was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life,’’ Hamilton told Lauer Wednesday. “I lied for a long, long time. There was sort of an omerta. People really encouraged me not to speak. I planned to take this secret to the grave. There was a federal investigation, and I sat up there in front of the grand jury and told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’’

Armstrong has already released a statement about Hamilton’s new book, and the abridged version is: “How convenient.” Whatever.

Yesterday, I was listening to a stand-up comedy station on Pandora and treated to a clip from George Carlin’s 2008 TV special, “It’s Bad for Ya!”, and I was a little upset that I hadn’t thought about it when the big Lance Armstrong news broke on Aug. 23. Then again, I’m happy if I can remember last night, let alone something I watched 4 years ago. Either way, I think Carlin perfectly summed up how some people feel at this point.

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In the biggest cycling news since somebody found out you could put baseball cards in the spokes to make it sound cool, 7-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong is “subject to lifetime ban and fan fallout” for saying he was giving up his fight against the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency’s doping charges.

“There comes a point in every man’s life when he has to say, enough is enough,” Armstrong’s statement read. “For me, that time is now.”

Also on Thursday night, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency said it will strip Armstrong of his seven Tour de France titles and Travis Tygart, USADA’s chief executive, said Armstrong would be subject to a lifetime ban from the sport.

Friday on “CBS This Morning,” CBS News chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian said the original charges brought against Armstrong in June were based on “non-analytical evidence” that he used performance enhancing drugs. This evidence reportedly included testimony from several former teammates, including Tyler Hamilton who told “60 Minutes” that he frequently saw Armstrong inject “EPO,” a banned naturally occurring hormone known as a blood booster. (via CBS News)

The statement brings up a lot of unanswered questions. Does Armstrong’s figurative tap-out mean he’s guilty and can’t deal with lying anymore? If a high-profile athlete like Armstrong is stripped of his titles for doping, does that set a precedent that leads to high-profile athletes in other sports losing their championships and accolades for failing drug tests? What if they’re just one person on a team? Will Armstrong be okay living the rest of his life with a Bad News Bears-esque “we know who REALLY won those races” talking point?

The most important question is this: Do you seriously care about Lance Armstrong?

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On Saturday, Dutch cyclist Laurens ten Dam became the latest Tour de France rider to earn semi-household name status for crashing, after he took a face-first dive in Stage 14 and finished the day’s effort with a mangled grill. He not only finished the stage but he was able to bounce back and start Stage 15 the next day with no problems other than a mild inability to eat food. Unfortunately, whereas Johnny Hoogerland’s barbed wire tangle last week earned him intermediate “that’s pretty metal” status, we can’t yet afford ten Dam the same luxury.

It turns out that ten Dam has a bit of a reputation for accidents. In addition to this weekend’s spill, ten Dam missed last year’s Tour de France because of a serious accident at the 2010 Tour de Suisse, in which he broke two vertebrae, fractured his wrist and chin, and suffered a severe concussion. Only a few months before that, ten Dam crashed and injured his hip and head in the final stage of the Ruta del Sol. In 2009, ten Dam was part of a big crash at the the Vuelta a Espana race, as he injured his back but was able to continue on.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you see Laurens ten Dam riding a bike, cross the street.

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Site note: The Dugout should be back today. Restocking new computers with programs necessary to create an esoteric baseball webcomic is harder than you’d think.

Sports

The Best and Worst of the Milwaukee Brewers First Half - Miller Park Drunk apes the Best and Worst of Raw format without my permission and makes me wonder if my sports news would be best reported this way. I’m not sure I could do this about the Indians. My Best would be “everything” and my Worst would be “nothing, shut up”. [Miller Park Drunk]

The Ridiculous Argument About What Is Or Isn’t A Sport - I thought this argument ended when you left high school and didn’t have to hear teen girls defend cheerleading. Apparently somebody thinks soccer isn’t a sport because they don’t like it, which is seriously a great qualifier for adults who use words. I don’t like celery, so celery isn’t a food! It’s a mineral! [A Slice of Bacon]

The Rock Responds to John Cena - CM Punk called some people in Australia “homos” and it necessitated an apology and a formal statement of regret from WWE. A major Hollywood Disney movie star cuts a 15 minute promo about how John Cena deepthroated a bunch of dudes in college (that is also transphobic, hateful toward fat people and the abstinent, and sort of racist) and nobody gives a crap. Because he’s cool! Yay the Rock! [The Wrestling Blog]

Kevin Love & Blake Griffin Square Off in an Intense Jenga Series - I am fairly confident that I could beat both of these guys at Jenga. And “Last Word”, if they know what that is. Oh, and Scattergories. [Smoking Section]

With Leather

@Storytime with Gilbert Arenas - A free Slurpee promotion from 7/11 becomes a call for racial equality. Did you know that if you live near a bunch of other races you can’t be racist? Did you know that athletes should probably not have Twitter accounts? [With Leather]

The 82nd MLB All-Star Game in Pictures - In case you missed it (and chances are, you did) relive the majesty and wonder of a mid-season baseball game that barely matters. The pictures are really cool, at least. [With Leather]

Whoops - Watch the biggest boob moment at Fenway Park since Roger Clemens retired. [With Leather]

A Look at Tour De France Crashes - Nothing makes French bike riding more awesome than dumping the riders into a ditch and slashing them mercilessly with barbed wire. Also, please view this gallery and see what cycling does to human legs so you will NEVER CYCLE EVER. [With Leather]

Not Sports

Diablo Cody is Polishing the Evil Dead Remake Script - I’m sure this won’t end with a teen girl pretending to be Buffy the Vampire Slayer against a bunch of rapist trees at all. Chances of a “barking up the wrong tree” joke have risen to 100%. Why are we letting Suicide Girls make movies, again? [Gamma Squad]

Real Housewives of the Bible - Slightly less sacrilegious than an episode of “Superbook”. At least this one doesn’t suggest that Original Sin could’ve been prevented if a boy from the future had just properly winded his Christianity robot. [Warming Glow]

The Kid in the Clover Grill - The companion piece to any of those stories where athletes are suddenly concerned about gay marriage, Jason Fry writes about the beauty of being able to change your mind. [Jason Fry]

Tom Green Invented Planking in 1994 - … you know, in case you need any more evidence to prove what you’re doing is dumb. Ten years from now some jerk on the Internet is going to put his ass on a Swedish guy and post it online like he made it up. [Uproxx]

Ever since Lance Armstrong decided to retire from Tour de France competition, nobody in America has cared much about the biggest event in cycling, with the exception of Tom Danielson and Christian Vande Velde, but 17th and 19th place ain’t going to cut it, fellas. However, this weekend gave us a few crashes to tickle our appetites for destruction.

Yesterday, a crash in the race’s 9th stage seemingly ended the career of Alexandre Vinokourov, above, who was famously banned after testing positive for PEDs at the 2007 Tour de France. He retired shortly after that ban, but then decided in 2009 that he didn’t want his career to end that way. Instead, it has apparently ended with a broken femur. But that’s arguably better than Jurgen Van Den Broeck of Belgium, as he was also involved in yesterday’s crash and is currently in the ICU with a shattered shoulder, collapsed lung and three broken ribs.

“Jurgen needs to stay two or three more days in intensive care,” team doctor Els Lemmens told Belgian television. “We have to make sure that his breathing problems don’t get any worse. We were worried about his abdominal pain because we feared a ruptured spleen or liver but that has turned out not to be the case. Everything is under control now.” (Via Cycling News)

Meanwhile, Spain’s Juan Antonio Flecha was sideswiped by a TV car during yesterday’s stage, causing him to collide with Dutch racer Johnny Hoogerland (new favorite name – Ed.), who in turn crashed into a barbed wire fence and suffered a series of lacerations.

Images after the jump, might be a little unsafe for the easily squeamish.

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