BASEBALL: It's a move that will undoubtedly make baseball purists in the United States howl in pain. The sport's international federation recently changed the rules of the game for next month's Olympic tournament: if the score is tied at the end of 10 innings, the manager of the team at bat will reset the lineup in the 11th to whatever point he pleases, and put the previous batsmen on first and second bases. It's a speedup rule that's been enacted in softball for that sport's extra innings, and may be in place at next year's World Baseball Classic, an IBAF-sanctioned event.

BADMINTON: Folks in the shuttlecock-crazy East will be chewing over a much different rule change: one out of eight linesmen will be imported at next month's Olympic tournament. The IWF generally takes its officials from a local pool, giving home athletes a tremendous advantage and the sport a growing credibility problem. With a record 50 nations competing, badminton's putting its best face forward.

SWIMMING: Jessica Hardy, the American sprint swimmer whose recent A and B drug test samples came back positive for clenbuterol, is taking her case to the public before an arbitration hearing next week. And then there's Tara Kirk, the swimmer who finished third at the U.S. trials in the 100-meter breaststroke behind Hardy by just .01 of a second. Even if Hardy is not allowed to go to Beijing, the deadline for submitting team rosters was last Monday... Kirk wouldn't go either.

Reuters examines the misunderstood sport of synchronized swimming, discussing 50-hour training weeks with a few Beijing medal hopefuls. Synchronized swimmers hold their breaths for minutes on end in competition, and undoubtedly don't shed tears when fat, snarky American sports columnists belittle their efforts.

EQUESTRIAN: In an international convoy that fascinates this blog to no end, the 297 horses competing in the jumping, dressage and three-day events are in the first leg of a global migration to Hong Kong. German agency Peden Bloodstock is responsible for the safe passage of all four-legged Olympians.

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Iraq, banned from the 2008 Games for replacing its Olympic committee with bureaucrats, is in talks to restore its place at the Games. Its hardline stance about its NOC and a lawsuit against the IOC makes that unlikely, however. The likely wrapup to this issue, in this blog's opinion, is that the IOC will allow the five Iraqi athletes to compete as Independent Olympic Participants (IOP). There's plenty of precedence for this: Yugoslavians took part in 1992 despite U.N. sanctions on their country at the time.

In the iconic French sports magazine L'Equipe, IOC president Jacques Rogge made as close to as statement as he's going to make about the Chinese government's human rights record.

"Reasons of State (raison d'Etat) forbids me to express myself in detail on that subject. I have to be careful about what I do and what I say. I am at the head of an organization. My duty is to make the Olympics a success and let the athletes express themselves freely. I am criticized. And I answer that I am ready to take blows in order to protect the athletes. In view of my responsibilities, I have lost some of my freedom of speech."

Meanwhile, in China...

A separatist group of ethnic Uighur Muslims in China's far west called the Turkestan Islamic Party claimed responsibility for this week's bus attacks in Kunming, and threatened to strike the Olympics using "tactics that have never been employed". The Chinese government, however, doesn't believe them.

The British Guardian has a fancy interactive map of the Olympic venues.

Migrant workers who helped build many of those Olympic venues in Beijing are now being asked to leave town by the local government.

This definitely rates a "wow." At Grand Century Place in Hong Kong, there's a display of 2008 Olympic venues made out of Legos. Check out Lego Watercube.

(Photo © Icon SMI)