Remember Zach Houchins? He’s the Nationals draft pick who, after being selected in the 15th round by the team, had to delete his Twitter account after posting some revoltingly vulgar racial epithets to his long-since-deleted Twitter account.

UPDATE: Kilgore spoke with Houchins this afternoon. “Whether people think it or not, I’m not racist,” Houchins told the reporter. “I’m not a bigot. I’ve had a black guy live with me for four years.”

Take one name off the list of Olympic athletes with ties to the D.C. area. The Associated Press via ESPN.com is reporting that 20-year-old boxer Gary Russell Jr., who was born right here in D.C. and lives in Capitol Heights, Md., collapsed in Beijing while trying to make weight, and will no longer be competing in the Olympic games. Russell, who was not hospitalized, collapsed while running. He had been trying to drop from 125…

The 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing are less than two weeks away, and we’re definitely starting to feel some Olympic fever. We know we’re just supposed to blindly support anyone representing Team USA No Matter What, but are there any local athletes to whom we can throw a little extra love? (Baltimore doesn’t count). A quick perusal of of the USOC athlete roster says, why yes! Keep in mind, a lot of Team USA still…