I don't want to make too big a deal out of one response to a tweet that's been retweeted more than 11,000 times, but I'm going to do it anyway, in the spirit of the London Olympics. Here's your guide to the 2012 Olympics backlash toward Michael Phelps, who was simply too successful in 2008 to be popular again in 2012:

Shutup bitch you got whored RT @MichaelPhelps Congrats to @ryanlochte ... Way to keep that title in the country where it belongs!!

— Sloppy Joe (@RabbiJoeKo) July 28, 2012

Well, okay. Michael Phelps's career in the spotlight hasn't been perfect, but for a guy who might have had the highest peak of anybody in his field and did it as a 23-year-old—well, he handled it all right. Certainly well enough, you would think, to not get hammered so relentlessly for failing to beat a guy who'd beaten him already in the last year.

But that's the problem with looking superhuman, even for a while—once you prove to be fallible, you're going to get killed for it. Let the Michael Phelps backlash begin.

Unless he wins again. Then people will probably turn on Ryan Lochte.