WE wish we could enjoy the Olympics the way they want us to. You know, like two of those Seven Dwarves, Happy and Stupid.

* Gymnast Paul Hamm blew both his opportunity to become the biggest hero – even bigger than Michael Phelps – among U.S. Olympians, and his shot at immortality. All he had to do is say, “I don’t want this gold medal; I didn’t earn it. I won only due to a scoring mistake. My Korean opponent won it. It’s his. I won the silver.” But he didn’t.

* Saturday, the official Website of the 2004 Games reported, “Thousands of spectators from all over the world have overflowed Athens’ Olympic Stadium [to watch track and field events.]”

They must’ve overflowed into one section, then sat on one another’s laps, because throughout virtually all of NBC’s weekend coverage from that stadium included the sight of thousands of empty seats.

That same official Olympics site also noted that, “With such a high selling rate, tickets to the Athens 2004 Games are already hard to find.” That explains the empty seats – the people who bought tickets misplaced them.

* Last week, NBC News presented an upbeat feature about how ex-Olympic swimmer Janet Evans, among others, is trying to encourage sportsmanlike conduct among U.S. Olympians. Although NBC didn’t make an issue of it then, many U.S. athletes behaved like preening punks four years ago in Sydney.

Saturday, NBC aired a promotional feature about Maurice Greene, who, as he did in Sydney, came across as a showboating braggart. A bit earlier, sprinter Shawn Crawford did a check-me-out number after winning his qualifier. NBC even saw fit to replay part of it. NBC’s Bob Neumeier concluded that Crawford is “passionate.”

* The weekend’s most riveting Olympic feature was not on NBC but within Saturday’s ABC News. Reported by ESPN’s Andrea Kremer, it was about U.S. synchronized swimmer Tammy Crow, who pleaded no contest to double vehicular manslaughter and was sentenced to serve 90 days after the Olympics. The parents of one of Crow’s victims were not pleased.

WFAN’s Sid Rosenberg wants it both ways. He wants to serve as Don Imus’ high-profile low-life while advancing a career as a credible sportscaster.

College Sports TV, a network with increased clearance throughout the country, has let Rosenberg know that he’s out. CSTV could no longer indulge his obligatory shock act on the Imus show – he recently called the U.S. women’s Olympic soccer team a bunch of “juiced-up dikes” – without it reflecting on the network.

Rosenberg had become a regular on CSTV studio shows. And a liability. He might’ve chosen to clean up his Imus act in service to his sportscasting career. But he wanted it both ways.

*

ESPN’s Joe Theismann, on Saturday’s Jets-Colts, was in midseason form. When a flag flew in the Jets’ backfield, he resolutely identified it as a flag for holding, as if he’d seen the infraction. Bad guess. Turns out, it was a hands-to-the-face call. But we weren’t supposed to notice.

ESPN’s stakes race coverage from Saratoga on Saturday was lost to a six-inning, 18-7 Little League World Series game that ran nearly three hours . . . Kingston, N.Y.’s WRNN, carried by most area cable systems, will again televise four Army football games, including Nov. 6 vs. Air Force.

Tales From the Gypped: Last Sunday, as the PGA Championship headed for a three-man, three-hole playoff, Denver’s CBS affiliate, KCNC, bolted in favor of the Broncos’ preseason pregame show.

Team Players: What an age we live in. ABC’s John Madden and Fox’s Howie Long and Terry Bradshaw – all paid a fortune by their networks – now appear in commercials for Sirius radio. Correct me if I’m wrong, but if you’re tuned to Sirius, it’s unlikely that you’ll be watching ABC or Fox.