(Photo courtesy of Fight Magazine)

If you thought Frank Mir‘s apology on UFC.com for his remarks about Brock Lesnar didn’t sound like it came entirely from a place of sorrow deep within his heart, congratulations, you’re a tough one to fool.  I spoke with Mir yesterday for this SI.com column and he confirmed that, even after he was called in to the UFC offices and chided for the comment, he still didn’t really understand what the big deal was:

"When I got called in and they told me, ‘Listen man, this is an issue,’ I kind of had a smirk on my face the whole time," says Mir, who was quoted in a public apology for the remark on the UFC’s Web site earlier this week. "I was like, you’re kidding, right? This is a joke, right? I’ve heard people say that this is to the death. I’ve heard people say about an opponent, ‘I’m going to kill him.’ I heard Brock say he was going to put his hand up my rear end to pull out a horseshoe. I didn’t hear anyone get too upset about that."

Mir said he genuinely tried to understand what people were so upset about, and even took to the internet to try and find out what fans were saying.  Still, he remains unconvinced that it was really such a big deal:

"No one’s been able to explain it to me yet," Mir says. "I thought we understood that what we say on camera is part of the entertainment aspect of our sport and we kind of get a little artistic license. It’s not like I said this to my neighbor, that if his dog shows up in my yard one more time I’m going to kill him. That would be bad. That’s a problem. I didn’t understand it, but hey, it came my way, I said it, and I can’t cry about it now. I’ve just got to deal with it, I guess."

This whole situation was blown even more out of proportion when a website quoted Shane Carwin as saying that anyone who would make a comment like Mir’s must be "either a terrible person or mentally unfit to fight," which prompted Carwin to clarify the comment on his own website and take a shot at the media in general (but we’re still cool, right Shane? please God, we can’t take another beef with "Hulk Hands").

As if that wasn’t enough fuel thrown on the fire, Lesnar’s camp reportedly fired back at Mir, threatening that he "may never be able to fight again after the third fight is over."

So, to recap what we’ve learned:

- Threatening a very specific type of death will get you in trouble with the UFC.

- Threatening general "murder" or simply saying something to the effect of ‘I’m going to kill that guy,’ is perfectly fine.

- Threatening to render your opponent incapable of competing ever again, that’s also cool.

- Don’t even let Shane Carwin think you’re taking his quotes out of context, or there’ll be hell to pay.

Yeah, that about sums it up…for now.