Given Barack Obama’s well-known weaknesses among downscale white men, his campaign seems to be trying to use sports to help him appear to be more of a regular guy. In addition to playing more basketball on the campaign trail (he’s reportedly pretty good), Obama appeared on a local sports talk station this morning here in the Triangle and did an interview almost exclusively about sports — UNC basketball, the White Sox, the Bears, etc. It’s a good bet that he’s doing more of these sorts of appearances across the board.

Update 4/30 10:02 AM: Obama was also scheduled to appear on the podcast of ESPN’s Bill Simmons but the company made a decision not to feature either candidate during the primaries.

Update 4/30 1:59 PM: Along the same lines, here’s Obama trying to take Tyler Hansborough to the hole in a pickup game at UNC yesterday morning: