To paraphrase a well-known Liverpudlian, we never said we were more popular than Michel Bergeron.
It might even be true factually, in the way that the Beatles were, in fact, bigger than Jesus for a shiny moment in the 1960s (and the Lowest of the Low, our favourite band, were bigger than Bruno Gerussi, as they once intimated in a spoof of the Fab Four's famous press conference).
But we would never dream of actually say so, humility being a core value here at French Immersion PLC - along with fecklessness and thrift, of course.
The Ultimate Fighting Championship, of course, has a slightly different view of the world.
Take UFC president Dana White, who put the 'hype' back into 'hyperbole.'
White recently and frequently suggested that UFC welterweight champeen Georges St-Pierre, or GSP as he is known to his devotees, is more famous than Wayne Gretzky.
"It's true. Get over it, Canada," he said.
We reckon Oor Dana is answering a question that isn't being posed - and it's a debatable point, given the Great One's popularity at his zenith.
Perhaps it would be more appropriate to ask whether GSP is as popular globally as, say, Steve Nash. Or the most famous of all Canadian-born athletes, Owen Hargreaves (when you've suited up for Bayern in a Champion's League final, Man U, and England at the World Cup, you are way, way bigger than any fighter not named Manny Pacquiao - even if you haven't played in almost two years.)
And while St-Pierre is a household name in Thailand and parts of the U.S., he admits the adulation doesn't generally extend to his home province.
"People are used to seeing me around, having lunch at the restaurant . . . I'm more popular in English Canada. And in the Philippines, it's crazy, the craziest I've ever seen," St-Pierre said last week.
The Gretzky comparison seems to make St-Pierre slightly uncomfortable ("he was my idol," he said), although he did allow that he would love to do as much for his sport as the skinny kid from Brantford did for the NHL.
St-Pierre can perhaps best be described as the new Jacques Villeneuve - well-known and beloved at home, but a star that burns much more brightly abroad.
Indeed, a decidedly unscientific survey of those sporting St-Pierre paraphernalia and placards (like 'GSP: Muhammad Ali of UFC') suggests a healthy proportion of those who were in the Bell Centre to cheer him on are from away, places like New Hampshire, Connecticut, Ontario and British Columbia.
That doesn't mean the joint wasn't deafness-inducing when he walked in for his title fight against the cartoonish Josh Koscheck.
It was probably as loud as game seven of the Habs/Caps series last year - in fact the only time FI's sensitive ears can recall a louder din in the Bell Centre is when St-Pierre made his first appearance on a home stage, in 2008.
It was the first UFC card in Canada, and St-Pierre mauled Matt Serra in an atmosphere that seemed more feverish and electric than this year's main event.
Mixed martial arts has grown in leaps and bounds since then - and its fans are a brand new kind of rabid - particularly in this fair country and our little distinct society within it.
But it would be an overstatement, of the type White specializes in, to compare the popularity of the sport here with the personal popularity St-Pierre enjoys.
And even then, in Quebec that probably equals about 0.25 of a Gionta, Price, Cammalleri or Subban.
Let alone a full Gretzky.