The 50 Worst Sports Ideas Ever

Washington Times ^ | April 25, 2002 | Patrick Hruby

[L.N. Smithee]

Like leisure suits and the Ford Pinto, it was an idea to suit its era.

Which is to say, surpassingly ill-conceived. On a warm summer evening in 1974, the attendance-starved Cleveland Indians held their first

[Born on the Storm King]

How about the offsides penalty in soccer? I always wanted to get a local high school basketball team to play a game usinmg the offsides penalty to prove how boring soccer is, e.g., He's running for a fast break---OFFSIDES!"

[ABG(anybody but Gore)]

What? Who had the number 1 pick?

I think the Rockets took Hakeem with the #1 that year.

[ABG(anybody but Gore)]

Televising the NFL Draft

While I agree that snails move at a faster pace than the first round, where else can you see the Bengals annual screwing of the pooch, or Mike Ditka make a complete ass of himself by trading his entire draft for Ricky Williams, then sporting dreadlocks?

[Vigilantcitizen]

Celebrations: To me, what has made watching the NFL almost the equivilant of watching WWF. Note to players; there have been THOUSANDS before you that have made hard tackles, interceptions, 80 yard runs for touchdowns, etc...So please do us all a favor, and do away with the choreographed dance routines after a simple pulling guard play has been executed.

NFL referees: Some ref's seem to think we tune in just to see the yellow hankees go a flying. Get over yourselves. We tune in to watch football, not 45 flags over phantom holding and pass interference calls.

The NFL could save money by using local high school ref's, (which do a superb job here in Georgia,IMHO), who would probably be a lot less concerned with getting their ugly mugs on tv.

Same with some baseball umps. There are more good umps than football refs, but there are some who make blatantly bad calls, with consistency.

The officials are there to make sure the game is played according to the rules, but some seem to want to affect the outcome of the game. Which screws the players, and the fans.

[skateman]

And your point is..................?

[Maceman]

And the #1 Worst Sports Idea EVER (drum roll):

Sports talk radio.

[L.N. Smithee]

And your point is..................?

Well...my memory about that incident was jogged since Smith was one of the faves of the teenyboppers. It sticks out in my mind because Smith was never mentioned among the heartthrobs of the game at that time, or even among the best-looking guys on the Astros (believe it or not, Seventeen magazine once said Rick Honeycutt was a hottie). But hey, what do I know? I have never been a teenage girl.

I decided not to say anything about Scuffy Smith specifically when telling that story to avoid the appearance of unfair, unprovable, and unwarranted accusations, but you asked.

[AmishDude]

Boston trading Babe Ruth

Low on funds, Red Sox owner and theater producer Harry Frazee sold the Bambino to the New York Yankees in late 1919 for $125,000 in cash and a $300,000 loan.

Trivia note: He used the cash to finance the show No, No, Nanette!

[Cyber Liberty]

"The Arizona Cardinals"

Har! Nice to see he feels my pain.

"Andre Rison giving Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes the keys to his pad"

Probably in poor taste since she croaked in a car crash last night....

[discostu]

All I can say is: we are not worthy. Knowing your sports is one thing, but being able to rattle of a thumbnail history of baseball mascots?! You are a true sports fanatic. All must bow to you.

[L.N. Smithee]

On the bright side: Not even the San Francisco Crab ever defecated on the field. (Finley's habit was to parade Charlie O. around the visiting dugout - particularly after the big donkey had just eaten a rather heavy meal.)

Finley was such a skinflint, it's hard to believe he fed the donkey.

[L.N. Smithee]

Knowing your sports is one thing, but being able to rattle of a thumbnail history of baseball mascots?! You are a true sports fanatic. All must bow to you.

It's not so much that I am a fanatic as much as I always enjoyed The Chicken and The Phanatic (his incident with Tommy Lasorda is an all-time classic). I once considered being a mascot myself, but I don't have the dedication of Giannoulas or Raymond.

[Chemist_Geek]

I thought there would be a riot in Hockeytown USA, over that damn thing, but then our friends in Windsor had CBC, and the Wings were usually on UPN 50 or Fox Sports Net(then PASS Sports).

Half of Detroit watches hockey on CBC unless the local Wings announcers are on, and for national coverage, usually Detroit(and other Michigan homes with CBC) tunes in to CBC, if nothing else because of Don Cherry.

What got me was that there was a poll(by FOX) that said that Americans liked "Foxtrax". The Hockey News poll said that 90% hated it.

You've hit the nail on the head. We didn't care about that silly contrail, because we didn't see it on Hockey Night In Canada. Nowadays, I watch WKBD because I can't get CBC on the satellite and I'm spoiled by said satellite's picture quality.

As far as the poll goes, I'm sure it's one of those "registered-voters" vs. "likely-voters" poll population effect thingies...

[Chemist_Geek]

OBTW: I thought that actually being able to do the FoxTrak was cleverer than the idea of it... You know, hard to implement, but dang if they didn't figure out a way!

[RayChuang88]

In fact, I remember it was a nationally-televised game on ABC in 1984 that annoyed so many people--including those at the NCAA headquarters--that it finally forced the introduction of the 45-second shot clock in the 1985-86 season.

[Slip18]

" Disco Demolition Night"

Weren't you at the Disco Demolition Night in Chicago?

[Cyber Liberty]

I watched it on the Telly. I do remember telling you about it. Steve Dahl.