Pyle of List

For some reason, ABC/ESPN decided to curse the OSU-USC matchup this past weekend by giving it a name that made it sound like an independent wrestling PPV. Naming a regular season matchup is never a good idea, not to mention “Collision at the Coliseum” was as lame a name as possible. Must’ve taken them 2 minutes of thought to come up with that one. Anyway as nearly everyone predicted, the game was an absolute romp not deserving of a title except for maybe “Buckeye ‘Barassment”. Nothing on the field justified the countless hours of unnecessary coverage bestowed upon this blowout, which allows the OSU-USC game to officially join the following group of overhyped events in sports:

David Beckham in the US - Check me. I’m American and I hate Soccer. Maybe that’s a terrible opinion to have based on 25 minutes of watching an MLS game 2 years ago but alas it’s mine. But the fellas at MLS and the David Beckham (and probably Victoria) got their heads together and came up with the perfect solution. Bring an aging, overhyped star into America and turn a country’s indifference into the top story on ESPN. Beckham even wore the jersey number 23 so we would all get that he was the Jordan of soccer. And it worked, kinda. Sportscenter jumped at the chance to hype Beckham’s move to LA of course. (What the New York Red Bulls didn’t need the exposure?) But the 2007 season produced very poor league numbers for Beckham and soccer has yet to become America’s new sports passion. Although it’s pushing the Competitive Eating and Texas Hold’em leagues for TV time. So who knows?

Dual Threat QBs Revolutionizing the NFL

After Mike Vick won that frigid playoff game in Green Bay during the 2003 playoffs, every talking head pronounced the “new era” of quarterbacking in the NFL was here. Running QBs were going to change the game as we knew it. Old timers like Dan Marino and Boomer Esiason bristled at the statements that the pocket quarterback was going the way of the dodo. Well, here we are six years later and there’s not much that has changed. The best quarterbacks in the league are still pocket passers. Even Donovan McNabb realized that he’d be more effective if he quit dancing around and committed to looking off defenders and checking down his receivers. Tim Tebow will figure this out once he gets to the NFL. This season, we’ve also seen the continued tailspin of Vince Young, but we’ll talk more about that in a few paragraphs. (Note: I’m not discounting quarterbacks that are mobile in the pocket. This is about the guys that look at one receiver and then take off for the first down.)

These guys are totally flaming!

Inferno Match: Undertaker v. Kane - I remember this like it was yesterday. I was in high school, and an avid pro wrestling fan. One Monday Night Raw, they promoted Undertaker and Kane fighting in the first Inferno Match. The match only ended when one combatant was set on fire. On fire! I’d only heard about these kinds of things happening in underground Japanese videos that were passed around amongst the truly hardcore wrestling fan. Then the WWF went and crapped on my dreams. The guys never got near the fire until the end of the match, when ‘Taker lifts Kane’s foot up and sets it on fire. Guys with extinguishers jump out immediately and put it out. Two hours of build up for a five minute crappy match.

Dan-Dave Decathalon Debacle

For some reason in the early 1990’s, serialized commercials with gigantic budgets and drawn out plots were all the rage. Michael Jackson had one for Taco Bell that ran throughout the AMA’s, Bird & Magic had the McDonald’s HORSE commericals (eventually involving Michael Jordan) and Reebok had Dan & Dave. At the height of the Pumps’ popularity and in the lead up to the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, Decathletes Dan O’Brien and Dave Johnson became household names with their popular ongoing ad designed to culminate at their showdown for the gold medal. Only Dave forgot to qualify and Dan stunk up the joint. Oops! I’m totally convinced this was a setback in the shoe wars that Reebok has never overcome.

Glacier’s WCW Debut

The more you hype up a wrestler, the more they seem destined to fail. In fact, there probably is a direct correlation of hype to suck that’s not positive. But WCW was hellbent on changing that with its most ambitious push ever. It seemed like the cryptic ads ran for more than a year before we found anything out (what does “Blood Runs Cold” mean?). Eventually, the day for this life-changing phenomenon was upon us and expectations were incredibly high. Then we actually watched Glacier wrestle and were instantly disappointed. His finishing move was a kick! Sure, the intro was impressive, but Glacier is likely to go down as the biggest flop in pro wrestling history.

Fight, fight fight…

Mike Tyson’s Comeback Fight - Yeah, this is just what I wanted to do, spend 100 bucks or so for a minute and half of punching. Nowadays I can get this kinda action for free on the internets. We waited six years. Six, long, hard years while Tyson sat in jail. I had visions of Iron Mike just sitting there, seething day in and day out, waiting for the day he could punch somebody’s face in. Then that day came: Don King set up the fight with Peter McNeely who actually looked impressive at the time (36-1). Then, in the blink of an eye (and two knockdowns in the first round) it was over. McNeely’s corner threw in the towel at the 89 second mark, and we were all left wondering what had happened.

The XFL

Oh NBC, what a horrible investment that turned out to be. This abomination debuted during my freshman year of college. LA’s team was called the Xtreme and they played home games in the Coliseum. Apparently, they won the league championship (thanks Wikipedia!). It was marketed as an off season complement to the NFL. It failed miserably. Remember the “opening scramble” which replaced the coin toss? One guy suffered a season-ending injury in the opening weekend of the season trying to earn possession for his team. Good idea! Also, Tommy “Mad Dog” Maddox was the league’s MVP! When you’re league MVP moonlights as a statue, you’ve got problems. The one lasting, good thing that the XFL brought to us is the “sky cam” that is still in use today by the NFL and college football. Sky Cam rules! Oh yeah, and skankier cheerleaders.

Sammy Sosa’s Bat Autopsy on ESPN - Surely a stand up guy like Slammin’ Sammy Sosa wouldn’t have cheated to hit any of his 600+ home runs. But he did accidently pick up a corked bat in 2003 and was unfortunate enough to have it explode the one and only time he ever made that mistake. And ESPN, desperate for a scandal jumped at the story. In the following 2 days we got “Outside the Lines” with opinions from every baseball expert the four letter network could find culminating with a live autopsy of bats Sosa had sent to the Hall of Fame. In a truly Geraldo-opens-Al-Capone’s-secret-vault moment ESPN cut open the bats to revel….drum roll……..nothing. Many have pointed to this little escapade as proof that Sammy is a stand up guy that made a one time mistake. Others realize that it only proves the Sammy isn’t dumb enough to send corked bats to the Hall of Fame with his name on them…accidentally or otherwise.

The good ‘ol days.

The Return of American Gladiators - As an 11 year old I got the OK from Mom and Dad to stay up really late on Saturday nights because American Gladiators came on at midnight. I would camp out in the living room and wade through SNL and televangelists to get to the highlight of my weekend. And I still remember the Gladiators; Gemini, Nitro, Turbo and the rest taking on some no name wannabe weekend warriors in Atlas and Joust. So when I heard that NBC was bringing the Gladiators back I was stoked. But in the reality TV world we live in we no longer get to watch no name wannabes. Everybody needs to milk their 15 minutes of fame and get their whole teary eyed story out there for the world. And the full hour of athletic competition was drained of it’s fun by 40 minutes of Dr. Phil-like vintages of the challengers struggles to get here and “sideline” interviews with everyone by the mellow, easygoing Hulk Hogan and super interesting Tatiana Ali. In the end, an episode of the new incarnation has less action worth watching than your average episode of “The Office” and is absolutely unbearable without DVR.

The 2006 NFL Draft Class

Reggie Bush! Vince Young! Matt Leinart! Vernon Davis! All top-10 picks in 2006. Reggie Bush is the poster boy for the current dearth of every down running backs. Vince Young is having…issues. And, he’s never put up impressive numbers since that Rose Bowl game. Matt Leinart thinks he’s still in college. I truly believe that he is one of the few college players that would have had a better pro career if he had opted for the draft with a year of college eligibility left. He wouldn’t have spent that final year living like a gossip rag celebrity for 12 months while being interrupted for a football game once a week. Vernon Davis…well, his problems could be attributed to having Tiny Tim as his quarterback. VD was supposed to be a freak of nature that no one could cover. I am an unabashed 49er fan. I can tell you first hand, he’s not a freak. He’s a disappointment.

I would rather be on fire than watch this

Sebastian Telfair - Chalk another one up to the ESPN hype machine. They ran ads for the “movie” about Telfair’s life (Through the Fire) non-stop leading up to it’s premier. Too bad no one told them Telfair wasn’t that good at basketball. I get it.  He’s Starbury’s cousin and “the next big thing to come out of high school”.  But the way he was shoved down our throats, he was doomed from the start.

Fox’s Celebrity Boxing

The idea of celebrities beating the bejesus out of each other is a fantastic idea. And the marketing team at Fox knew this would appeal to virtually everyone in America, so they launched a subtle and tasteful ad campaign. Just kidding, they sleazed it up as much as possible and ran commercials non-stop for several weeks leading up to the event. When the day finally arrived, it was anything but glorious and turned out to be a shameful spectacle of the highest order. Watching a roided up Danny Bonaduce beat the snot out of Greg Brady seemed like a good idea, but turned out to be more depressing than one could imagine. Watching washed up celebs take a beating for a pay check is about one step above prostitution on the hierarchy of disgrace.