Glow Pucks and 10-Cent Beer · the 101 Worst Ideas in Sports History by Wyshynski, Greg -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Title Page Copyright Page Epigraph Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS INTRODUCTION PART 1 - ADVENTURES IN EGOMANIA

Hulk Hogan, Thespian - Like Brando . . . Only with 24-Inch Pythons Manute Bol, Hockey God - Like a Really, Really Tall Version of Alexandre Daigle Jeff Gordon Hosts Saturday Night Live - NASCAR Star Leaves Millions Begging for Sinead O’Connor’s Return Rafael Palmeiro for Viagra - Baseball All-Star Pulls a Boner Deion Sanders Releases Prime Time - Finally, a Reason to Hammer a Railroad Spike into Your Ear

PART 2 - STRIKEOUTS AND ERRORS

The Legalized Spitball - “He should be in the Hall of Fame with a tube of KY Jelly attached to his plaque.” Randy Johnson Nicknamed the “Big Unit” - What? . . . Was the “Split-Fingered Schvantz” Already Taken? Impersonating the Other Team’s Manager - The “Prince of Pranks” Strikes Out Marge Schott Remains Owner of the Reds - Call It the “Pennant Racism” Umpires’ Ever-Changing Strike Zone - Killing the Ump Would Only Make Him Stronger Replacing Gum with a $264K Jersey - After Bust, Baseball Card Makers Go Bonkers Letting Batters Call Their Own Pitches - AKA Really, Really, Really Shrinking the Strike Zone The White Shorts - Veeck Dresses Chicago in Bermuda Giving Steve Howe an Eighth Chance - “She Don’t Lie, She Don’t Lie, She Don’t Lie . . . Cocaine” Aluminum Bats - Allowing College Middle Infielders to Hit .750 since 1970 San Francisco’s Crazy Crab - A Claws for Concern by the Bay Nearly Every Thought That Escaped Charlie O. Finley’s Head - He Put the “O” in “Crazy”

PART 3 - MORONIC MEDIA

TV Timeouts - We’ll Be Back in a Moment Brian Dennehy Does the “General” - ESPN Has a Bad Knight The Heidi Game - A Decision as Cold as the Alps Subjective Lists about Sports - Hey! Who Put This on the List? Miller, Fouts Join Monday Night Football - “Like the Eagles munching on Prometheus’s liver at Mount Caucasus, babe . . .” Pay-Per-View Boxing - A Bigger Mess Than Don King’s Hair after Skydiving

PART 4 - SHANKS. DUFFS, AND SLICES

Fantasy Golf - The Fantasy? That It Isn’t Insipid and Tedious Regulating Golf Courses, Not Equipment - Diff’rent Strokes Rule Their World, Yes They Do . . . The Battle at Bighorn - What’s Worse Than Bad Golf? Exhibition Bad Golf!

PART 5 - STADI-DUMBS

The Retirement of Nos. 42 and 99 - Baseball and Hockey Make a Numerical Blunder Warm-Weather Super Bowls - Meteorological Class Warfare Variable Pricing - As If a $9 Beer Wasn’t Enough of a Rip-Off Grass in the Astrodome - Like Building a Farm in a Broom Closet Personal Seat Licenses - The Frivolous Expenditure So Nice, You Pay for It Twice! The Death of Organ Music - Turn That %#$% Down! Nobody Night - Baseball in Front of Empty Seats—No, the Marlins Aren’t Playing

PART 6 - DOUBLE DRIBBLES AND AIR BALLS

The Draft Lottery - Last-Place Teams Screwed by Ping-Pong Balls The College Three-Point Shot - Killing the Transition Game since 1986 Alternating Possession - Who Really Wants the Excitement of a Jump Ball? High School Players in the NBA - Should Teams Have to Include Diapers in Their Budgets? The Field of 65 - Suddenly, the NIT Champ Is the 66th Best Team in America The American Basketball League - Turns Out That Two Women’s Leagues Were One Too Many Five-Game Playoffs in the NBA - Hey Gang . . . Let’s Punish Success, Shall We? Allowing the Clippers to Draft Anyone - Los Angeles Has Some Huge Busts

PART 7 - LIARS!

Rosie Ruiz “Wins” the Marathon - Cheaters Never Prosper . . . Unless They Get Caught Tom Lockhart Reports Fake Games - League Promoter Turns into Fiction Writer Lying on Your Coaching Resume - What Do You Mean by “Checking My References”? Letting Pete Rose into Cooperstown - What Are the Odds of That?

PART 8 - SOCCER SUCKAGE

Mutiny in the Name of Victory - When Scoring into Your Own Net Is Actually Encouraged MLS in the Sunshine State - Futbol Es No Muy Bueno en Florida

PART 9 - PUCKING IDIOTS

In the Crease, on the Video - Instant Replay Robs the Sabres The Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, - The NHL Goes Quackers The Islanders Go Gorton’s - Four Cups . . . Apparently Just for Tartar Sauce Roller Hockey International - A Dumber Version of Roller Derby Drafting a Player Who Doesn’t Exist - The Buffalo Sabres Get Creative Attack of the Third Jerseys - Making a Quick Buck through Fashion Disasters

PART 10 - OLYMPIC ABOMINATIONS

Awarding the Olympics to the Kaiser - International Olympic Committee Misjudges the Healing Power of the High Jump Olympic Snowboarding - Dude . . . Seriously? Reebok’s “Dan and Dave” - Did Hype Harm American Track? Clubbing Nancy Kerrigan, - Whyyyyy!? Whyyyyy!? Whyyyyy . . . Us?

PART 11 - AWFUL INNOVATIONS

The World Bodybuilding Federation - Muscles, Self-Tanner, and Complete Disaster Drug-Testing Policies - The No. 1 Reason Why Keith Richards Learned to Play Guitar The Black-Jersey Trend - Never Bet on Black Tchoukball - Gesundheit! Slot Machines Meet Horse Racing - The Sport of Kings Takes a Gamble

PART 12 - FOOTBALL FUMBLES

The Tuck Rule - First Recorded Instance of Pirates Getting Raped, Pillaged College Bowl Sponsorship - Presented by Tampax NFL Crowd-Noise Rule - Shhhhh . . . Someone’s Playing Professional Football Canadian Football Invades America - A Bad-Tasting Import Mixing Santa with Philly Fans - Ho, Ho, Ho . . . ly Crap The Premature Death of the XFL - Made Jesse Ventura into John Madden for a Season NFL Achievement Streaks - Ironmen Don’t Need Vacation Days St. Louis Cardinals Move to Arizona - Worst Thing to Hit the Desert since Ishtar Using Sharp Objects for Pregame Motivation - Aren’t Players Usually Worried about Getting Cut? The Rooney Rule - Action? Affirmative The Onside Kick Do-Over - When Did the NFL Become a Charity? The USFL’s Trump Card - The Donald Helps Bust the NFL’s Rival The Pro Bowl - Just Another Excuse for Pro Athletes to Get Lei-ed The Bowl Championship Series - Makes HAL 9000 Look like Pollyanna

PART 13 - THE TOP 25 WORST IDEAS IN SPORTS HISTORY

Turning the MVP into the Best Player Award - When the Numbers Just Don’t Add Up The XFL - Misunderstood Genius . . . but Also an Unmitigated Disaster Whatizit! - Whatwasit? Crap White Broadcasters on Black Athletes - All the Racial Sensitivity of a Lynch Mob

Howard Cosell, Monday Night Football, 1983 Jimmy the “Greek” Snyder, 1988 David Halberstam, Miami Heat Radio Play-by-Play, 1997 Rush Limbaugh, ESPN NFL Sunday Countdown, 2003

Maz Is Elected to Cooperstown - The Bar Is Lowered to Limbo Levels The Night the Lights Went on at Wrigley - Sung to the Tune of “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia,” by Vicki “Mama’s Family” Lawrence Michael Jordan’s Career Choices - In Baseball and D.C., No One Wanted to Be like Mike Overexpansion in the 1990s - A Case of Too Much, Too Soon, and Too Bad

National Hockey League Major League Baseball National Basketball Association

Sideline Reporters - Nice Blazer . . . Now Please Shut Up The 1994 Baseball Strike - One Strike . . . and the Fans Were Out Celebrity Nonsingers Tackling the National Anthem - Oh, Say Can You Suck? The One-Player Panacea - Going for Broke and Achieving It Tie Games - Tie Goes to the Bummer Asterisks* - *That Thing to the Left of This Sentence The Olympics TripleCast - Three Channels . . . One for Each Subscriber 10-Cent Beer Night - “No beer and no TV make Homer something something.” The Designated Hitter - Depriving the World of Hundreds of David Wells At Bats Disco Demolition Night - “When you lose control and you got no soul / It’s tragedy.” Artificial Turf - The Grass Is Always Greener When It’s Fake The Glow Puck - FOX’s Unfair Change Leaves Fans Unbalanced The Bronze Medal - From Ancient Greece to Nagano, a Symbol of Futility Selling Your Legend - Paying the Price for Greed The Coin Toss - There’s a 50-50 Chance I’m Right on This Instant-Replay Abuse - After Further Review . . . The Overtime Shootout - Undermines Every Facet of the Game in an Exciting Way

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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