Who Cares?:Most Overrated Sporting Events

We’ve all been there; sitting on the couch watching Sportscenter for the Dodger game highlights, when you become bombarded by information regarding a sporting event that, quite frankly, you just don’t care too much about. But like an annoying child, it just keeps on annoying you so eventually have to watch it jump into the pool. ‘Watch this! Watch this!’ indeed. Here is our list of the most annoying children of the sports world. Enjoy!

“Bitch!”

Westminister Dog Show

This started out as a group of hunters who wanted to get together and compare their dogs, which could have been mildly interesting, but has become the premier beauty contest of dogs. And in recent years, not only does one network or another bring you wall to wall coverage of the 2 day event but it headlines on sports websites like Foxsports.com and ESPN.com, plus it receives Sportscenter coverage. Everything you need to know about this event is summed up in this tidbit from the wonderful world of Wikipedia; in 1984 the Westminster Kennel Club ruled that dogs competing in its shows may not have names longer than seven words. This rule has been challenged more than any other rule in the Club’s 129-year history. That’s the big controversy!! How many words are in the dog’s name? And where is the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals when someone parades around a Doberman named “Royal Tudor’s Wild As The Wind”?

Any excuse to use this picture

Euro 2008 (soccer)

Americans are never going to like soccer, unless we win the World Cup and can front-run for 4 years. Which, like I said before, means never. If we don’t even support the young men out there defending the honor of ol’ Glory, how in the world could someone think that the American sports fan will be interested in watching a bunch of Europeans play a game we already don’t support? (Memo to the sports powers that be: adding Europeans to anything rarely makes it better unless you’re trying to turn a run of the mill get together into a swingers party… so I’ve heard) One of the complaints about soccer in this country is the ridiculous flopping that persists CONSTANTLY and Euro 2008 is no exception. But without the masculine looking players from other continents butching it up, this whole affair reeks of metrosexuality and whatever that all-powerful magic injury spray smells like.

And here I thought making two poor people fight was the sport of Kings…

Belmont/Preakness

Horse racing doesn’t make any sense to me. I couldn’t imagine laying down money on a horse to run faster than another one, and I really don’t want to watch them. Are they horses going to give a hilarious post race interview? Or perhaps and entertaining little dance after victory? Horse fight? No? Then count me out. Yet the sporting world becomes enamored with these events every year and shove them down our throats. Notice I give the Kentucky Derby a pass, as it’s basically just a giant party every year, and no one hates a party.

After this picture was taken, this kid was promptly beat up

Scripps National Spelling Bee

Boring. B-O-R-I-N-G. Now if this were the actually spelling bee, I would watch. [warning: language is NSFW]

Bet these guys got lei’d! *head explodes from bad joke*

Pro Bowl

Any exhibition held AFTER a sports champions are decided is misguided at best. Especially when the sport is a violent and injury-riddled sport like pro football, which rewards brutality and perseverance every Sunday. But, what happens when you remove every reward, incentive and motivation for these men to maim one another? An unbelieveably anticlimactic and boring pseudo-contact passing league that NFL officials and the media refer to as the Pro Bowl. The players, on the other hand, probably call it the fake an injury and get a Hawaiian vacation Bowl. Can we just end the charade now before the only attendees are contest winners from big corporations?

“Use your effing signal!”

Daytona 500

We’ve discussed whether NASCAR counts as a sport or not already. But whatever you may think, you’ve got to admit that this thing gets shoved down our throats every year. Let face it NASCAR fan, it the first race of the year. It’s not the final race where the championship is decided. It’s not even the final race to determine the 10 or 12 or whatever participants in the horribly contrived “Sprint for the Cup”. There are 35 more events to go after this is done. I get that you’re excited to have the asphalt ovals and an excuse to campout with tons of other people in a parking lot back, but it’s time to stop calling it the “Super Bowl of Motor Sports.” The Super Bowl is the culmination where the best battle for the championship, this is more like that Thursday Night Special game in late August where the NFL drags out that “stellar” Monday Night Football crew and lines up musical acts for 2 hours before the game.

When’s the last time you saw a Pro get this excited about a base on balls?

Little League World Series

What could be better than going out to the ballpark on a warm late summer afternoon to watch the pros engage in the national pastime? Why, sitting at home and watching 11-13 year olds play a much lower quality of baseball on ESPN. They try very hard to make the game just like the big leaguers. They even went so far as to have their own league wide scandal in 2001 when phenom pitcher Danny Almonte’s was exposed for being a 15 year old. (A full 2 years older than the age limit to play in the World Series) The story was busted wide open by 2 Sports Illustrated reporters who spent weeks digging through records and talking to witnesses in the Dominican Republic. The other boys on the 3 place finishing team will never find their name in the LLWS record books. And to think, if we would just ignore youth baseball like we do every other youth sport there would be no record book for them to be left out of. The things we could do to make the world a better place.

If this guy can be your champion, then you suck

World Series of Poker

Yeah, I played a lot of poker…in 2002 when it was super popular! You feel that, people who still watch and talk about poker non stop? That’s a burn! Seriously, I don’t want to hear your story about how some idiot called your raise with nothing but an off-suited 3,7 and ended up knocking you on a lucky river draw. No one freakin’ cares! So why do we have weeks of coverage of people I don’t care about playing a game that’s about as relevant as Pogs. And can we stop trying to make celebrities out of these poker “pros”? Do you see those quotation marks? That means they’re not really pros. Alex Rodriguez is a pro. Kobe Bryant is a pro [editor's note: yeah...pro rapist!]. Doyle Brunson is not a pro. Deal with it.

Tags: by DLamp, By JP, by Philguard, list schmist i want my monkey man!