Poor Sports:
Celebrating the Worst in Athletics

booyah 2000 'Poor Sport of the Year' Awards


by Jeff Hause

Dream Date
"POOR SPORT DREAM DATE:"
Mark "Chewy" Chmura
I wonder if he pinned her first.
Wow! What a year! Accused murderer Ray Lewis won the NFL Defensive Player of the Year award! (His craftiest defense was in the courtroom.) Rae Carruth was arrested for the murder of his pregnant girlfriend after hiding in the trunk of a car (his back-up plan: wear a lampshade over his head and stand very still). But there were many more amazing stories in 2000! Here are some of the highlights:

ILLEGAL PASS: Green Bay Packers Pro Bowl tight end Mark "Chewy" Chmura (actual nickname) was charged with third degree sexual assault after his 17-year-old baby sitter said he had sex with her at a party following her high school prom. The accuser says the Packer tight end attacked her tight end in the bathroom of a Hartland area home. Chmura, who a few years earlier ironically refused to meet President Clinton at a White House reception for the then-champion Packers because of the president's "bad morals," was released by the team soon after the arrest. Now that you're out of work as a player, good luck getting a high school coaching job, Mark.

CAUGHT WITH HIS PANTS DOWN—LITERALLY: Maybe the biggest surprise of the year was that former Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Michael Irvin was not charged with any crimes in 2000, despite reports that he was found standing naked and holding a marijuana cigarette during a police raid on a Dallas prostitute's apartment. (He was revealing TWO joints, so to speak.)

Bad Knight
POOR SPORT "DOUBLE SECRET PROBATION" AWARD

FALLEN KNIGHT: After surviving for what seemed like about a day and a half under a "zero-tolerance" conduct policy for his constant violent outburts against opponents, players, and school staff, Bobby Knight was fired by the University of Indiana for grabbing a student by the arm to lecture him about, ironically, manners. How Indiana will handle the new "zero-victory" policy from the basketball team has yet to be determined.

Hours after he was fired, Knight returned to the campus from a Canadian fishing trip (Bobby's favorite sport—you're actually allowed to kill the opponent). He met with his players in private, then grabbed a bullhorn to address hundreds of students who were protesting his dismissal. He told the faithful that they had not heard the last of him. "There's nobody that's ever coached that appreciates the support of students as much as I have," he said. As long as they mind their manners, anyway.

Meanwhile, 19-year-old freshman Kent Harvey, whose accusations led to Knight's dismissal, was burned in effigy by protesters (all the while acting with the kind of perfect manners that Knight demands, I'm sure). The boy was also sent death threats by e-mail and telephone. But with any luck, the police will soon have Bobby off the phone and laptop.

WILTED REPUTATION: As if dying didn't make it a bad enough year for basketball Hall of Famer Wilt Chamberlain, The Philadelphia Daily News reported amidst glowing memorials of the scoring champ that the FBI actually investigated him in the late 60's because of rumors that he was fixing games. (Judging by the number of women he slept with, the only thing that needed to be fixed was WILT.)

UPDATES ON 2000'S POOR SPORTS:

WRONG "ANSWER:" After an eventful plane flight with SportsHollywood reporters from Philadelphia to Vegas to Los Angeles, Allen Iverson outdid himself in offensiveness. Not satisfied with delivering racist rants to airline stewardesses and passengers alone, Allen chose to record them on a rap album for the enjoyment of everyone—adding touches of homophobia, paranoia, and even contract murder. You can read a sample of his artistry here. You won't ever hear it, by the way, because he was forced to change the lyrics when the NBA threatened to punish him. But despite the censorship, he still ranks as the NBA's greatest offensive force, in more ways than one.

BASKETBALL WIZ: Hornets forward Derrick Coleman attempted to rebound from the previous year's drunk driving charges (crashing his car and sending a teammate into the hospital) and from the public indecency charge he accrued after urinating on the floor of a Detroit restaurant. He returned to the team in the fall with a few wrinkles added to his game. The most noticeable wrinkles being around his midsection from being grossly overweight. He missed the first two months of the season when the team basically benched him for being too fat. "He just let himself go during the summer," Charlotte coach Paul Silas said. Maybe Charlotte should let him go. The team is 3-10 so far this season with Coleman and 16-2 without. Amazingly, since Coleman signed as a free agent two years ago, the Hornets have compiled a .500 record with Coleman in the lineup and .800 without him.

CRACK OF THE BAT: Lastly, Darryl Strawberry told a judge that the Subway Series between the Mets and Yankees was one of the Strawman's darkest moments. In a year that also included cancer and marital problems, that was saying a lot. When the World Series opened on October 22nd, Strawberry (who had played on both teams between arrests) said watching the game prompted him to leave his rehab center in Tampa, Florida, and use crack cocaine—not surprisingly a violation of his probation. On the bright side, even though he didn't play, he still had a few hits.

(1/9/2001)


Poor Sports Archive
Jeffrey C. Hause has written professionally (in a very amateur fashion) for entertainers like Jay Leno, Jim Carrey, Rodney Dangerfield, Gabe Kaplan, Rick Dees and people he'd rather not tell you about. He's also written screenplays at Warner Brothers, Disney, Universal, Columbia, Franchise Pictures, the Samuel Goldwyn Co., and Interscope. Here's his résumé. E-mail: jeff@sportshollywood.com.

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