What were they thinking? Bad sports moves...

[BooCocky]

It's basically a thread to bitch about moves your favorite teams have made over the years.
For instance Trading Ruth to the Yanks, or it could be something smaller that made a huge impact...
Anyways, every ownership makes a bad move, whether it's to save money or even bad scouting. Over the years, there have been some pretty lopsided trades, and some trades that would start a demise of a franchise.

So let me go on about my Pittsburgh Teams.

Bad drafting 101

In 1997, the Pirates picked 8th in the MLB draft, they went on and picked JJ Davis, in his career he hit .179 in his illustrious career. Who did they miss out on? Lance Berkman who was picked 16th.

1998, picking #15, they choose Clint Johnston, a pitcher who never rose above AA. They passed on a couple other pitchers you may have heard of: C.C. Sabathia, Brad Lidge, and Mark Prior.

2001, 8th again, the card says John Van Benschoten, record-setting HR hitter for Kent State. Of course, the Pirates turn him into a pitcher and he blows out his arm. By the way, they missed out on #25 Bobby Crosby, #26 Jeremy Bonderman, and #38 David Wright.

2002, #1, and it's Bryan Bullington. Yep, blown out arm. Who'd we miss this year? BJ Upton, Prince Fielder, Jeremy Hermida, Scott Kazmir, Nick Swisher, Jeff Francoeur...

Bad Signings? Hmm, we have some of those, the infamous Derek Bell signing, 2 years, 10 million dollars. Let's just say that 2001 did not produce great results for this marriage. Bell managed a mind-numbingly horrible .173 average, to go along with 5 HR and 13 RBI in 46 games...

More bad Pirate Moves

At the end of the 1992 Season Barry Bonds' contract expires, the Pirates negotiated with him but realized Bonds wasn't in there future, instead they sign Andy Van Slyke. Who at the time was 32 years of age. Nice move PGH, the best offensive player the last 30 years for an aging Center Fielder.

O fuck, I forgot about the Aramis Ramirez trade,

4. 2003: Pirates trade 3B Aramis Ramirez and OF Kenny Lofton to the Cubs for 2B Bobby Hill, 3B Jose Hernandez, and minor leaguer Matt Bruback.

Lets say this, Hill had one full season as a starter, Hernandez struck out a lot, and Bruback never made it too the majors. Not to mention Ramirez became an all star caliber third baseman.

Damn, it sucks being a Pirates fan...

 

[48.7 is Approximately 49 Times Better Than You]

It's not a management issue, but a coaching blunder.

Oregon lost the civil war game to the Beavers in Autzen last year. We were down by two with 15 seconds left.. We're on their twelve or so, easily in field goal range. Instead of calling a timeout so we can set up nicely, Belloti rushes our kicking unit onto the field. I was screaming at this point to call a timeout. We get the kick off with a few seconds left, but due to it being hurried, he misses wide and we lose the game.

(I may have messed up some details in there, but that's the jist of it.)

 

[Mr. TM]

1997 in Vancouver. The Canucks had made it to the finals just a few years before, and still had a good core of players. But Canucks just needed something to pump up their line up. Why not sign Mark Messier? He seems good. They payed $18,000,000 for the aging superstar, causing the Canucks to trade 3 very cheap players. The crappy thing about it, all of those players made less than Messier combined, and all of them ended up getting more points then Messier. The consequences... years of horrible Canuck teams until Brian Burke was able to turn them around.

 

[Khalifa]

Well did anyone say it was for a particular sport?

Basketball=Lakers;

Well first off a couple of bad moves. Trading shaq to heat for Odom, Butler and Grant.

Not that good. Odom and Butler were great additions but Grant was retiring next season anyways. But i still feel we could of got better for this. I know we had to trade Shaq but come on for 3 people who haven't eevn amde a name for themselves unless it had the word "weed" in it. BUt Odom and Butler turned out great so it sort of worked out in the end.

2005 Lakers trade Caron Bulter to Wizards For the biggest flop in history.

Caron Butler was the Lakers third and second Leading scorer most times. Bulter was improving and had some great court vision along with good defence. Teams always underrated him so he always played good for a second/third man . Anyways when they traded Butler for Brown i was like ok we jsut stuffed up. Not because BRown hasn't done anything but because we traded Butler who was improving and we had no back up small forwards in the bench. Anyways what happened for the Lakers the next season and a half. We got killed. With Butler in there instead of Kwame we could of got a center by the next draft/free angency and still keeped one of our stars. Anyways LAkers stuffed up and made a huge mistake.

 

[agentmichaelscarn]

Since Im a Detroit's sports fan Ill list a few bad moves from their teams.

Detroit Tigers-1987. The Tigers were in the midst of a pennant race and felt the need to grab another pitcher so they traded for Doyle Alexander at the time it seemed like a great trade cause all they gave up was an unheralded minor leaguer. Doyle did help them win the division that year so it wasnt a total loss but he did nothing for them after that and that minor leaguer turned out to be a guy by the name of John Smoltz. Smoltz of course has gone on to a hall of fame career.

Detroit Lions-Where do I begin? Ill just do a couple recent draft blunders to save time and space. In 2003 they were in need of a playmaking WR. So they grabbed one in the first round, thats great I was glad they did but unfortunately they grabbed Charles Rogers, who has done all of nothing as a pro. Guess who the guy picked directly after him was? Only another WR by the name of Andre Johnson who has turned out to be one of the best in the game. In 2005 we decided to draft another WR this time it was Mike Williams who has been an even bigger bust than Rogers. Everybody in Detroit thought they were gonna go with Shawn Merriman, Derrick Johnson or Demarcus Ware all 3 would have been great picks instead they draft a guy who scored 2 or 3 TDs his entire Lion career.

Pistons-2003 Draft. Everything fell in place for the Pistons, 5 or so years earlier they traded Otis Thorpe for the Grizzlies first round pick, Great trade. The Grizzlies kept postponing the pick until they were forced to give it to Detroit in 03 no matter what pick it was. Memphis was slated to get the 7th pick but by the luck of the draw got the 2nd overall pick. So the Pistons had the 2nd pick in one of the best classes in recent memory and were coming off a conference finals season so everything was set up perfect. Who do they grab? Darko freakin Milicic. They could've had Carmello Anthony, Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade among others but they ended up with Darko. I could only imagine how good these Pistons teams the last few years would have been with Wade or Bosh on the team. The silver lining in this is that Joe Dumars did end up trading Darko to Orlando for a first round pick and used that pick on Rodney Stuckey who is turning into a star so that wasnt a total loss.

 

[Pimpin]

Since most of my favorite teams come from the Dallas Fort Worth area of Texas I'll list the bad moves of the major teams from that area.

Dallas Cowboys- Ah where do I start? I'll start with a few additions that pretty much went to complete shit.
Pacman Jones- Pacman was brought in as a 3rd corner & a boost to an extremly weak special teams unit. Well he made a few good plays as a 3rd corner but nothing special & he choked as the punt return specialist & im not gonna mention his off the field problems.

Tank Johnson- Tank was cut by the Bears in the 2007 offseason cause of off the field problems. The Cowboys signed him to a 2 year deal cause they thought he could upgrade the defensive line & be the great player that he was with the Bears. Well not only did that not happen but he got beaten out by a 7th round pick named Jay Ratliff.

Roy Williams(The Reciever)- Now this is a questionable move cause they wasted a 1st, 3rd & 5th round picks to the Lions just to get him but we will wait & see what happens during the 2009 season.

Texas Rangers- Even though I ain't a fan of the Rangers I have to hear about them alot when I was living in Texas. Their worst mistake was signing Chan Ho Park to an expensive deal but they do also trade away young prospects that have proven to be successful with other teams like John Danks, Armando Galarraga & Chris Young.

 

[Khalifa]

Pistons-2003 Draft. Everything fell in place for the Pistons, 5 or so years earlier they traded Otis Thorpe for the Grizzlies first round pick, Great trade. The Grizzlies kept postponing the pick until they were forced to give it to Detroit in 03 no matter what pick it was. Memphis was slated to get the 7th pick but by the luck of the draw got the 2nd overall pick. So the Pistons had the 2nd pick in one of the best classes in recent memory and were coming off a conference finals season so everything was set up perfect. Who do they grab? Darko freakin Milicic. They could've had Carmello Anthony, Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade among others but they ended up with Darko. I could only imagine how good these Pistons teams the last few years would have been with Wade or Bosh on the team. The silver lining in this is that Joe Dumars did end up trading Darko to Orlando for a first round pick and used that pick on Rodney Stuckey who is turning into a star so that wasnt a total loss.

Yes I must admit it was a bad call but believe it or not Darko wasn't so abd in college. As for Anthony you couldn't really trust him yet and they already had a true point guard in billups.I would of picked Bosh . I mean he is tall, very athletic and can actually play D. He is udner rated. But then again you cant be sure with any one in the teens/early twentys with injurys. I mean ODen is turnign out as a flop isn't he?