Sportsman You Love To Hate

[Jimmy]

Can't remember if we've had this kind of chat before. 

Sportsman you love to to hate. 

So like I hated Diego Costa in the way that felt like I should; a pantomime villain, a terror to play against, had a temper, played up the crowd, the dives, the theatrics, his petulance, a Chelsea player (yuck). But this was safely in the knowledge that you knew if he played for your club you'd love him. 

Not like Charlie Adam, who is just a cunt. 

 

[Draevyn]

Back in the day, Wayne Gretzky

Currently, probably Ovechkin.

I'd also put Kyle Busch in this group. He's one of those guys who is super talented but I just love to hate him.

[OctoberRaven]

For the record, David Beckham isn't it. I just hate the fuck, no loving to about it, and it could have been all avoided if he contributed to Florida sport history instead of bulldozing it.

[Jimmy]

9 minutes ago, OctoberRaven said:

For the record, David Beckham isn't it. I just hate the fuck, no loving to about it, and it could have been all avoided if he contributed to Florida sport history instead of bulldozing it.

Legend.

[OctoberRaven]

Don't care. He demolished any hope of a Strikers revival. He's dead to me forever.

[LL!]

Luis Suarez is someone I love to hate. 

 

David Beckham is someone I love loving and can't wait for Inter Miami CF to kick off again. Just got my jersey 2 weeks ago. Ready to kick off again!

[Cymbols]

Yeah I disliked Beckham as the best player for a rival nation. But once his international career ended, and he went stateside, I definitely grew to like the guy. Good player, and comes across like a decent guy.

[The Buscher]

Chipper Jones killed the Mets for the better part of 17 years, going as far as to name his kid Shea after Shea Stadium.

[Roster Depth Sicko No. 2]

For the longest time it was Gerrard, but the emotion slipped away.

[MalaCloudy Black]

Yeah Jeets.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

'Fins fan so hate Brady. Not love to hate, just hate. I hated Gronkowski more though.

 

It made it even sweeter when we got that "miracle" win a couple of seasons ago and it was his slip at the back that sealed it.

 

[Meacon Keaton]

On the flipside, I love to hate Brady. He's probably the best ever, and I acknowledge that, and the fact I've gotten to see him play has been amazing. But it's easy to hate the handsome, millionaire, future Hall of Fame quarterback who is married to a Victoria's Secret model. So yeah, I love to hate Brady. 

[The Buscher]

51 minutes ago, Meacon say “Hi People!” said:

On the flipside, I love to hate Brady. He's probably the best ever, and I acknowledge that, and the fact I've gotten to see him play has been amazing. But it's easy to hate the handsome, millionaire, future Hall of Fame quarterback who is married to a Victoria's Secret model. So yeah, I love to hate Brady. 

You left out the part where he whines like a 5-year old either to his linemen or the refs every time a defender lays a hand on him.

[gunnar hendershow]

I tend to not have an actual hatred for most athletes. The ones that I do hate it's because they're awful people. As a result the list of people I "love to hate" is pretty damn long. Tom Brady, Derek Jeter, and Troy Polamalu are probably a top 3.

[Adam]

Richard Sherman, for one. Ronnie O'Sullivan was for a long time, Novak Djokovic too. Djokovic is probably one of the best examples for me, he is objectively a brilliant, brilliant tennis player and athlete, but he just riles me up. As much as anyone in tennis can anyway!

I'm trying to think of some footballers, but to be honest most of the ones I thought of probably push more towards actual disdain or hatred for me. Maybe Dean Windass back in the day, truth be told I would have loved to have seen him play for Rovers but he always wound us up something rotten when we played Bradford.

[Bobfoc]

8 minutes ago, Adam said:

Djokovic is probably one of the best examples for me, he is objectively a brilliant, brilliant tennis player and athlete, but he just riles me up. As much as anyone in tennis can anyway!

Djokovic is someone who riles me up a little when he's on court. It's mostly a case of his strategic use of injury timeouts that gets me. Off the court, he seems OK, though. If anything, I've seen more press conference outbursts from Federer, who's always seen as Mr. Nice.

[gunnar hendershow]

Oh yeah Djokovic as a player can be annoying to watch because of how strategic he is with everything, but at the same time you don't go out there to try and lose so it doesn't get to me too much. But I am a huge Federer fan and have been for close to 20 years now so Djokovic is always going to be the guy I root against even if he might (increasingly likely he will) go down as the best men's tennis player ever.

[VerbalPuke]

Randy Moss, he made the Lions look like shit constantly. Reggie Miller when the Pistons were good in the early 2000s, probably Knicks fans feel the same. 

i'd say Bret Farve but I actually don't like him as a human being. 

[Pooker]

Kobe Bryant, especially his last few years playing. When he was dealing with all his injuries, you could tell how much passion he still had for the game, how much he still wanted to play, but his body just couldn't hold up any more.

 

[Bobfoc]

4 hours ago, damsher hatfield said:

Oh yeah Djokovic as a player can be annoying to watch because of how strategic he is with everything, but at the same time you don't go out there to try and lose so it doesn't get to me too much. But I am a huge Federer fan and have been for close to 20 years now so Djokovic is always going to be the guy I root against even if he might (increasingly likely he will) go down as the best men's tennis player ever.

Djokovic doesn't get as much credit as I think he deserves in the media. A lot of people still talk about Federer and Nadal as the two greatest players of their era, but Djokovic has won 17 Grand Slams, only two fewer than Nadal and three fewer than Federer. The latter is six years older than Djokovic, who also has a winning record against both of them. If not for the Pandemic, I wouldn't have been at all surprised if Djokovic had ended up matching Federer's total this season.

For me, a big thing that's irked me about Djokovic ha been that he's stopped Andy Murray from winning more Grand Slams. He'd probably have won them all if not for a combination of injuries and meeting Djokovic in finals.