The Worst Sports Owners Tournament

[munky]

Harold Ballard, Mike Brown, The Bidwells, Ralph Wilson, Bill Wirtz, off the top of my head.

Do not speak ill of the walking dead.

I still love Ralph, I just wish he'd try to make the Bills competitive.

[gunnar hendershow]

Peter Angelos is missing from the baseball bracket. At least Huizinga, Loria, and Steinbrenner have championships. Angelos drove one of baseball's proudest franchises into the ground and has infected it with nepotism and has no guilt due to his own guaranteed profits.

[JStarr]

Angelos was last man out in baseball. It was just hard to pin down a lot of his issues in specific stories, enough to keep him in for a potential deep run. You know, if anyone ever actually votes.

Which no one's done yet.

[Matt]

This cunt. Close thread.

[Plubby]

The Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan

[DavidMarrio]

Well yeh Tom Hicks for sure....

But what about Mike Ashley?

[Colly]

Well yeh Tom Hicks for sure....

But what about Mike Ashley?

See above.

Thaksin Shinawatra should surely be mentioned even if just as evidence against the fit and proper persions test. Just glanced at his wiki, scandal, scandal, scandal, purchase of Manchester City, scandal, scandal. Great fun.

[NobBe Nobbs]

Bill Wirtz

No, that's not emphatic enough.

BILL WIRTZ

[Meacon Keaton]

Yeah, he's at the very least Top Three.

[Blaze09]

This should start and end with Donald Sterling.

[JStarr]

All right, fine, I give up and I'll take votes here. Seriously, though, I think the pieces will turn out well worth the time to read. (Should be, I've put in a retarded amount of work on them, occasionally annoying my wife and new baby in the process.)

Baseball Matchups:

(1) Frank/Jamie McCourt v. (8) Wayne Huizenga

(4) George Steinbrenner v. (5) Arnold Johnson (If you don't know who he is, go read. Seriously, I'd place him as a dark horse to win.)

(3) Marge Schott v. (6) Vince Naimoli

(2) Jeffrey Loria v. (7) David Glass

Hockey/Soccer Matchups:

(1) Tom Hicks v. (8) Charles Wang

(4) Atlanta Spirit v. (5) Malcolm Glazer

(3) Harold Ballard v. (6) Freddie Shepherd

(2) Bill Wirtz v. (7) Peter Pocklington

Football Matchups:

(1) Dan Snyder v. (8) Ralph Wilson

(4) Mike Brown v. (5) Al Davis

(3) Bob Irsay v. (6) Hugh Culverhouse

(2) Art Modell v. (7) Norman Braman

Basketball Matchups:

(1) Donald Sterling v. (8) Joe/Gavin Maloof

(4) James Dolan v. (5) Howard Schultz

(3) Chris Cohan v. (6) George Shinn

(2) Ted Stepien (seriously, go read once this one's posted) v. (7) Michael Heisley

[DMN in the House]

No way Al Davis belongs in this tournament. He's done more for the NFL than any living owner.

[naiwf]

No way Al Davis belongs in this tournament. He's done more for the NFL than any undead living owner.

Fixed. Though I do agree that he shouldn't be here.

[JStarr]

No way Al Davis belongs in this tournament. He's done more for the NFL than any undead living owner.

Fixed. Though I do agree that he shouldn't be here.

Then go vote for Mike Brown. Of course, that's still overlooking that over the last 25 years, Al's contributed little more than chaos and mayhem.

[gunnar hendershow]

Baseball Matchups:

(1) Frank/Jamie McCourt v. (8) Wayne Huizenga

(4) George Steinbrenner v. (5) Arnold Johnson (If you don't know who he is, go read. Seriously, I'd place him as a dark horse to win.)

(3) Marge Schott v. (6) Vince Naimoli

(2) Jeffrey Loria v. (7) David Glass

Hockey/Soccer Matchups:

(1) Tom Hicks v. (8) Charles Wang

(4) Atlanta Spirit v. (5) Malcolm Glazer

(3) Harold Ballard v. (6) Freddie Shepherd

(2) Bill Wirtz v. (7) Peter Pocklington

Football Matchups:

(1) Dan Snyder v. (8) Ralph Wilson

(4) Mike Brown v. (5) Al Davis

(3) Bob Irsay v. (6) Hugh Culverhouse

(2) Art Modell v. (7) Norman Braman

Enjoy how 3 owners from Maryland teams are on this list.

Basketball Matchups:

(1) Donald Sterling v. (8) Joe/Gavin Maloof

(4) James Dolan v. (5) Howard Schultz

(3) Chris Cohan v. (6) George Shinn

(2) Ted Stepien (seriously, go read once this one's posted) v. (7) Michael Heisley

And I read the writeups, but I'm using a phone so it's a lot easier to vote this way. Well done.

[DMN in the House]

No way Al Davis belongs in this tournament. He's done more for the NFL than any undead living owner.

Fixed. Though I do agree that he shouldn't be here.

Then go vote for Mike Brown. Of course, that's still overlooking that over the last 25 years, Al's contributed little more than chaos and mayhem.

The only things Al's done in the last 25 years is move back to Oakland, watch his former coach kick his team's ass in the Super Bowl, and draft horribly. I'm sorry, that doesn't outweigh the fact that he did more for the black athlete than anyone this side of Branch Rickey, and helped force the merger.

[gunnar hendershow]

Either way we can all agree Mike Brown will win that matchup easily. And while he screwed Cleveland, kinda, Art has done a lot for the city of Baltimore. He was a tyrant running the Browns but moving to a new city and getting a new stadium helped him create one of the league's top franchises. He also got out once everything was in place instead of holding on for too long.

[JStarr]

No way Al Davis belongs in this tournament. He's done more for the NFL than any undead living owner.

Fixed. Though I do agree that he shouldn't be here.

Then go vote for Mike Brown. Of course, that's still overlooking that over the last 25 years, Al's contributed little more than chaos and mayhem.

The only things Al's done in the last 25 years is move back to Oakland, watch his former coach kick his team's ass in the Super Bowl, and draft horribly. I'm sorry, that doesn't outweigh the fact that he did more for the black athlete than anyone this side of Branch Rickey, and helped force the merger.

I'll give you the merger. If it wasn't for him grabbing the NFL by the nuts and saying "We're coming after your players," there would still be two leagues.

As for the black athlete part, Paul Brown comes in a little bit ahead of Al. Most of the rest of the NFL was still made up of crusty old racist white guys, and Brown was bringing in Marion Motley, Bill Willis, and Jim Brown when no one else was giving those guys opportunities.

The entire AFL had to be proactive in scouting the HBCU teams for talent, and Al didn't do all that much more than Hank Stram or Sid Gillman were doing at the time. The Raiders were the first to draft a black QB in the first round, sure...but then they drafted Ken Stabler in the second and told Eldridge Dickey he was going to play receiver, since, you know, black guys weren't smart enough to play QB and all. Now that's some trailblazin' right there.

There's a lot more, but I know you won't bother to read any of it, so why bother?

[DMN in the House]

No need to patronize me. When the athletes themselves praise him, that's good enough for me. Not to mention Tom Flores and Art Shell as coaches, as well as women in upper management. Her name escapes me, but one of the Raiders top brass is Korean and female.

Of course, you have a blog, and I don't, so LOLOAKLAND, that feel better?

[JStarr]

No need to patronize use facts on me. When the athletes themselves praise him, that's good enough for me. Not to mention Tom Flores and Art Shell as coaches, as well as women in upper management. Her name escapes me, but one of the Raiders top brass is Korean and female.

Of course, you have a blog, and I don't, so LOLOAKLAND, that feel better?

Amy Trask.

Link to the football bracket, including the stories about Al.

Writing about these things teaches you a lot about finding facts. If I'm going to put my name out there on these pieces, I need to know what I'm writing about. If I'm all LOLOAKLAND, it's because they've earned it, not because it's "cool" to hate on the Raiders or whatever.

I put Al against Mike Brown precisely because of what Al's contributed over the years, giving him a matchup he'd be very likely to lose, since Mike Brown has had absolutely no redeeming value over the years. Still, Al's last true genius move may have been snagging Bo Jackson after Tampa Bay fucked up signing him. Looking at it from the outside, I'd be pretty embarrassed if my team's owner was becoming known primarily for suing coaches, alienating his best players, drafting speed freaks and going 5-11. (Read what's written, and you'll notice that I praised some of the recent speed freaks for looking like solid players so far.)