Yahoo Sports The very worst sports decisions of 2024
Our colleague Ava Wallace already paid tribute to some of the best sports moments of 2024, stories of courage and glory, creating memories fans will never forget. The Chiefs winning a second straight Super Bowl. Simone Biles, Rebeca Andrade and Jordan Chiles sharing an Olympic podium for the ages. Noah Lyles sprinting 100 meters into forever. Caitlin Clark helping lead a revolution.
But sports didn’t just give us magnificence in 2024. As usual, moments of splendor were accompanied by, well, less splendid narratives. Teams that chose poorly. Stars who stumbled. Leaders who came up short when the spotlight was on. That whole Jake Paul thing.
Thus, in what is now an annual tradition, this is our non-comprehensive list of some of the most regrettable moments of the year, which are best left behind in 2024.
1. The Giants letting Saquon Barkley test the market
In March, the New York Giants had a decision to make about running back Saquon Barkley, the face of the franchise since they took him with the No. 2 pick of the 2018 draft. They could either place the franchise tag on him for a second straight season, give him a new contract or let him test the market in search of a better deal. They chose … poorly, and it was all recorded by HBO’s “Hard Knocks” cameras.
With New York unwilling to meet Barkley’s contract demands, the division rival Philadelphia Eagles swooped in and gave him a three-year, $37.75 million deal with $26 million guaranteed, an investment that has paid off handsomely. Barkley leads the NFL in rushing yards and is just 268 from breaking Eric Dickerson’s seemingly untouchable single-season record. His backward leap against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Nov. 3 is almost certainly going to be the NFL’s play of the year, one that blew the minds of his teammates on the sideline.
The Eagles, at 12-3, need just one more win to clinch the NFC East. The Giants, meanwhile, are going to miss the playoffs for the 11th time in the past 13 seasons and are in line to finish with the league’s worst record.
2. Olympic swimming in the Seine
Paris Olympic organizers were determined to hold events involving distance swimming in the Seine even though swimming in the river had been banned for nearly 100 years because - how do we put this delicately? - it was full of poop. France even spent around $1.5 billion in an attempt to - again, trying to be tactful here - make the Seine less poopy.
And swim in the Seine they did, though the triathlons had to be postponed after rainstorms pushed the levels of E. coli bacteria to unsafe levels. Two athletes, from Belgium and Switzerland, who had competed in the men’s and women’s triathlons had to drop out of the mixed relay competition after becoming sick, though it was unclear whether the Seine was to blame. The same could be said for three German open-water swimmers who became ill after swimming in the Seine during the 10,000-meter marathon.
“Vomited 9 times yesterday + diarrhea,” one of the sickened Germans, Leonie Beck, posted on social media, adding: “Water quality in the Seine is approved,” accompanied by a check mark.
3. Arresting Scottie Scheffler
Rain in Louisville was causing a bit of chaos ahead of the PGA Championship’s second round in May. Tragically, a retired police officer working as a security guard died before dawn when he was struck by a shuttle bus near Valhalla Golf Club. But the fact that Scottie Scheffler, the world’s No. 1 male golfer and someone regarded as one of the nicer guys on the PGA Tour, ended up getting his mug shot taken in jail garb over a traffic infraction is pretty crazy.
The charges against Scheffler - second-degree assault of a police officer, a felony, plus third-degree criminal mischief, reckless driving and disregarding signals from officers directing traffic - were dropped fairly quickly, and a city of Louisville investigation into the incident revealed that Detective Bryan Gillis failed to turn on his body camera in violation of department policy. Gillis would only add to the absurdity of the situation by issuing a statement, after prosecutors dropped the charges against Scheffler, saying that his $80 pair of pants were “indeed ruined” during the incident.
4. Tony Romo talking over the Super Bowl’s final play
The CBS analyst’s popularity among NFL fans already had diminished before February’s Super Bowl, and he didn’t exactly win back favor by yakking away before, during and after Mecole Hardman’s touchdown catch that won the game in overtime for the Chiefs. Initially, Romo had a useful point to make about relatively new NFL rules regarding postseason overtime periods, but he failed to recognize the importance of pausing to give announcing partner Jim Nantz room to call a play of such magnitude.
Then, instead of letting the victorious moment breathe, Romo immediately launched into a winding analysis of the play as cameras showed various Chiefs reacting with jubilation. What the moment needed was not Ro-mo so much as a little Ro-less.
5. High schools continuing to hire Conner Stalions
Conner Stalions, the man in the middle of the NCAA’s investigation into sign-stealing at the University of Michigan, does not seem like someone who should be guiding the youth of America. But two Michigan high schools this year seemingly disagreed with that statement.
In early September, reports surfaced that Stalions had been elevated to acting coach at Detroit Mumford High after serving as volunteer defensive coordinator since the spring (William McMichael, the team’s full-time coach, suffered a mild stroke). Mumford, historically one of the worst high school football programs in the state, lost its first game with Stalions at the helm, 60-0. It lost its next game, 71-0, and the two after that by a combined 50-0.
But Stalions wasn’t done. After Mumford finished its 1-8 season, Belleville High hired Stalions to run its offense during its state playoff run. Led by quarterback Bryce Underwood, the top-ranked football recruit in the country who recently switched his commitment from LSU to (yep) Michigan, the Tigers went 10-2 and advanced to a Michigan region final.
“Connor … he’s been a great tool for us in enhancing how we attack opposing defenses,” Belleville co-head coach DeJuan Rogers told CBS Detroit.
6. Denying Jordan Chiles a bronze medal
The final of the women’s gymnastics floor routine event at the Paris Olympics ended in controversy after U.S. coaches got the judges to increase a score for Jordan Chiles that pushed her past Romania’s Ana Barbosu for the bronze medal. That, however, was just the beginning of a saga that saw Romanian officials successfully appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which agreed with their assertion that Team USA lodged its request for an inquiry process into Chiles’s routine four seconds too late.
Weeks later and with Chiles having appealed the CAS ruling to Switzerland’s Federal Supreme Court, video evidence emerged that indicated the Americans did, in fact, make their request within their allotted time (up to one minute after a given athlete’s score is shown on the scoreboard). The Supreme Court request on behalf of Chiles also noted that CAS gave Team USA very little notice of the Romanians’ appeal and thus did not allow the Americans sufficient time to collect evidence before a terse ruling from the CAS that it declined to reconsider.
The 23-year-old gymnast said last month she still has the bronze medal she received in Paris despite the International Olympic Committee’s demand that she return it.
7. Not picking Caitlin Clark for Team USA
The U.S. women’s basketball team took home its eighth straight gold medal at the Paris Olympics, winning all but one game by at least 13 points, but the decision to leave Caitlin Clark off the roster despite her talent and overwhelming popularity still was strange.
“Obviously, we know the success that Caitlin had in college, and she’s had a tremendous start to the WNBA season so far,” Jennifer Rizzotti, the USA Basketball women’s national team committee chair, said after the snub. “But essentially it was the committee’s job to pick the 12 based on our selection criteria, and as much as you want to maybe make conversation around how we should have considered TV viewership or jersey sales or popularity, that wasn’t the purview of the committee to have those discussions. The selection criteria were very clear.” Instead, USA Basketball wanted to give U.S. Coach Cheryl Reeve “the opportunity to have the best roster available, not necessarily always the 12 best players,” Rizzotti said.
Clark was a near-unanimous selection as the WNBA’s rookie of the year, receiving 66 of 67 votes. She averaged 19.2 points, 5.7 rebounds and 8.4 assists for the Indiana Fever, leading the WNBA in assists while setting rookie records for points and three-pointers.
8. The Diamondbacks signing Jordan Montgomery to a huge contract
Don’t believe us? Just listen to the guy who had to pay for Montgomery’s one-year, $25 million deal, which made him one of the 10 best-paid starters in baseball last season.
“Let me say it the best way I can say it: If anyone wants to blame anyone for Jordan Montgomery being a Diamondback, you’re talking to the guy that should be blamed because I brought it to their attention,” owner Ken Kendrick said after the season. “I pushed for it. They agreed to it. It wasn’t in our game plan when he was signed right at the end of spring training, and looking back in hindsight, [it was] a horrible decision to have invested that money in a guy that performed as poorly as he did. It’s our biggest mistake this season from a talent standpoint, and I’m the perpetrator of that.”
Montgomery finished the 2024 season at 8-7 with a 6.23 ERA.
9. The 76ers signing Joel Embiid and Paul George to huger contracts
By retaining Embiid and adding George to form a starry trio that also included Tyrese Maxey, Philadelphia thought it had created a title-contending “Big Three,” but that turned out to be the number of wins the team managed through its first 17 games. Several weeks later, the 76ers still appear far closer to landing Cooper Flagg in the NBA draft than planting their flag in the Finals.
In an underwhelming Eastern Conference, Philadelphia has time to get its act together - and recorded a rousing win over the Boston Celtics on Christmas Day - but a rally probably will require much better health than its stars have enjoyed thus far. Embiid has played in just nine games and has been dealing with a sinus fracture; he also has a lingering knee issue he described as “depressing” and served a three-game suspension for shoving a journalist. George has missed 10 games with his own knee problems and Maxey (hamstring) was sidelined for six.
Even if this season goes bust, the 76ers can expect great play for years to come from the 24-year-old Maxey, but the future looks murky, at best, for his 30-something co-stars. It’s not hard to envision a scenario in which the 76ers decide they want to break up the trio, but it could be difficult to move the contracts for Embiid ($193 million over three years, starting in 2026) and George ($212 million over four years).
10. Coyotes fans buying 2024-25 season tickets
In January, the Arizona Coyotes exhorted new season ticket purchasers to “Hop on the Wagon” for the 2024-25 season. What the team didn’t say then is that said wagon would be required to make 10½-hour trips from Phoenix to Salt Lake City, which is where the Coyotes ended up this season after the NHL approved a move in April.
Now branded as the Utah Hockey Club, the artists formerly known as the Coyotes are plying their trade under new, much-better-funded management. The arrangements allowed for hopes in Arizona that the NHL might come back some day, but the only return of immediate importance for fans there was the money they plunked down on season tickets.
11. White Sox fans buying 2024 season tickets
At various points during this past season, Chicago fans may well have found themselves wishing their team would relocate to Utah. Alas, the only place the 2024 White Sox went was into the record book with 121 losses, the most of any MLB team since its modern era began in 1900. But at least 2025 season ticket prices will be cheaper!
12. LeBron James engineering his son to the Lakers
The most admirable thing about this episode is LeBron James’s NBA longevity; his ability to play for 22 years afforded him enough time for his oldest son to join him in the league. The addition of Bronny James to the Lakers also stands as a testament to the enormous clout his father developed over a massively successful career, but that’s where the ostensibly feel-good story begins to curdle.
Simply put, Bronny had no business being in the NBA, at least not at this early stage in his professional basketball development. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that, but Ken Griffey Jr., he ain’t. The contrived nature of his moment of on-court history with LeBron in the Lakers’ season opener began during the draft, when their Klutch talent agency reportedly told other teams not to interfere with Los Angeles’ plans to draft Bronny with the 55th pick, and it continued over a season-opening stint in which the 6-foot-2 guard posted microscopic numbers before being sent to the G League.
Perhaps at some point, Bronny will become good enough to merit an NBA roster spot, and it’s worth rooting for him to do so. If he outlasts his father’s playing career and winds up on an NBA team with which LeBron has no direct involvement, then Bronny can get the credit he didn’t earn this time - not that it’s his fault - for making the most of his talent.
13. Chess world champion’s rook move is more like a rookie move
“I was totally in shock when I realized I made a blunder,” Chinese grand master Ding Liren said after essentially handing his crown to 18-year-old Gukesh Dommaraju, who pounced on the gaffe to become the youngest chess world champion in history. The moment, which also stunned chess analysts looking on remotely, unfolded late in the 14th and final scheduled match of their title series this month. With many observers anticipating the match would end in a draw - which would have sent the series to a tiebreak format of rapid chess, a discipline in which Ding was widely considered the superior player - he unexpectedly moved his rook back toward his king.
That opened up a sequence in which Dommaraju could quickly gain a decisive advantage, and it was such a bizarre turn of events that the youngster stared at the board in apparent disbelief before eventually sealing his unprecedented triumph at the sport’s highest level.
Never before had the world championship been decided by a “childish one move blunder,” former chess champion Vladimir Kramnik wrote on X.
14. Jerry Jones’s nonurgent approach to the Cowboys’ offseason
When Dallas team owner/personnel chief Jerry Jones said in early August of contract negotiations with CeeDee Lamb, “I don’t have any urgency to get it done,” he could have been talking about the entirety of the Cowboys’ roster-building project to that point. Having lost a number of veteran stalwarts after the 2023 season ended, Jones’s biggest moves in free agency were the decidedly meh acquisitions of linebacker Eric Kendricks and running back Royce Freeman. Oh, and the Cowboys brought back running back Ezekiel Elliott and signed Dalvin Cook, as if to signal that only aging former stars would be allowed to compete for work with unaccomplished holdover Rico Dowdle.
Not surprisingly, 7-8 Dallas ranks at the bottom of the league in Pro Football Focus’s rushing grade. As for Lamb, he was eventually inked to a new deal, and quarterback Dak Prescott finally got one even closer to the start of the season, but Jones’s dithering in both cases probably resulted in having to pay more for the players than might have been necessary. And the two mega-signings weren’t enough to end Dallas’s Super Bowl drought, which stretched to a 29th season.
15. Rory McIlroy not leaving the U.S. Open even sooner
After losing both a two-shot lead down the stretch at Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina and another great chance to win his first major since 2014, the Northern Ireland star wasted little time getting to his courtesy car and peeling out of the parking lot. Just before that, however, he lingered in the clubhouse long enough to watch Bryson DeChambeau complete a terrific up-and-down from an 18th-hole bunker to win the tournament.
McIlroy’s stone-faced reaction was caught on camera, creating a meme that probably wasn’t what he wanted people to take away from his performance. A day he would soon describe as “probably the toughest” of his professional career couldn’t - and didn’t - end soon enough.
16. Everyone who watched the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight
Sure, the fact that it was streamed on Netflix made it easy to tune into for a lot of folks who otherwise probably wouldn’t have shelled out for an expensive pay-per-view event. As it turned out, that only served to greatly increase the number of viewers who wished they had found something else to do with their time than gaze at the action-starved spectacle.
Those with hopes of watching a compelling sports event instead were reminded that it has been a couple of decades since Tyson, now 58, was actually good at boxing. Some boos even rang out at AT&T Stadium as the lifeless bout dragged on, perhaps leaving the only satisfied parties as Tyson and Paul, who raked in huge paydays, and Netflix itself.
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