Top 25 in Second-rate Paper

Admittedly "Top whatever" lists are almost always entirely subjective, although there are some things most people can agree are wrong. While meandering through the metal detector at Kansas City International Airport on Monday, I came along a copy of USA Today, where they were proclaiming their list of "The Top 25 Sports Stories" of the 25 years of USA Today. A wholly original idea.

Some issues with USA Today's highly dubious list. Admittedly, USA Today is "kind of a newspaper" in the same way that UWM has "kind of a basketball team," but I feel the need to open fire despite the feeling like I'm playing dodgeball with a paraplegic.

#1: Boston Red Sox win World Series
Seemingly on this list for no other reason than winning the World Series, and having it been a long time since they had done so before. If that's all it takes, then the White Sox should have this place, since it took them longer to win it, and suffered even greater futility throughout the years. Wanna play the Curse Card? Did you know---the term "Curse of the Bambino" was not even coined until 1986? It also lists heartbreaking losses to the Yankees as justification. But honestly, outside of Bucky Dent and Aaron Boone, are there any that immediately come to mind for the average sports fan living outside of New England? I am suspecting that whoever compiled this list is a Red Sox fan, as Buckner's error also clocks in on this list at #15. Also, the Red Sox winning the World Series gave us the movie "Fever Pitch," which bastardized a great book on what it means to be a fan, and as such automatically disqualifies it from the top spot.

#14: US Women win '99 World Cup
Sure, 90,000 people got into the Rose Bowl for the largest crowd to ever attend a Women's sporting event, but where are they now? There's not even a major Women's professional league in this country. If this is the "token women's team sports story," then they chose poorly. If it's the "token soccer story" then the 1990 World Cup, 1994 World Cup, and 2002 World Cup all did more for the men's and women's game in this country than the '99 WWC ever did. Honestly, if Brandi Chastain didn't take her shirt off, would anyone outside of the stadium have talked about it?

The numbers that count: 0, 1, 1
Zero. That's how many of the Top 25 moments are taken from the NFL. The closest an NFL moment comes is the OJ Simpson Trial clocking in at #24, which can hardly be considered NFL-sanctioned. One is the number of the top 25 stories that actually happened in a football game, Doug Flutie's Hail Mary against Miami coming in at 11. Think about all the great finishes, individual and team efforts, Super Bowls and Bowl games, coaches, National Championships, and legacies of College and Pro Football in the last 25 years. If anything, the growth of the NFL in that time to the juggernaut that it is today is worthy of consideration.
One is also the number of events on this list from the NBA. From 1982 to the present (or depending on how much of an old-timer you are, 1998), the NBA went from a bush league also-ran to a must-see attraction. Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Isaiah Thomas (Pre-Knicks), Hakeem Olajuwon, Patrick Ewing, the "NBA on NBC" theme, Charles Barkley, Clyde Drexler, Karl Malone, all the great players and great finishes could only get 1 mention, and that was Jordan's last-shot-that-wasn't-really-his-last-shot.

#25 Wayne Gretzky sets all-time scoring mark
A huge feat to be sure, but I would argue that the Great One's move from Edmonton to Los Angeles was a bigger event, as it put the NHL on the map on the West Coast and in the Sun Belt. His play in LA revived a franchise and showed that the NHL could succeed in warm weather markets after earlier franchise failures in Atlanta and the Bay Area had halted expansion there. New teams in Dallas, Phoenix, Anaheim, Tampa Bay, Atlanta, San Jose, South Florida, Carolina, and Nashville followed shortly afterwards. The last three- and four of the last eight Stanley Cups have been won by those Sun Belt teams. 8 of the last 11 Stanley Cup Finals have featured a warm-weather team, and 6 different warm-weather-teams have made it to the Finals [Los Angeles, Anaheim (twice), Carolina (twice), Florida, Dallas (twice), Tampa Bay] since 1993.

Perhaps appropriately so for this list, the poll on the side of the page at press time asking "Which moment is your favorite of the last 25 years?" The response for "none of the above" is leading with 45% of the vote.

Suggested moments:

• "The Catch" 49ers vs. Cowboys, and 49ers dynasty
• Jordan's retirement/baseball foray/first un-retirement is at least as big a story as hitting his last-shot-that-wasn't-his-last-shot
• The Dream Team
• Even though I find it boring, the rise of NASCAR as a marketing and "sports" powerhouse.
• The stadium construction boom. Just think about how many pro and college teams are playing in new or newly renovated stadiums just since 1990.
• 1994 FIFA World Cup is (financially-wise, still) the most successful World Cup in history and gives top-flight soccer a foothold in the United States
• If you're going to include the 2004 Red Sox, you also have to include the 1994 New York Rangers