Biggest chokes in sports history?

[GooooMarquette]

This wasn't a choke.    Cleveland earned it.   Having Green miss a game and Bogut out certainly helped the momentum shift to the Cavaliers.   But remember, without Irving and Love, Cleveland took GS to 6 last year.    Time to acknowledge that LeBron is an all-timer.    Losing to an all-timer, with all of his teammates healthy, while not having all of your pieces every game, is not a choke.

Agreed.

Sure, the Warriors had the best regular season record and a 3-1 lead, but as you stated, the losses of Green and Bogut totally shifted the momentum.  And LeBron and Irving played like champions.

I wanted the Warriors to win, but I tip my cap to a Cavaliers team that truly earned this championship.

[WellsstreetWanderer]

At the same time, do we get to hear how lucky LeBron and the Cavs are to have had Bogut go out with injury like we heard about the Warriors all year?  Losing Love was addition by subtraction.  Losing Irving hurt.  Losing Bogut hurt this year.

 Didn't MWP tweet something about luck being a big part of winning a championship? ( In response to comments about game 6 being"rigged"

[warriorchick]

You go 73-9 and are up 3-1 it's a choke. I don't care if it's against the 96 Bulls, you have that type of regular season you're expected to win or else you choked.

That isn't taking anything away from lebron, not a fan of his persona or demeanor but he is an all time great.

I am going with my guy Drew Magary on this one:

http://deadspin.com/hey-warriors-you-are-choking-crapbags-1782281499


ETA:  Unfortunately, Drew is a potty mouth.  Substitute the "s" word for "crap" or the link won't work.

[Benny B]

I am going with my guy Drew Magary on this one:

http://deadspin.com/hey-warriors-you-are-choking-crapbags-1782281499


ETA:  Unfortunately, Drew is a potty mouth.  Substitute the "s" word for "crap" or the link won't work.

As always, the best part of any article on DS is the comments section.

[Eldon]

As always, the best part of any article on DS is the comments section.

Beautiful.  Just beautiful.  The article itself gave me some hearty  laughs.  I had never seen that Beiber vine before.  Very very funny.

[Lennys Tap]

I am going with my guy Drew Magary on this one:

http://deadspin.com/hey-warriors-you-are-choking-crapbags-1782281499


ETA:  Unfortunately, Drew is a potty mouth.  Substitute the "s" word for "crap" or the link won't work.

Great stuff, Chick. Hilarious and pretty much dead on. The 73-9, "greatest team ever" became the first and only team in NBA finals history to blow a 3-1 lead. And 2 of the 3 losses were at home. And this happened because the great "Rim Protector" Andre Bogut missed a couple of games? Andrew frickin' Bogut? Seriously? No, it happened because while Steph Curry was being too cool for school (that errant, totally unnecessary behind the back passes was both parts so dumb and arrogant it made me a Cavs fan) and Draymont Green was playing the fool, Lebron James, Kyrie Irving, et al outplayed and outworked them. By a lot.

Make no mistake. For the defending champs (and the team with the best record in NBA history) to turn into the only team in NBA history to blow a 3-1 lead is a choke job of monumental proportions. They didn't miss a field goal or make an error. They got their asses handed to them 3 straight games (2 of them at home) while looking (with the exception of Klay Thompson and last night anyway Draymont Green) equal parts inept and disinterested.

What was it? The final 4:39 of the game without a point? While they turned it over or jacked up contested 3s off the dribble while eschewing any semblance of their normal offense? Quintessential choke.

[muwarrior69]

Yanks blowing 3 games to none lead to Red Sox and a 4-3 lead heading into the 9th of game 4 with Mariano Rivera ready to close.

Yup! ...and I'm a Yankee Fan. Now if that happened to the Red Sox, Mets, Cubs or the Old Brooklyn Dodgers we'd all understand, but the Yankees, c'mon!

[tower912]

Jean van de Velde.    18th at Carnoustie.   

[brewcity77]

Have we forgotten the 2011 Marquette team that lost leads to Louisville, Notre Dame, and UConn all in the span of 10 days?  No choker could ever choke more than the choking dogs of Marquette that peed down their legs.

[Galway Eagle]

Have we forgotten the 2011 Marquette team that lost leads to Louisville, Notre Dame, and UConn all in the span of 10 days?  No choker could ever choke more than the choking dogs of Marquette that peed down their legs.

The Louisville and Vanderbilt losses were definitely chokes but I think the prior team choked more against Florida state, DePaul, WVU, Nova, and ND

[brewcity77]

The Louisville and Vanderbilt losses were definitely chokes but I think the prior team choked more against Florida state, DePaul, WVU, Nova, and ND

Guessing you're too new to Scoop to remember this...

http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=23962.0

[MU82]

Agree that GS losing that series the way they did was a choke job.

Green did it to himself by missing that one game, but he also played pretty poorly in Games 3 and 6 (as well as several in the OKC series). There was zero, zero, zero guarantee that they win Game 5 with him.

Bogut? Maybe, early in games they missed him as a defensive tone-setter and also missed his fouls, but let's not make him out to be Shaq or Russell or even Mutombo. The man averaged 16.6 minutes in the playoffs -- roughly a third of each game -- after averaging 20.7 minutes during the regular season. Given that they won 73 games, I would say they were pretty good at playing without him. And he played little if at all down the stretch of any important game; their lineup was at its best without him.

As I said, it was a choke, but I really don't think it was a huge one. Compared to, say, the Cubs in Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS, Greg Norman in the Masters, the 1964 Phillies and plenty of others I could name if I had more than 2 minutes before hitting the send button here so I can take my dog for a walk, I don't think it was that monumental of a choke. They were facing the best player in the world, and they never had the Cavs beaten in any of the final three games.

[Pakuni]

Biggest choke in sports history?
How about this guy?

[Herman Cain]

High level competitive sports is not an easy thing. I respect all athletes who make it to the upper tiers of their sport. So I do not really subscribe to the notion of choking. There are going to be winners and losers. Some athletes  are simply better at maintaining their calmness and focus in critical moments and that is what makes them a winner. If you really peel the onion back you will find the guys who don't choke have lots and lots of experience playing their sport back to their youth days and things flow for them naturally.

[Sheriff]

You gotta have the 2012 U.S. Ryder Cup team on the short list.

I was there to witness that.  Ouch.

[Sheriff]

Jordan Speith at Augusta, 2016.

[warriorchick]

I was there to witness that.  Ouch.

It happened down the street from me.

[Sheriff]

It happened down the street from me.

Same here.  My wife and I walked home from Medinah.

[jsglow]

Biggest choke in sports history?
How about this guy?

+1. I remember the announcers admonishing him every time he grabbed a club. 'Just take your triple bogey and win the damn thing.'

Greg Norman was like an ice block in the sun. Took hours to melt away.

[MU82]

High level competitive sports is not an easy thing. I respect all athletes who make it to the upper tiers of their sport. So I do not really subscribe to the notion of choking. There are going to be winners and losers. Some athletes  are simply better at maintaining their calmness and focus in critical moments and that is what makes them a winner. If you really peel the onion back you will find the guys who don't choke have lots and lots of experience playing their sport back to their youth days and things flow for them naturally.

The AP lead after the Cubs lost Game 7 of the 2003 NLCS:

CHICAGO - Kerry Wood trudged off the mound with his head down, flipping his glove into the stands as he hit the dugout steps. In the biggest start of his life Wednesday night, the Chicago Cubs' ace couldn't pitch his team into the World Series.

The Florida Marlins got seven hits and seven runs off Wood in 5 2-3 innings, and they went on to a 9-6 victory to win the NL championship series after trailing three games to one.

"I felt I let the team town, the organization down and the city of Chicago down," Wood said. "I choked."

You are free to "not subscribe to the notion of choking," but the Cubs' top pitcher of that decade came right out and said that's exactly what he did. It wasn't the first time he said it about himself, and he also said it about his team's collective choke the previous night.

[Eldon]

The AP lead after the Cubs lost Game 7 of the 2003 NLCS:

CHICAGO - Kerry Wood trudged off the mound with his head down, flipping his glove into the stands as he hit the dugout steps. In the biggest start of his life Wednesday night, the Chicago Cubs' ace couldn't pitch his team into the World Series.

The Florida Marlins got seven hits and seven runs off Wood in 5 2-3 innings, and they went on to a 9-6 victory to win the NL championship series after trailing three games to one.

"I felt I let the team town, the organization down and the city of Chicago down," Wood said. "I choked."

You are free to "not subscribe to the notion of choking," but the Cubs' top pitcher of that decade came right out and said that's exactly what he did. It wasn't the first time he said it about himself, and he also said it about his team's collective choke the previous night.

Including the fans!

Biggest choke job ever by a fan?  Cubbies win.

[Eldon]

Cubs should paint this seat black.  Or remove it and send it to Miami to enshrine in the Marlins HOF.  Actually, I bet some Marlins fan would pay good money to have it.

[Tugg Speedman]

Why get detailed ...

The 20th century Cubs.

[Galway Eagle]

Guessing you're too new to Scoop to remember this...

http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=23962.0

No I used to read CS and scoop before I signed up. Just can't remember every post. Genuinely impressed that you did though.

More disappointed I forgot about that @ND game since I was there.

[Pakuni]