17.) 2006 (+1)
NFL: Colts (+5 * 3)
NHL: Hurricanes (-1 * 2)
MLB: Cardinals (-4 * 2)
NBA: Heat (+3)
UCL: Barcelona (-1)
NCAAF/BB: Florida / Florida (-2)
Tennis: Federer / Nadal / Federer / Federer (-2 * 2)
Kind of the platonic ideal of a sports year. Yes, when I started this, I'm somewhat surprised a year that saw my Colts win their first Super Bowl is this low, but honestly that makes a great deal of sense given what else is a counterbalance - for instance the endless Federer tennis dominance (though muted a bit by Nadal showing up at non-French events), and the Cardinals winning with 83-damn wins. The Heat was a fun ride, as a was anti-Mavs back then and seeing Shaq win was fun. Honestly, other than the Colts on teh hugely positive side, and the Cardinals on the negative, this was kind of a fairly harmless year. The Florida/Florida combination is always funny to me (and of course Florida basketball would win the next year) but I was far more annoyed by the football team and Urban Meyer (already) - I was ahead of my time.
16.) 2023 (+4)
NFL: Chiefs (+3 * 3)
NHL: Golden Knights (+3 * 2)
MLB: Rangers (-3 * 2)
NBA: Nuggets (+4)
UCL: Manchester City (-4)
NCAAF/BB: Michigan / UCONN (+3)
Tennis: Djokovic / Djokovic / Alcaraz / Djokovic (-4 * 2)
This is only the second year on my list where nothing ranks lower than a +3/-3 (my lowest ranked year is the other one). In one way, that high level of variance isn't great, but in this case most of it balances each other out, and ultimately the positivity of the Chiefs and Golden Knights winning wins out (not to mention the Nuggets, and a really fun Michigan run). Yeah, the negatives aren't great, including what ties for my least favorite tennis season with Djokovic stealing three grand slams in that little window before Sincaraz would grow up. Also the Rangers win the most meaningless, unmemorable title ever (other than Seager's home run) which I think we all kind of knew at the time. Finally, seeing that oil-funded football factory finally win was awful too given they were woefully outplayed by Inter Milan in that final. In the end, the year skews positive as we finally got a likeable (to me) back to back Super Bowl champion in KC (and a true dynasty) and the Nuggest and Vegas win their cup. But yeah, this is one of those weird one with no real throughline other than a range of emotions.
15.) 2009 (+6)
NFL: Saints (+2 * 3)
NHL: Penguins (-3 * 2)
MLB: Yankees (+3 * 2)
NBA: Lakers (-2)
UCL: Barcelona (+2)
NCAAF/M: Alabama / UNC (-2)
Tennis: Nadal / Federer / Federer / Del Potro (+1 * 2)
Weird one, where nothign is too high, nothing too low. For the Saints, while of course I was crestfallen the Colts and Peyton lost, this is probably the best team for them to lose to, the still shiny post-Katrina Saints who were so damn fun that season. For the Yankees, by this point I was in college in New York so getting them winning that year was crazy fun. Barcelona even scores highly here because I wasn't yet annoyed by them, Pep-ball was still fresh, and Man U was far more annoying at that point. I do want to say looking at this list, this has to be the most "blue blood" year ever with teh Yankees, Lakers, Barcelona, Alabama football, UNC basketball and even the Penguins winning. For tennis, it's a weird one with two of my favorite victories with Nadal finally winning on hard court and the drama and brilliance of young Delpo. But of course that sandwhiches Federer finally beating Sampras's record, winning the career slam and stealing one from Roddick. Can't win them all I guess.
14.) 2012 (+7)
NFL: Ravens (+5 * 3)
NHL: Kings (-2 * 2)
Giants (+2 * 2)
Heat (-3)
UCL: Chelsea (+2)
NCAAF/BB: Alabama / Kentucky (-3)
NCAAF/BB: Alabama / Kentucky (-3)
Tennis: Djokovic / Nadal / Federer / Murray (-2 * 2)
So, this I guess is the year that inspired this, with that beautiful "Djokovic / Nadal / Federer / Murray" quadro, but that's a negative to me mainly because the back half of the year was the scariest Nadal injury to date where he basically disappeared for half a year. Anyway, aside from that you had the dullest of dull Alabama wins (that's doing the heavy lifting in that college score) and the Heat beat a likeable Thunder team at the time I (and many) still disliked LeBron. Some may be surprised by my NHL ranking, but I will fully admit to me that while the Devils did lose that Final, including losing Games 1-2 at home in OT, the Eastern Conference Final win against the Rangers was my Stanley Cup. Finally, the Ravens, and more than that Ed Reed, finally winning a ring caps all of it anyway. On balance this was a positive year, despite be not liking a lot of what happened. For the Giants and Chelsea, no idea other than I liked those stories man.
14.) 2014 (+8)
NFL: Patriots (-4 * 3)
NHL: Kings (-2 * 2)
MLB: Giants (+4 * 2)
NBA: Spurs (+5)
UCL: Real Madrid (+5)
NCAAF/BB: Ohio State / UCONN (+2)
Tennis: Wawrinka / Nadal / Djokovic / Cilic (+2 * 2)
The shock may be not having the Patriots win, with the Malcolm Butler of it all, as a -5, but that's basically because I didn't really like the Seahawks either. Anyway, the rest of the year makes up for it big time across the board (other than the Kings). We get the Spurs and Real Madrid with absolutely epic titles. This is where admittedly my random weighting is screwing things, because it doesn't really accoutn for where the winner is one of my teams. But I have to live by my wack formula here, but trust me this probably should rank higher up for the Spurs and Real Madrid wins alone. UCONN was fun at that point because it became hilarious that this random team won again, with now Kevin Ollie at coach and beat Kentucky. Finally, the Giants were fun because I had this evenutally wrong idea that if the random as hell Giants would win a third World Series in five years, that we would stop caring about ringz. Didn't happen, but in the moment it was an amazing thought. As a random aside, I do think the 2014 World Series had the highest combined potential score, in teh sense even if the Royals won, it probably would;ve been a +4 and I don't know if any final(s) would score higher than a combined +8 - a ranking for another day I guess.
13.) 2005 (+9)
NFL: Steelers (-1 * 3)
NHL: n/a (0)
MLB: White Sox (+1 * 2)
NBA: Spurs (+4)
UCL: Liverpool (+4)
NCAAF/BB: Texas / North Carolina (-2)
Tennis: Safin / Nadal / Federer / Federer (+2 * 2)
It is weird that this ranks so high, but then again, no individual grade is too low, and there's two +4's, even if those are in low weighting sports. By this point I was all in on Pop and the Spurs, mostly because I loved them playing fast in that year's Conference Finals against the Suns. Liverpool was more just loving the story of that year, probably the first year I really followed European Soccer, and watching what is still remembered as the Miracle on teh Bosphorus. Tennis gives us probably as good a year as we can get that also involved Federer winning two slams, and Nadal won his first (was already a fan) and Safin beat Fed in my lowkey greatest match ever watched (was always a Safin fan). The big elephant in the room on this one is to some degree giving the NHL a pass for cancelling a season. I shouldn't probably do that, but because of that this becomes a net positive year in many ways. Quickly on college though, North Carolina really ruins this as we had probably the best tournament ever start to finish in 2005, and had a great title game but the wrong team winning. Alas, can't win them all.
11.) 2007 (+12)
NFL: Giants (+5 * 3)
NHL: Ducks (+4 * 2)
MLB: Red Sox (-4 * 2)
NBA: Spurs (+4)
UCL: AC Milan (+2)
NCAAF/B: LSU / Florida (-3)
Tennis: Federer / Nadal / Federer / Federer (-3 * 2)
Great start, but trails off a bit, huh. The Giants win is probably my single biggest '+' that doesn't involve one of my favorite teams. Still can't believe they pulled it off in such perfect fashion to end perfection. The Ducks were a fun, stacked team, that allowed me to watch Scott Neidermayer captain his way to a cup. The Spurs of course, are the Spurs, and beat LeBron when my sick childhood mind still disliked him. For the Red Sox, I was plainly anti-Boston at this point. In fact, it was probably this title that broke me for all Boston sports for good. The college ones were just boring, and tennis dominance was almost similarly so - the only drama being of the bad kind with Federer ripping away a game Nadal at Wimbledon. Anyway, I'm a bit surprised this didn't rank higher, but that's what happens again when I cap my scale at +/-5, because if there was a '+10' that I could give out in this made up system, by God I would've with the Giants.
10.) 2002 (+14)
NFL: Buccaneers (+2 * 3)
NHL: Red Wings (+2 * 2)
MLB: Angels (-3 * 2)
NBA: Lakers (-2)
UCL: Real Madrid (+3)
NCAAF/BB: Ohio State / Maryland (+3)
Tennis: Johannson / Costa / Hewitt / Sampras (+3 * 2)
I have no idea how this scores high, other than I guess Pete Sampras's swansong US Open win for his 14th slam is a great capper. To be honest, none of the other tennis results are particularly meaningful in either direction, but watching old man Sampras (who of course was 31....) win a slam again was just beautiful after watching him lose the last two US Open Finals. As for the rest, I guess this is also the power of the greatest Champions League Final goal ever (yes, better than Bale's bicycle kick) with Zidane's still epic volley against Leverkusen. Ohio State was also a super fun story, and I had a good friend in my class at the time who was an Ohio State fan who was pumping up Maurice Clarett from the beginning of the year. Finally, the Buccaneers, despite beating the Raiders, were somewhat fun in the sense I could already tell they were something historic on defense. The Lakers probably shoulds core lower if I were grading this off of the real NBA finals that was their robbery against the Kings, but alas. Finally, it may seem weird rating a almost comically unfair Red Wings team this high, but screw the Hurricanes.
9.) 2015 (+14)
NFL: Broncos (+5 * 3)
NHL: Blackhawks: (+3 * 2)
MLB: Royals (+4 * 2)
NBA: Warriors (+2)
UCL: Barcelona (-4)
NCAAF/B: Alabama / Duke (-5)
Tennis: Djokovic / Wawrinka / Djokovic / Djokovic (-4 * 2)
It's crazy this and 2002 are the same score given how damn high or low most of these are. Also, call this the power of my weightings because a year where Barcelona beat a great Juve team in the UCL final, we had peak annoying Saban Alabama and (even worse) Coach K Duke win, and then Djokovic start his romp to the Djoko-Slam still be this high is a testament to how much I care about those top three sports. The Broncos score where they do because obviously they do - a ride to teh sunset for Manning and watching that orgasmic defense. The funny thing about those NHL and MLB scores is I don't think they're all that different even if both series go the other way - those were both really high "don't care which team wins" series (probably should be another list....). And for the Warriors, at this point they were still fresh and fun. God, the 2015 Royals are still incredible aren't they - I don't think enough gets said about the small market Royals making back to back World Series and winning one. That happened folks.
