http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/09/27/hated.sports.ap/index.html MOST HATED SPORTS 1. Dogfighting (I didn't even know this was considered a sport) 2. Pro Wrestling (ditto) 3. Bullfighting (sorry, but killing an animal with a weapon is not a sport) 4. Pro Boxing (I like boxing, but I can see why this is up here) 5. PGA Tour (boring at times, but can't believe that many people hate it) 6. PGA Seniors (I can understand the dislike here) 7. LPGA Tour (I watch this more than I used to; there are some young woman on the tour that can really whack the ball) 8. NASCAR (hmmm) 9. Major League Soccer (most popular sport in the world right?) 10. ATP Men's Tennis (don't ever watch it, but i always thought it was popular) Poll reveals most hated sports include dogfighting, golf Those surveyed disliked violence, fake violence and gentility Saturday, September 27, 2003 Posted: 5:45 PM EDT (2145 GMT) (AP) -- Popularity polls come and go. As the baseball playoffs begin, the National Football League is boasting that one poll shows it is more than twice as popular as the national pastime. For a deeper insight into the American psyche, consider the sports that are loathed the most. No. 1 on the list, by far, is dogfighting, hated or disliked a lot by 81 percent of the public, according to a poll conducted by the Sports Marketing Group in Atlanta. No. 2 is pro wrestling, legal but farcical and more than a little trashy. That's also its appeal to those who love it, though more than half the nation can't stand the sight of over-muscled showmen slamming each other around the ring -- fake or not. No. 3 is bullfighting, a sport that Americans who haven't been to Spain or Mexico or read Hemingway don't get, never see and, apparently, don't want. Then there's pro boxing at No. 4, loathed by 31.3 percent of the public. Need we say more than Mike Tyson and Don King? No real surprises there, considering the violence of those sports and the aversion toward them, especially by women. But this is where the list gets interesting, with class, race and age figuring into the findings. The genteel PGA Tour is the No. 5 most hated and disliked sport (30.4 percent), followed by the PGA seniors' Champions Tour (29.9), the LPGA Tour (29.2), NASCAR (27.9), Major League Soccer (27.6) and the ATP men's tennis tour (26.5). That's a lot of people who hate or dislike events that sponsors are backing with billions of bucks. All those sports, to be sure, have their share of passionate fans who love them or like them a lot but the level of antipathy toward them is astonishing. Golf, even in the age of Tiger Woods, still turns off many Americans with its snooty country club image. The image may not fit reality -- there are plenty of public courses played by middle-class golfers -- but perception is everything in polls. Three times as many black fans -- 13.4 percent -- say they love or like the PGA Tour now compared to 1993, doubtlessly because of Woods. But that hasn't put much of a dent in the number of people who still can't stand the sport. Ten years ago the hate/dislike figures on the PGA Tour were roughly the same -- 31.9 percent. NASCAR turns off almost as many with the opposite image: red, white and blue -- or as some see it, redneck, blue collar and white skin -- even if it is has broadened its appeal to millions who don't fit that description. Soccer still seems like a foreign film with subtitles to many Americans, and men's tennis has lacked a few small essentials: stars, diversity and compelling rivalries. They are all held in lower regard by more people than the NHL, the Arena Football League, the Indy Racing League, women's college basketball and the WNBA. NBA, MLB make list too But the big story in this list of sports Americans hate most -- based on a telephone poll of 1,000 respondents that is a prelude to a larger study later this year -- is what comes next: the NBA, with 19.7 percent of the country hating or disliking it, and Major League Baseball, with 17.5 percent strongly against it. For most of the sports, with the exception of NASCAR, which has grown both in popularity and unpopularity with increased exposure on television, there was little change from the Sports Marketing Group's study that asked the same questions 10 years ago. For the NBA, though, the hate/dislike responses increased sharply from 11.9 percent a decade ago, while baseball's negative numbers nearly doubled from 9.9 percent. Baseball isn't quite as bad off as the NFL is claiming from a Harris Poll that says pro football is more than twice as popular as baseball. In the Sports Marketing Group poll, the NFL was loved or liked a lot by 42.8 percent of Americans, while baseball's popularity number was 31.8 percent. "In the NBA, there are underlying racial issues and resentment about how the players act, how many get arrested and how much they're paid," said Sports Marketing Group managing director Nye Lavalle. "In baseball, the labor disputes, the huge salaries, the perception of players on steroids and their perceived arrogance are factors." Ten years ago, only 12.5 percent of white Americans had strong feelings against the NBA. In the poll this year, that soared to 21.1 percent of whites who hated or disliked the NBA. The number of black respondents who felt that way stayed virtually unchanged at under 3 percent. "There's been a seismic shift in the fan base of the NBA," Lavalle said. "If the league keeps going in the same direction, it's going to be in deep trouble. Baseball is on the decline and it could be dying if it doesn't change the way it's structured." In other words, both sports may be going to the dogs.
i hate NASCAR, WNBA, BASEBALL (TOO BORING IMO), SOCCER (TOO LONG BUT I WATCH THE WORLD CUP THOUGH), and LA CROSSE!!!
I wouldn't say most hated but boring sports are: NASCAR(hate the oval track, they just go round and round. It only gets really interesting when they collide with no one serious hurt that it) -baseball(pretty boring at time) -WWF(it's silly, use to like it but now it's totally r****ded at time) -GOLF(very boring to watch) -Curling(yawn) Favorite Sports: NBA Volleyball NHL Soccer Track&Field
1. NASCAR- there is nothing stock about a "stock cah" What a bunch of redneck, white trash stupidity. 2. WNBA- women's college hoops works in some place , no one cares about a pro league for them though. 3. Hockey- only people who shovel snow and have names with too many consonants like hockey. It's like the joke, I went to a fight and I saw a hockey game breakout. 4. WWE- not a sport 5. Pro tennis- boring as sin unless Anna Kournikova is losing a tournament. Watching her bounce around makes it worthwhile. 6. Formula One- dyametric opposite of NASCAR, worst use of high tech everything that makes races no-passing parades. 7. horse racing- totally useless except for gambling.
Curling, baseball, WWF, Car racing bore me on TV. Watching golf usually does, too, a little bit less since I started playing golf a few years ago. Other sports that bore the hell out of me are any kind of horseback riding (except races where they fall and stuff), dancing, ice skating, gymnastics and stuff like that. I have to admit that I do like a good boxing fight, even though the rational side of me thinks that the sport is not really a good thing. I also love watching soccer, NBA, track and field (running, especially the relays) and, during the Olympic Games, swimming. Tennis - it depends on who is playing, I used to love watching Boris Becker or John McEnroe.
I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate baseball. A hellish disease that obliterated all players and parks would make me smile. Baseball is the genesis of all evil. It is the germ of smug, racist, anti-intellectual, backward self-abuse. Die, stretch-pant scum, die. And take your stupid ball caps with you to hell.
I hate tennis, wnba, golf, baseball, auto racing , which i dont consider a sport, wwf, and syncrinize (sp) swimming. I have to disagree with those who dont like hockey. I think it is a great sport. It probaly is the toughest sport in the world. You gotta have the endurance to skate up and down a rink all nite and u do have to know how to SKATE. Then of course u gotta be able to handle yourself in a scrap with another player. I enjoy hockey cause it combines the fast pace of the NBA and the contact of the NFL. GROWng up in philly, PA my dad used to take me to Flyers games as a kid. That was during the 1980's, Flyers (Broad Street Bullies) were the baddest team in the league. They started fights during the warmups. I remember one game where a fight broke out during a warmup and it was a bench clearing brawl. It lasted for over 30 minutes and they had to call in the cops.
don't the best players not even play half of the game? i'm pretty sure i saw ice times of like 26 minutes when seeing the leaders one time. dogfighting - how can people like that at all? lets see animals hurt each other. great. and bullfighting? lets stab a bull with a bunch of things, then taunt it and run it ragged, then stab it to death. brilliant. crazy americans for not liking it. the nba definitely has a problem marketing a black sport to a predominantly white population. there used to be so many more white people in the game just 15 years ago it seems but they can't hang now and the population isn't quite ready to fully come along for the ride.
Ice Hockey: The ball is too small and moves too fast for my eyeballs to follow all the time. It's like "where the **** is the ball?"Sometimes a magnifying glass in front of TV is needed to track the ball's movement, but then I couldn't see anything else. j/k about the last part. Auto racing in general except when it's held in narrow streets where a lot of crashing is bound to happen. Once it was held in the streets of Macau. It's like watching a bunch of furious animals being herded through a funnel and get squeezed one by one along the way, pretty sadistic fun if ya ask me, ranks up there with modern boxers' sissy fights with gloves. WWF: Please don't mix up stunts show with sports. NFL: Reminds me of two clans of big, menacing apes fighting for a papaya in the dawn of ice age. Understandable but not my type of fun. Baseball: I tried to like it but gave up after half an hour, it's hard to like it when I don't even know the rules.
My 2 cents...which is probably going to offend a few folks but I'm the one paying the monthly satellite bill... 1) Professional Wrestling is NOT a sport and I find it both stupid and detestable. Years ago when I was growing up, my loving immigrant grandmother who spoke broken English watched and enjoyed it greatly...I lost interest and we both got turned onto real sports when I was about 12 or so. 2) "Stock Cars" are not stock. A waste of the world's finite resources. 3) I don't know anybody who actually likes golf...I only know a lot of people who are addicted to it. Too damned boring. 4) It probably was a golf addict that invented soccer...it kept golf from being the most boring sport on earth. 5) I hate being cold and consequently can't watch hockey or "winter sports". Hockey bores me...what's the old schtick...I went to a boxing match the other evening and a hockey game broke out... 6) Baseball...not fun until the playoffs get near. Too dominated by big money markets. Look at the payrolls and then look at the standings. 7) College Football - give the NCAA the death penalty. The players are all mostly pros to begin with. Lose the fascade. 8) Pro Football - A series of events lead to my not watching more than 2 or 3 minutes of any pro game (usually during a channel surf) over the past 15+ years. The invention of the Ickie Shuffle and it's related end zone celebration spin-offs, the Oilers' second half rollover against the Bills and Numero Uno - Art Modell yanking the original Browns franchise (now Ravens) out from under the 80,000+ screaming maniacs in the coldest open air stadium to ever exist because they wouldn't build and pay for sky boxes to line his pockets. F U Modell and rot in hell. 9) Basketball - the last bastion of my interest in spectator sports. I'm so thankful for humble Rocket players like Dream and Yao. But if the Rox ever traded Steve Francis for an Iverson type, it would be a close call on renewing my NBALP for its sixth season. Hmmm...just went back to "proof" it...seems like a lot of angst. Maybe (at least for me) the importance of sports just lessens as we mature. Well, some of us do.
Ouch -- tough crowd. Not only do I like watching golf (PGA, LPGA and European), I'm a HUGE men's tennis fan. I guess my only saving grace, according to this list, is that I think engaging an animal in dog-fighting earns you a one-way ticket to hell.
Cohen - Someone addicted to playing also likes to watch. IOW, do you know of anyone (assuming no physical disabilities) that likes to watch but does not like to play? They are almost an identical subset. I realize this is a minority opinion but I just dislike golf...spectating or playing. I'm over 40, but when I was younger it was a standard joke of mine that I would never truly be old until I played golf...still don't own a set of clubs. Shooting hoops is far preferable! BTW - For the record my personal addiction is music. Playing piano is preferable to almost all spectator sports. And I can setup my synth in front of the TV as I watch the Rox!
WNBA cause they think their affiliation with the NBA gives them credibility. I'd pay to see the 5A boys state champion beat the Detroit Shock by 30.
I don't like any sport that isn't basketball. The only one I really hate is MLB... well, just the Astros because they always find a way to interrupt whatever radio show I'm fond off (be it Jim Rome in the late '90s or the Coast to Coast AM replays now). Like everyone else has stated, pro wrestling isn't a sport. Going by this lists' criteria, I could put ballet in my number one most hated spot.
