Which professional sport is your fave?

[scottie]

<poll>

[Indy Coug]

Based on the amount of time I spend watching, it's the NBA, but I really don't watch any of the professional leagues that much compared to college football and basketball.

[scottie]

It's still early but I'm surprised by the number of MLB votes. (I love MLB, btw, but it's not what I picked).

[beefytee]

I put the NHL, but College football would definitely win if you included non-professional.

College basketball would probably beat out the NHL for me as well.

[BoylenOver]

NHL would be my top. I'm more likely to watch a Thrashers/Lightning game in mid-December than I am of watching a game that doesn't involve my favorite team in any other sport (excluding the NCAA tournament).

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I'm divided between the NBA and NFL, but I voted for the NFL. The NBA's regular season is more or less meaningless, while the NFL's regular season is great. The NBA's postseason is better than the NFL's postseason.

I'm probably equally excited by both sports, so the tiebreaker will come down to the quality of the reffing in the relative leagues. I know the Lakers are the legitimate champs this year, but other years' champions seemed to have hinged on what the refs/league big wigs did. 2006 Miami Heat and the 2007 San Antonio Spurs immediately come to mind. The Heat-Mavs Finals represents to me the apex of poor NBA officiating. Miami really should have an asterix next to that title.

It's quite a bit more difficult to say that the 2007 Spurs were a sham, but with Phoenix tying the series 2-2 and having home court, Phoenix probably had a better than 50% chance of winning that series. Enter Robert Horry at the end of Game 4 and he decides to bodycheck Nash into the scorer's table (and Nash then dramaticized the hit). Stoudemire and Diaw leave the bench and the stupid league with the stupid rules throws Phoenix's only two legitimate big men out of Game 5. Granted, those were the rules and those players broke them. But the rule is incredibly dumb in light of the fact that these teams are often tight knit and its sometimes impossible to keep guys glued to their seats when they think their teammate has been mugged. So, were the Spurs really the best team that year? Who knows? The nice thing about 7 game series is that they usually determine who the best team is. That's the advantage it has over a single elimination system. The NBA screws that up sometimes.

The single elimination system sometimes produces upsets which are exciting but you're left thinking that the champion got lucky. Were the 2001 Patriots really the best team in the league that year? The tuck rule game was retarded, and then they upset a team that would have gone down as one of the best ever had they won (the 2001 Rams). But the 2001 Patriots and the tuck rule game is the exception- the NFL seems to be a much more fair league than the NBA even if the best team may not win it every year.

[I.J. Reilly]

I think college basketball should be included on this list. They've really been making their case as a professional sport lately.

[MartyFunkhouser]

If you pick something other than MLB you are a communist.

[JohnnyLingo]

I love the NBA, even if I get very frustrated with it due to the reasons CMBF outlined.

I think the biggest problem is that David Stern feels that the act of acknowledging there are problems with the officiating will undermine the league's credibility too much.

Meanwhile, everyone knows there are problems anyway, and Stern's refusal to seriously address the issues makes people think he doesn't care or is covering something up.

[TripletDaddy]

If you pick something other than MLB you are a communist.

Speaking of which....big series starting today. Predictions?

[SipiTau]

My preference in order:

Tri-Nations: Southern Hemisphere Rugby Comp (NZ All Blacks, South Africa & Oz)

Super 14: Professional rugby comprising teams from NZ, Oz & South Africa.

UFC/MMA

NBA

NFL- Will only watch if I have a relative or acquaintance playing.

[RockyBalboa]

My favorite professional team is the Utah Jazz,,,,but outside of them I'm not a huge fan of the NBA....but I must admit, aside from how boring and predictable the Finals were that this years edition of the playoffs was better than normal and had more drama than usual.

I love the NFL...I could watch any game regardless of who is on...and I can't say that about any of the other Professional Sports.

[creekster]

Cycling. Mark your calendars; the Tour de France starts July 4th!

[SeattleUte]

Sunday nights I take my oldest son back to his mother on Bainbridge Island. I take all three of my youngest on the trip and return with the other two; it's a ritual they prize. Sometimes a Mariners or Seahawks game has just let out.

Mariner fans: Nuclear families; sometimes groups of guys hanging out, but also quite a lot of grannies and children; all seated fairly quietly enjoying the ride and the beautiful scenery.

Seahawk fans: Widespread drunken revelry; fisticuffs and slippin and slidin on spilled beer; the odor of alchohol redolent; f-bombs all over the place; women whith their tits hanging out; tatoos galore; an unusually heavy trafficing of harleys on the auto deck.

[UtahDan]

I'm amazed that this is not overwhelming NFL since that is the most popular sport in our country by a mile. I wonder if there is a Utah dynamic working here. Seems like a lot of my Utah friends past and present just aren't that into the NFL. Too far from an NFL city? Pull of college football too strong in state?

Maybe my view is skewed by living in a football town, but almost every one I know in the east is a die hard fan of some franchise. Tons of Steelers fans around, for example, Dallas fans even.