Sports are arguably too important in the average guy’s life. Guys are the ones arguing against that point. Sports cause guys to skip family events and work obligations for meaningless mid-season games and preseason action. Yet there is the negative half of sports; the kinds of things that make the average guy cringe at when he spends his average 60 hours a week “with” his favorite teams. Now there can be a number of things guys hate about sports, but I thought I’d come up with just a few:

Check out Top 10 Things Guys Hate About Sports after the flip!

Sideline reporters

Exceptions to this rule include but are not limited to Bonnie Bernstein, Erin Andrews and Peter Gammons. Why Peter Gammons you ask? Because he is already in the Hall of Fame and still reports the most exclusive baseball news you can find. It’s like Hugh Hefner still copy editing Playboy.

Guys hate sideline reporters because they bring absolutely nothing to the table except generic athlete-speak that you’re just going to hear after the game. Example: “What do you think you can do to turn this game around in the second half coach?” “Well we just have to play better you know, come out here and really take it to them and try and put some points on the board.” It’s like they read the John Madden Bible as soon as the cameras come on. Dumb.

Women’s Bowling

While we’re at it, throw in women’s billiards and the WNBA. I understand that women want to play too and that’s fine, but from a guy’s point of view there is no reason we want to watch you work for a 7-10 spilt while sporting your 1983 librarian glasses and black tight leg jeans. We’ll watch women’s tennis because they hit almost as hard as the guys while not actually looking like Roger Federer. We’ll watch softball because, and they are few and far between, sometimes a player is gorgeous and we like to imagine hitting a home run down the 205′ line off her and then taking her to Dairy Queen.

Yet when it comes to Women’s Bowling/Billiards/Basketball we just aren’t buying. There’s no sense in watching women with wrist/finger/knee braces who resemble your buddy Steve. Advertisers know this too, as you’ll never see a Viagra commercial during the 2008 Women’s Billiards Championship. Speaking of which…

Erectile Dysfunction Commercials

Look if you have erectile dysfunction chances are you’ve either already brought it up to your doctor or hung up the spikes for good. The endless commercials that feature grey haired men fishing together, dancing with their wives, building a rocking chair, or just doing a lot of hugging are really are cutting into quality television programming. If you’ve ever watched an hour of golf on TV you will undoubtedly start to question yourself during every commercial break, wondering when your next doctor’s appointment is.

When these commercials first started they were bland, tasteful, and left to the imagination, all while including a generally unhappy man who is probably looking at divorce, to a happy ballroom dancing man. Now commercials include “contact your doctor if erections last more than 4 hours” and “side effects may include Gastro esophageal reflux”. We’d all be fine with: “Can’t get it up? Take this pill”, now move on to a Bud Light commercial or Wilford Brimley talking about diabetes testing supplies.

Pickoff Moves

I think one time in the 70’s the Fake-to-Third-Fake-to-First pickoff move actually worked. I imagine it was at the filming of The Bad News Bears. Ever since then though pitchers throughout the years attempt this move as if to say “hey, I’m more afraid of the guy at the plate, so I’m going to pray to God this works and I don’t care how dumb I look or pathetic I seem doing it”.

The problem with the pickoff move is the time it takes to do it. The game of baseball moves slowly enough already, as it’s partnered with golf as the two sports you can either get extremely excited for or take a nap during play. Actually if you’ve ever tired just watch a Braves telecast on TBS- it’s like walking into a funeral home, you’ll be out in no time. This way you can sleep through Tim Hudson pick off moves.

TV Timeouts

TV timeouts when you’re watching TV are fine, as you might be able to get in-game update for other scores and news, or a two minute lecture on I have genital herpes. And I don’t. Guys hate when you’re actually attending a game and their team takes the momentum and goes on a huge run, only to have a TV timeout come in and cause half of the fan base either to space out at Jumbotron commercials or wait to use the pee trough. Besides a fart on an airplane, nothing is more disheartening or unwanted.

Ushers

There are two types of ushers at a sporting event. One’s that guys hate, and one’s that guys really hate. The lesser of two evils just stands there and watches the game, letting you pay the beer guy to never leave your section and throw peanut shells in dyed comb-over sitting two rows down.

The Usher From Hell checks every ticket like there’s anthrax on it, makes sure you know exactly where your seats are while you are actually standing in that row already, and guards your section like Gary Payton (when he was “The Glove”, not when he’s “I’m old so I’m just going to shoot from whatever spot I receive the ball”). It’s this man who foils your plan of buying upper deck seats and eventually sitting behind the dugout by the 8th inning and heckling Arod about what you read in Star about him.

Explaining Things

Guys hate having a large crowd of people over watching a sporting event, then having a controversial play happen and having to explain why a certain call was made. Exceptions to this include calls that are blown on the field or calls where no one has any idea what’s going on (examples include Steve Bartman, Brett Hull in the crease, Chris Webber’s time out, and Jeffrey Maier ).

What guys hate is when its mid-April during a meaningless baseball game and your buddy’s girlfriend asks you why that guy gets to go to first base if he didn’t hit the ball. This is when you give your buddy the are-you-kidding-me-with-this-shit look.

Lack of Instant Replay

Purists will claim that instant replay destroys the history of the game and takes out human error. Find any purist though who watches their favorite team lose a point/game/series to a blown call and you’ll find that guy changing his tune.

In a perfect world umpires and referees would be perfect, but they aren’t as they are humans and sometimes fat, and a guy hates nothing more than losing a game due to a missed call. That and maybe day trips to botanical gardens.

The Same Side Heckler

Guys hate it when fans will heckle the home team players for no reason other than this fan clearly hasn’t watched the team in a decade. You find this a lot in New York and Philadelphia, two cities known for booing their reigning champions and Santa Claus. You want to bash the guy for hitting .220 into August? Totally acceptable. You want to boo him relentlessly for sporting a 120 yards 0TD 3INT stat line? Fine. But booing the guy who’s hitting .485 with runners in scoring position because he fouled out with a guy on third doesn’t fly. You can tell the heckler that sentence too to shut him up. Who cares if it’s true or not.

Inadequate Parking

Sporting events are like weddings to guys. You look forward to them for a long time, know that everything that goes on there is going to be awesome, and hope you don’t throw up in the bathroom while the fun is still going on. Everyone even dresses alike usually.

Guys hate it though when there is inadequate parking at their sporting event. Whether it be the tailgating has already commenced and the only lot that’s open shares a drive-thru with a Burger King, or the lots around the stadium are so congested that parking costs more than the ticket to the game, guys hate parking. The only way to combat this is the tailgate route, which usually requires devoting an entire twenty hours or so to a game that lasts on average just under three hours. Guys like that.

Jim “Big Cat” Kelly is the managing editor of JimKellyJr.com, check out his site for more witty content like “20 Predictions For The Second Half Of The 2008 MLB Season.”