For those who thought sports was about dealing with adversity, 2006 was for you. Almost no one came through it unscathed.
Not Tiger Woods, who put together one of the greatest second-half runs golf has ever seen, but only after burying his father and dearest friend, Earl Woods.
Not Ben Roethlisberger, who won a Super Bowl in February, crashed his motorcycle in June and was laid up again by an emergency appendectomy just before the Steelers' opener in September. Small wonder he struggled to regain his grip on a shaky team that likely won't make the playoffs the season after winning it all.
Not Floyd Landis, whose too-good-to-be true comeback win at the Tour de France apparently was. Nor Justin Gatlin, who went from Olympic and world 100-meter sprint champ to chump when his drug test, too, came back positive.
And certainly not San Francisco slugger Barry Bonds. He passed Babe Ruth on the career home run list, but couldn't shake suspicions raised by grand jury investigations and a best-selling book that he also was juiced when it mattered most.
Not Bode Miller, who partied like an Olympian but had a hard time skiing like one. Nor Italy's World Cup-winning squad, which shrugged off a sordid match-fixing scandal back home and a startling head butt by French star Zinedine Zidane in the final - only to return and see several of its stars scatter to other leagues in Europe and a few top-tier clubs demoted to lower divisions.
Not even Barbaro was immune. The strapping bay colt steamrolled 19 other 3-year-olds at the Kentucky Derby, raising hopes the first Triple Crown since 1978 might be in the offing. Then he put a foot down wrong at the Preakness, fracturing his right hind leg, and the story was no longer about winning, but survival.
That much seemed assured by year's end as Barbaro prepared to leave the University of Pennsylvania's New Bolton Center and return to the farm. Even a happy ending, though, couldn't erase the haunting image of another breakdown in a racket that demands a steady supply of thoroughbreds testing their limits at an age when they're as high-strung as teenagers and just as reckless.
“Put it this way,” recalled trainer Bob Baffert, a three-time Derby winner. “It's the only race I've ever seen where they show the winner crossing the wire and almost nobody is acknowledging it. Everybody was in shock.”
So while nobody got off easy - isn't that supposed to be the point of sports? - some had a smoother ride than others.
The Rose Bowl was the perfect backdrop for a coronation when Southern California dropped by in January to face Texas with a third straight college football championship on the line.
The game featured unbeaten teams on dizzying winning streaks, a collision that seemed ordained from the opening game of the regular season. It ended with two Heisman Trophy-winning stars on the Trojans' sideline - quarterback Matt Leinart and tailback Reggie Bush - watching helplessly as Vince Young, the Longhorns' one-man band, called the tune when it counted.
On fourth down, out of options, Young tucked the ball under his bicep and took off for the corner of the end zone. Texas 41, USC 38.
“So often in games so heavily hyped like this, it doesn't live up to the hype,” Texas coach Mack Brown said. “I thought it was better than the hype.”
The same could be said about Leinart, Bush and Young, who soon scattered to Arizona, New Orleans and Tennessee as members of one of the best NFL drafts in memory.
Before they made their league debuts, the game gave a proper send-off to Jerome Bettis. A sketchy regular-season record put the Pittsburgh Steelers on the road for three straight playoff games, but by the time they reached Detroit, it felt like home. For Bettis, it was.
“The Bus” had logged 13 seasons by then and carried who-knows-how-many defenders on his back. But he'd never played in a Super Bowl, let alone one in his hometown. A year earlier, in the waning moments of New England's win over the Steelers in the AFC championship game, Roethlisberger sought out Bettis on the sideline and promised to get him to Motown. Together, they rolled over Seattle 21-10.
“It's been an incredible ride,” Bettis said, then retired on the spot. “The Bus' last stop is here in Detroit.”
The U.S. Olympic team had no trouble reaching Turin for the Winter Olympics. Finding the medals stand was a different story.
Miller arrived as the first American to hold the overall World Cup title in more than two decades, then got waylaid in the saloons and discos and wound up 0-for-5. Speedskaters Chad Hedrick and Shani Davis both won, but might have won more if they hadn't gotten in each other's way. Figure skater Johnny Weir got fifth after missing the bus the night of the final.
“I was late getting here and never caught up. ... I didn't feel my inner peace, I didn't feel my aura,” he said. “Inside I was black.”
Weir's aura could have been gold-plated, but he still wouldn't have beaten Evgeni Plushenko. That night, the Russian performed like the only skater in the A-flight, not just the best jumper, spinner and athlete, but the most artistic, too.
For art, the U.S. team turned to “The Flying Tomato,” aka Shaun White, and the rest of his snowboarding posse. They totaled seven medals, the most memorable being the silver Lindsey Jacobellis won that should have been a gold.
Holding a comfortable lead in the snowboardcross final, she tried to finish with a flourish and a move called a “backside method.” Reaching back for her board, Jacobellis tugged too hard, caught an edge and wound up on her backside instead. She barely made it to the finish line in time to grab second.
Which is where the U.S. team landed in the medal count, behind Germany and ahead of Canada.
March was a good month for underdogs, as a mid-major revolution spread to every corner of the NCAA basketball bracket. So many played so well that sorting them out wasn't easy. But George Mason carried the flag the furthest, and after knocking off Michigan State, North Carolina and Connecticut in short order, guard Tony Skinn offered fans a helpful primer.
“They get us confused with George Washington or Georgetown. But you can't miss us now,” he said. “We're one of 16 teams still playing.”
The Patriots advanced even further, to the Final Four, but got chomped by eventual champion Florida in the semifinals. The Gators weren't basketball royalty, either, at least not compared to the storied UCLA program awaiting them in the final.
But reflecting the fire that burned within coach Billy Donovan, they came out quicker, fiercer and better prepared - scorching the Bruins, 73-57.
Miami's Pat Riley hadn't won an NBA championship since his “Showtime” days in Los Angeles, coaching the Lakers. Shaquille O'Neal's wait for another ring was much shorter, but both needed a kid named Dwyane Wade to lead them back to the title.
In short order, Gary Payton, Antoine Walker, Alonzo Mourning got in line. Each was good enough to be “The Man” at some other time in some other town.
Yet there was little squabbling and even fewer doubts about whose hands they wanted the ball in at the end. Wade's ability to deliver in the clutch made Riley's pep talk before Game 6 in Dallas probably the shortest of his career.
“I packed one suit, one shirt and one tie,” he said. “That's it.”
Roger Federer made his year look the easiest of all, which may explain why he remained its best-kept secret.
The unflappable Swiss entered 17 events and reached the final in 16. He lost five matches all season, four to Spaniard Rafael Nadal and three of those on terre battue (red clay), such as at Roland Garros in the final of the French Open.
Having already won the Australian Open in January, Federer simply began another major streak by recovering to win Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. The last one was particularly sweet, since it gave him three majors this year to just two for Woods, his new pal, who sat in the front row of Federer's guest box.
“It's not too often you can relate to someone going through certain things,” Woods said. “We both can.”
For a while, Phil Mickelson looked ready to make it a table for three. He won the Masters in April, his third career major and second in a row, and was leading the U.S. Open until back-to-back brain cramps on the 72nd hole proved old habits die hard.
“I just can't believe I did that,” he said.
And not for the first time, either.
The gleaming silver trophy instead went to Australian Geoff Ogilvy, who lifted it and saw his face reflected back in the last bit of the afternoon's light.
Ogilvy's moment in the sun, however, was soon blocked out by Earl Woods' redoubtable son. Tiger returned to golf at the U.S. Open barely six weeks after the funeral, but played poorly and missed the cut at a major for the first time since turning pro. That Sunday was Father's Day. Tiger promptly claimed the British Open and rest of golf's calendar year, running out with six wins in a row.
“He's just better than us,” Ogilvy said after Woods waxed the field at the PGA Championship. “Someone has to be the best. Why not him?”
Few baseball people would have said the same about the Detroit Tigers, or even the St. Louis Cardinals, but both survived late-season swoons to make an unlikely World Series pair.
The Tigers hadn't sniffed the playoffs for nearly two decades when former Pittsburgh, Florida and Colorado manager Jim Leyland began a remarkable turnaround. A team that nearly broke the major league mark for losses a few seasons ago sneaked into the playoffs, then ambushed the Yankees and flattened the Oakland A's.
The Cards' playoff run wasn't nearly as convincing, but at least manager Tony La Russa was at the top of his game. He broke into the majors nearly 30 years earlier with the White Sox, and Leyland was one of the first coaches he helped hire. But the chess match between two of the sharpest skippers in the game turned hopelessly one-sided when Detroit pitchers made costly errors in all five games.
Stumbling was an apt description, too, for Americans' adventures abroad.
The U.S. men and women's basketball teams got upended and the World Cup squad barely unpacked before being sent home. The Ryder Cup team got hammered for the third time in a row by the Europeans, who wasted little time scaling the roof at The K Club and getting hammered themselves.
Jimmie Johnson, meanwhile, celebrated his first Nextel Cup championship by breaking his wrist. The same driver who came through NASCAR's grueling season unscathed was “horsing around” on top of a golf cart at a celebrity tournament in December when he fell.
It was his worst ride of the year, which began with a win at the Daytona 500 to start the year and ended with a victory lap through Manhattan during “Champion's Week.”
“You never know if it will happen again,” Johnson said.
But at least he'll get the chance to defend his title. Plenty of familiar faces won't be back next year.
Formula One champion Michael Schumacher, so dominant that even Tiger Woods regarded him with awe, bowed out with seven titles and a record 91 victories after puncturing a tire less than 10 laps into the Brazilian Grand Prix in October.
Andre Agassi bid farewell on a similarly sad note, flat-footed and in pain after losing to Benjamin Becker, the 112th-ranked player in the world, at the U.S. Open.
He broke into tennis as a precocious 16-year-old, oozing attitude, leaking talent and marked, it seemed, with a short shelf life. Instead, Agassi departed at age 36 with eight majors and a career Grand Slam in tow, an eminence grise who wrung every last bit of joy from his career.
A handful of greats from across the sports spectrum now leave behind only memories.
Death claimed Byron Nelson, golf's enduring gentleman, at age 94; Red Auerbach, architect of the Boston Celtics' dynasty at 89; LPGA pioneer Patty Berg at 88; boxer Floyd Patterson at 71; four-time Iditarod winner Susan Butcher at 51,and Hall of Fame center fielder Kirby Puckett at 45.
Former Wolverines football coach Bo Schembechler died at age 77 on the eve of maybe the best Michigan-Ohio State game ever. Both Schembechler and his mentor, Buckeye coach Woody Hayes, had gone to great lengths to make sure there was never a bad one, a tradition even kids born after the coaches had left the sideline could appreciate.
Just before kickoff, in a tribute so fitting it made you smile, one of those kids hoisted a sign that read, “Bo and Woody in Heaven: Play Nice.”
Not Ben Roethlisberger, who won a Super Bowl in February, crashed his motorcycle in June and was laid up again by an emergency appendectomy just before the Steelers' opener in September. Small wonder he struggled to regain his grip on a shaky team that likely won't make the playoffs the season after winning it all.
Not Floyd Landis, whose too-good-to-be true comeback win at the Tour de France apparently was. Nor Justin Gatlin, who went from Olympic and world 100-meter sprint champ to chump when his drug test, too, came back positive.
And certainly not San Francisco slugger Barry Bonds. He passed Babe Ruth on the career home run list, but couldn't shake suspicions raised by grand jury investigations and a best-selling book that he also was juiced when it mattered most.
Not Bode Miller, who partied like an Olympian but had a hard time skiing like one. Nor Italy's World Cup-winning squad, which shrugged off a sordid match-fixing scandal back home and a startling head butt by French star Zinedine Zidane in the final - only to return and see several of its stars scatter to other leagues in Europe and a few top-tier clubs demoted to lower divisions.
Not even Barbaro was immune. The strapping bay colt steamrolled 19 other 3-year-olds at the Kentucky Derby, raising hopes the first Triple Crown since 1978 might be in the offing. Then he put a foot down wrong at the Preakness, fracturing his right hind leg, and the story was no longer about winning, but survival.
That much seemed assured by year's end as Barbaro prepared to leave the University of Pennsylvania's New Bolton Center and return to the farm. Even a happy ending, though, couldn't erase the haunting image of another breakdown in a racket that demands a steady supply of thoroughbreds testing their limits at an age when they're as high-strung as teenagers and just as reckless.
“Put it this way,” recalled trainer Bob Baffert, a three-time Derby winner. “It's the only race I've ever seen where they show the winner crossing the wire and almost nobody is acknowledging it. Everybody was in shock.”
So while nobody got off easy - isn't that supposed to be the point of sports? - some had a smoother ride than others.
The Rose Bowl was the perfect backdrop for a coronation when Southern California dropped by in January to face Texas with a third straight college football championship on the line.
The game featured unbeaten teams on dizzying winning streaks, a collision that seemed ordained from the opening game of the regular season. It ended with two Heisman Trophy-winning stars on the Trojans' sideline - quarterback Matt Leinart and tailback Reggie Bush - watching helplessly as Vince Young, the Longhorns' one-man band, called the tune when it counted.
On fourth down, out of options, Young tucked the ball under his bicep and took off for the corner of the end zone. Texas 41, USC 38.
“So often in games so heavily hyped like this, it doesn't live up to the hype,” Texas coach Mack Brown said. “I thought it was better than the hype.”
The same could be said about Leinart, Bush and Young, who soon scattered to Arizona, New Orleans and Tennessee as members of one of the best NFL drafts in memory.
Before they made their league debuts, the game gave a proper send-off to Jerome Bettis. A sketchy regular-season record put the Pittsburgh Steelers on the road for three straight playoff games, but by the time they reached Detroit, it felt like home. For Bettis, it was.
“The Bus” had logged 13 seasons by then and carried who-knows-how-many defenders on his back. But he'd never played in a Super Bowl, let alone one in his hometown. A year earlier, in the waning moments of New England's win over the Steelers in the AFC championship game, Roethlisberger sought out Bettis on the sideline and promised to get him to Motown. Together, they rolled over Seattle 21-10.
“It's been an incredible ride,” Bettis said, then retired on the spot. “The Bus' last stop is here in Detroit.”
The U.S. Olympic team had no trouble reaching Turin for the Winter Olympics. Finding the medals stand was a different story.
Miller arrived as the first American to hold the overall World Cup title in more than two decades, then got waylaid in the saloons and discos and wound up 0-for-5. Speedskaters Chad Hedrick and Shani Davis both won, but might have won more if they hadn't gotten in each other's way. Figure skater Johnny Weir got fifth after missing the bus the night of the final.
“I was late getting here and never caught up. ... I didn't feel my inner peace, I didn't feel my aura,” he said. “Inside I was black.”
Weir's aura could have been gold-plated, but he still wouldn't have beaten Evgeni Plushenko. That night, the Russian performed like the only skater in the A-flight, not just the best jumper, spinner and athlete, but the most artistic, too.
For art, the U.S. team turned to “The Flying Tomato,” aka Shaun White, and the rest of his snowboarding posse. They totaled seven medals, the most memorable being the silver Lindsey Jacobellis won that should have been a gold.
Holding a comfortable lead in the snowboardcross final, she tried to finish with a flourish and a move called a “backside method.” Reaching back for her board, Jacobellis tugged too hard, caught an edge and wound up on her backside instead. She barely made it to the finish line in time to grab second.
Which is where the U.S. team landed in the medal count, behind Germany and ahead of Canada.
March was a good month for underdogs, as a mid-major revolution spread to every corner of the NCAA basketball bracket. So many played so well that sorting them out wasn't easy. But George Mason carried the flag the furthest, and after knocking off Michigan State, North Carolina and Connecticut in short order, guard Tony Skinn offered fans a helpful primer.
“They get us confused with George Washington or Georgetown. But you can't miss us now,” he said. “We're one of 16 teams still playing.”
The Patriots advanced even further, to the Final Four, but got chomped by eventual champion Florida in the semifinals. The Gators weren't basketball royalty, either, at least not compared to the storied UCLA program awaiting them in the final.
But reflecting the fire that burned within coach Billy Donovan, they came out quicker, fiercer and better prepared - scorching the Bruins, 73-57.
Miami's Pat Riley hadn't won an NBA championship since his “Showtime” days in Los Angeles, coaching the Lakers. Shaquille O'Neal's wait for another ring was much shorter, but both needed a kid named Dwyane Wade to lead them back to the title.
In short order, Gary Payton, Antoine Walker, Alonzo Mourning got in line. Each was good enough to be “The Man” at some other time in some other town.
Yet there was little squabbling and even fewer doubts about whose hands they wanted the ball in at the end. Wade's ability to deliver in the clutch made Riley's pep talk before Game 6 in Dallas probably the shortest of his career.
“I packed one suit, one shirt and one tie,” he said. “That's it.”
Roger Federer made his year look the easiest of all, which may explain why he remained its best-kept secret.
The unflappable Swiss entered 17 events and reached the final in 16. He lost five matches all season, four to Spaniard Rafael Nadal and three of those on terre battue (red clay), such as at Roland Garros in the final of the French Open.
Having already won the Australian Open in January, Federer simply began another major streak by recovering to win Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. The last one was particularly sweet, since it gave him three majors this year to just two for Woods, his new pal, who sat in the front row of Federer's guest box.
“It's not too often you can relate to someone going through certain things,” Woods said. “We both can.”
For a while, Phil Mickelson looked ready to make it a table for three. He won the Masters in April, his third career major and second in a row, and was leading the U.S. Open until back-to-back brain cramps on the 72nd hole proved old habits die hard.
“I just can't believe I did that,” he said.
And not for the first time, either.
The gleaming silver trophy instead went to Australian Geoff Ogilvy, who lifted it and saw his face reflected back in the last bit of the afternoon's light.
Ogilvy's moment in the sun, however, was soon blocked out by Earl Woods' redoubtable son. Tiger returned to golf at the U.S. Open barely six weeks after the funeral, but played poorly and missed the cut at a major for the first time since turning pro. That Sunday was Father's Day. Tiger promptly claimed the British Open and rest of golf's calendar year, running out with six wins in a row.
“He's just better than us,” Ogilvy said after Woods waxed the field at the PGA Championship. “Someone has to be the best. Why not him?”
Few baseball people would have said the same about the Detroit Tigers, or even the St. Louis Cardinals, but both survived late-season swoons to make an unlikely World Series pair.
The Tigers hadn't sniffed the playoffs for nearly two decades when former Pittsburgh, Florida and Colorado manager Jim Leyland began a remarkable turnaround. A team that nearly broke the major league mark for losses a few seasons ago sneaked into the playoffs, then ambushed the Yankees and flattened the Oakland A's.
The Cards' playoff run wasn't nearly as convincing, but at least manager Tony La Russa was at the top of his game. He broke into the majors nearly 30 years earlier with the White Sox, and Leyland was one of the first coaches he helped hire. But the chess match between two of the sharpest skippers in the game turned hopelessly one-sided when Detroit pitchers made costly errors in all five games.
Stumbling was an apt description, too, for Americans' adventures abroad.
The U.S. men and women's basketball teams got upended and the World Cup squad barely unpacked before being sent home. The Ryder Cup team got hammered for the third time in a row by the Europeans, who wasted little time scaling the roof at The K Club and getting hammered themselves.
Jimmie Johnson, meanwhile, celebrated his first Nextel Cup championship by breaking his wrist. The same driver who came through NASCAR's grueling season unscathed was “horsing around” on top of a golf cart at a celebrity tournament in December when he fell.
It was his worst ride of the year, which began with a win at the Daytona 500 to start the year and ended with a victory lap through Manhattan during “Champion's Week.”
“You never know if it will happen again,” Johnson said.
But at least he'll get the chance to defend his title. Plenty of familiar faces won't be back next year.
Formula One champion Michael Schumacher, so dominant that even Tiger Woods regarded him with awe, bowed out with seven titles and a record 91 victories after puncturing a tire less than 10 laps into the Brazilian Grand Prix in October.
Andre Agassi bid farewell on a similarly sad note, flat-footed and in pain after losing to Benjamin Becker, the 112th-ranked player in the world, at the U.S. Open.
He broke into tennis as a precocious 16-year-old, oozing attitude, leaking talent and marked, it seemed, with a short shelf life. Instead, Agassi departed at age 36 with eight majors and a career Grand Slam in tow, an eminence grise who wrung every last bit of joy from his career.
A handful of greats from across the sports spectrum now leave behind only memories.
Death claimed Byron Nelson, golf's enduring gentleman, at age 94; Red Auerbach, architect of the Boston Celtics' dynasty at 89; LPGA pioneer Patty Berg at 88; boxer Floyd Patterson at 71; four-time Iditarod winner Susan Butcher at 51,and Hall of Fame center fielder Kirby Puckett at 45.
Former Wolverines football coach Bo Schembechler died at age 77 on the eve of maybe the best Michigan-Ohio State game ever. Both Schembechler and his mentor, Buckeye coach Woody Hayes, had gone to great lengths to make sure there was never a bad one, a tradition even kids born after the coaches had left the sideline could appreciate.
Just before kickoff, in a tribute so fitting it made you smile, one of those kids hoisted a sign that read, “Bo and Woody in Heaven: Play Nice.”
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