History OvershadowedByControversy / Sports

** The 1936 Summer Olympics were notable for a number of reasons: they were the first Olympics to be televised (with its coverage of the events pioneering many techniques now used in the filming of sports), introduced the Olympic torch relay, and Jesse Owens winning four gold medals in it. But the games are mainly known for one thing: Being hosted in Berlin during the era of UsefulNotes/NaziGermany. Not helping this was the fact that UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler saw the games as an opportunity to promote his government and Nazi ideas of racial supremacy.

%% Please see cleanup thread before deleting Spongebob-related example under Super Bowl LIII.

* The Washington Commanders were best known by non-sports fans because of their former name for many decades, the Washington Redskins, seen by many as a racial slur used against Native Americans (with their logo in particular being considered a caricature of one to some people). There were many campaigns to persuade the team to change it. None of these succeeded until July 2020, when various major outlets (including Nike and Amazon) refused to sell any more Redskins merchandise and [=FedEx=] threatened to remove its name from the team's stadium unless the name was changed, resulting in the team's much more generic name of Washington Football Team for the 2020 and 2021 seasons before being rebranded as the Commanders from 2022 onwards.
** Even after the name change to the Commanders, the team remains embroiled in controversy, thanks to a workplace culture so toxic that the ''United States Congress'' felt the need to step in and investigate (as of this writing, owner Dan Snyder is refusing to testify before the committee), and accusations that he's been cooking the books and not giving the other 31 owners their fair shares[[note]]The NFL operates under a "shared revenue" system, where most of the money taken in by the 32 teams is collected by the league, then redistributed equally among the clubs. This prevents the teams in the much more lucrative markets (New York, Los Angeles, California's Bay Area, etc...) from gaining an advantage over the Buffaloes and Jacksonville's of the league. At least in theory.[[/note]]. The NFL Commissioner can, at his own discretion, call for the other 31 team owners alongside Snyder to vote on whether or not they should just throw him out of the league, and quite a few people are calling for this to happen. Snyder eventually hired the Bank of America to help sell the newly-christened Washington Commanders (either partially or completely) on November 2, 2022, which would hopefully lead to an end of his long, tumultuous tenure.

* Boxer Creator/MikeTyson, once a boxing world champion, is more notorious for the [[TheTysonZone numerous violent incidents in his private life]], including being convicted of rape and biting off Evander Holyfield's ear. The other things he is known for now are being the [[SNKBoss near unbeatable]] final boss of the [=NES=] port of ''VideoGame/PunchOut'', and for his [[AdamWesting appearances]] as a {{Cloudcuckoolander}} in works like ''Film/TheHangover'' and ''WesternAnimation/MikeTysonMysteries''.

* Nowadays, Creator/DennisRodman is known less for his Hall of Fame basketball career and more for being a very bizarre person outside the paint (the series ''The Last Dance'' devotes time to some of it, like leaving training camps to party in Las Vegas or take place in wrestling events), including a widely-criticized friendship with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un years after his retirement from basketball.

* Bob Knight was one of college basketball's most successful and innovative coaches. However, most people know him for [[HairTriggerTemper his volatile temper and violent behavior]], especially infamous episodes like him throwing a chair across the court during a game, being recorded on video grabbing one of his players by the neck, and getting arrested in UsefulNotes/PuertoRico for assaulting a cop. (As of 2023 he still has not returned to face trial and sentencing for that.) These incidents and others eventually led to him being fired by Indiana University.

** The 2011 500 wasn't controversial in itself, but is sadly best known today for its winner, Dan Wheldon, being killed in a crash that very much ''was'' controversial a few months later.

* During the 2022-23 season, Memphis Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant quickly went from a lovable All-Star point guard to an egotistical, wannabe gangsta between his bold comments on him saying he's perfectly okay in the Western Conference, having an entourage threaten other people during the season, and even showing off a gun he got at a nightclub, the last incident resulting in him having an eight-game suspension and having a temporary break from playing in the NBA in order for him to get his life back on track.

* Former Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott was and is undoubtedly best known for the many, many offensive things said by her. These remarks include complaining about having to pay José Rijo "three million to sit on his butt" while he was recovering from an elbow injury, being upset at the sudden death of umpire John [=McSherry=] [[SkewedPriorities because it would postpone a game]], saying that she didn't want her players to wear earrings because "[[UsefulNotes/{{Homophobia}} only fruits wear earrings]]", and ''especially'' her numerous racist comments and apparent Nazi sympathies[[note]][[Wrestling/KevinNash "This show is about as interesting as Marge Scott reading excerpts from Mein Kampf!"]][[/note]].

* "Shoeless" Joe Jackson, one of the controversial eight "Black Sox" involved with a Chicago White Sox's 1919 World Series scandal, was the only one of the eight banned figures to be considered worthy of deserving entry into the Baseball Hall of Fame.[[note]]Proof of his worthiness is that he's the "Joe" alluded to in the common American idiom "Say it ain't so, Joe!" after a story claiming that a kid asked him that after he left the court (nowadays largely considered to be apocryphal, as Jackson himself said that the exchange never occurred).[[/note]]

** The 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal saw Nadia Comăneci earn the first perfect ten in gymnastics. However, in Canada at least, they are best known for the city of Montreal racking up an astronomical level of debt in order to pay for the staging of the games (the ''720 percent'' cost overrun for the games remains the highest in IOC history) and the (much-delayed) construction of the venues. A notable target is Olympic Stadium, which was not completed until long after the games were held, and which has been plagued with issues ever since. Its derisive nickname of "The Big Owe" is not far off the mark; its cost would not be fully paid off until 2006, by which time both of its post-Olympic tenants, the [[UsefulNotes/CanadianFootballLeague CFL's]] Montreal Alouettes and [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams MLB's Montreal Expos]], had departed for pastures new.[[note]]Between 1976 and 2006, the Alouettes folded and revived ''twice''. They eventually moved to the team's original home, a considerably older and smaller but far more centrally located stadium. As for the Expos, they moved south of the border to Washington, D.C. to become the Washington Nationals.[[/note]] Costs aside, the Montreal Olympics were also known for a controversial ban of the Taiwanese team due to pressure from mainland China and a 29-country boycott owing to the IOC's refusal to ban the New Zealand team thanks to the New Zealand rugby team touring apartheid South Africa earlier that year[[note]]They weren't banned because rugby wasn't a Olympic sport and the IOC had no jurisdiction[[/note]]. Also, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Team Canada failed to win a single gold medal on home turf.]]

* Similar to the Commanders, The Atlanta Braves and Kansas City Chiefs have both been accused of racism towards Natives on a lesser level. Both teams have used a "Tomahawk Chop" as a rallying cry, though their on-field success has lessened the outcry somewhat.

*** Probably the biggest controversy was the massive Russian state-sponsored doping program uncovered in the aftermath of the games, which resulted about a third of the Russian team being banned from the Rio Olympics (and later the ''entire'' Russian team being banned from both the Tokyo Olympics and the 2022 World Cup when Russia refused to comply with anti-doping rules).

* UsefulNotes/TheAshes 2023, Second Test, Lord's Criceket Ground: Englishman Johnny Bairstow was controversially given out after he wandered out of his crease on the last ball of an over (the umpire had not yet called "over") and Australian wicketkeeper Alex Carey threw down the stumps. The Australians eventually won, but were subject to abuse by MCC members as they headed off through the Long Room.

*** Both the NFC and AFC Championship games were affected by questionable officiating,[[note]]In the NFC Championship, a case of pass-interference by the Los Angeles Rams, which should have given the New Orleans Saints an automatic first down, got missed, forcing the Saints to settle for a field goal and go into overtime, which the Rams ended up winning. In the AFC Championship, the Kansas City Chiefs were hit with a highly specious pass interference penalty halfway through the fourth quarter when Chris Jones lightly brushed Tom Brady on the shoulder; the resulting penalty helped the New England Patriots drive for a touchdown to take a 24-21 lead, and also ultimately winning in overtime.[[/note]] leaving many people, especially Saints fans, feeling that neither team deserved to be there.

*** Czechoslovakian gymnast Věra Čáslavská quietly turned her head down and away whenever the Soviet national anthem was played, in silent protest against the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Pact_invasion_of_Czechoslovakia Warsaw Pact invasion of her country]]. This led to the new regime banning her from both sporting events and international travel for many years.

** The 1936 Summer Olympics were notable for a number of reasons: they were the first Olympics to be televised, they introduced the Olympic torch relay, and coverage of the events pioneered many techniques now used in the filming of sports. But the games are mainly known for two things: Jesse Owens winning four gold medals, and the fact that they were hosted in Berlin during the era of UsefulNotes/NaziGermany. Not helping this was the fact that UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler saw the games as an opportunity to promote his government and Nazi ideas of racial supremacy.

** The 1904 Summer Olympics are mainly remembered for how poorly planned they were, perhaps most infamously including a marathon event that nearly killed multiple participants.

* Former ice dancer Tatiana Navka is known for being the 2006 Olympic Champion, a two-time World Champion, and a three-time European Champion with her former partner Roman Kostomarov. Since her retirement, she's become more well-known for being the wife of Dmitry Peskov, who is the media spokesperson for Vladimir Putin himself. Other controversies include her and her skating partner dressing up as Holocaust concentration camp prisoners on the Russian version of ''Dancing on Ice'', and her homophobic comments about Spanish gymnast Cristofer Benítez in 2021, when she implied that any man who took part in rhythmic gymnastics was taking part in a "feminine sport", which drew considerable backlash from many prominent skaters both in and outside of Russia.

* Baseball player Roberto Osuna received a year-long suspension in 2018 for allegedly assaulting his son's mother. The case ended inconclusively and he was quickly snapped up by the Astros after the suspension ended, but any chance of his being known for anything else ended at the 2019 World Series, when Astros assistant manager Brandon Taubman bizarrely went out of his way to draw attention to it, shouting to three female reporters (including one wearing a bracelet promoting awareness of domestic violence) "I’m so fucking glad we got Osuna," when he hadn't even been particularly notable in the game just played. The rest of the team’s management then accused the reporters of completely making the story up despite numerous witnesses, until they were finally forced to admit it was true and fire Taubman a few days later. Meanwhile, Osuna himself understandably just tried to keep completely out of the whole mess.[[note]]As detailed in the "Teams & Organizations" folder below the controversy surrounding the Astros soon got much, much worse[[/note]]

* Puerto Rican boxer Luis Resto is known solely for [[WeightedGloves cheating]] in a 1983 fight with Billy Collins Jr. by allowing his trainer to remove the padding from his gloves and soak his hand wraps in plaster of Paris, causing his punches to hit harder than they normally would have. This incident made him effectively ''persona non grata'' in the boxing world, especially after it was revealed that Collins' vision was permanently blurred after the match, which ended his career and may have driven him to kill himself. Resto was stripped of his license and later convicted on assault and conspiracy charges.

* Avery Brundage is regarded as a highly influential figure in the modern Olympics; however, several of his influences are among his more questionable qualities, such as his obvious racism, particularly on display in the 1936, 1968, and 1972 Games, and his close ties to the Nazi Party, which remained even after its dissolution.

* Nowadays, Dennis Rodman is known less for his Hall of Fame basketball career and more for being a very bizarre person outside the paint (the series ''The Last Dance'' devotes time to some of it, like leaving training camps to party in Las Vegas or take place in wrestling events), including a widely-criticized friendship with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un years after his retirement from basketball.