There is a lot to be thankful for in today’s sports landscape. LeBron James may be the most physically gifted basketball player that the sport has ever seen. Stephen Strasburg can supposedly throw a baseball 103 mph. You can watch ALL of the NFL games at the same time with the Sunday Ticket! I think they still play hockey some places…Brett Favre won’t stop retiring! OK, scratch that last one, but as far as sports are concerned–we are living in a golden age of high definition awesomeness. We have gigantic televisions, cold beer, spirited rivalries and more than a handful of athletes who make sports fun to watch again.

Then you have teams who depress you when you’re watching the morning SportsCenter highlights. Like these teams:

Charlotte Bobcats

Michael Jordan had unparalleled achievements on the basketball court. He has done the same thing in the management seat. Like drafting Adam Morrison 3rd overall in the 2006 Draft. Signing any swingman shooting guard provided he has had questionable work ethic and attitude issues with former teams. Drafting every flash in the pan player that has come out of UNC for the last decade. Watching Emeka Okafor keep treading in a pool of mediocrity. I imagine it’s not easy to unseat MJ in anything, but someone is going to have to in order to make this team watchable again.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Are they looking into other head coaches? Will Jimmy Clausen ever live up to his hype? Is Charlie Weis on the hot seat? Is Charlie Weis roasting chickens and eating them whole with that hot seat? Can anyone decipher the sounds coming out of Lou Holtz’s mouth? What is Touchdown Jesus wearing to the game today? Nobody cares except people who graduated from Notre Dame and ESPN! And Brett Favre didn’t even graduate from ND! Stop trying to sell this team as a powerhouse. Or please just keep it off the front pages of every sports site not located within 150 miles of South Bend.

New York Yankees

Sure, they have Jeter and everyone respects him. He plays the game the way it’s supposed to be played. Jeter just seems to hustle just a little bit harder. He seems to play for the love of the game. And then there is the rest of the team who play for the love of the contract. Over $200,000,000 in contracts for the season–most of whom were poached from MVP ballots and overpaid to come play for the team with the most MLB mystique. And the most money. Come put on our green stripes and roll around in our new money pit! Meet Scrooge McDuck in person! Win Championships by watching George Steinbrenner make it rain at the winter meetings! Do you hear us Aroldis Chapman? Get your head out of Cuba and your ass to New York. We’ll be waiting with open checkbooks…

Detroit Lions

The Lions are just too bad to actually hate. Nobody has really loved the team since Barry Sanders prematurely retired after the 1998 season. Since that year, the Lions have wandered aimlessly through the jungle of the NFL season, where their fearless (brainless and former) leader Matt Millen would march them out onto the field to be eaten alive by the other animals. If the NFL were a zoo, the Lions would have been put down the day after Sanders retired. And the worst part is that every Thanksgiving Day, I have to turn on the TV and watch whatever band of crappy receivers (note: not Calvin Johnson) they drafted this year suck for 3 hours. It ruins my day. And probably yours. And definitely everyone that lives in Detroit’s.

San Diego Padres

Last year they traded a perennial Cy Young contender Jake Peavy to the White Sox, pulled a contract offer to their most beloved player and all-time save leader Trevor Hoffman, and eventually they will trade Adrian Gonzalez (arguably the best hitting 1st baseman in the National League) to the highest bidder sometime this season. They finished 21 games out of 1st place and watched PETCO devour any signs of offense the team had left. If there is one thing baseball fans hate more than watching a boring offensive team, it’s a boring offensive team that will sell all its most talented players to the Cubs, Yankees, Red Sox and Angels.

Los Angeles Clippers

If there was ever a team that could use a “life coach,” it would be the LA Clippers. The Clippers haven’t made a good personnel decision, well, ever. Along with that, they have suffered some terribly weird and unfortunate injuries throughout the years which leaves some basketball fans to feel the team is cursed. Only three players that have played for them have made the Hall-of-Fame. Their 1st overall draft picks like Danny Manning and Michael Olowokandi have gone from hero-to-zero in no time at all. And the players they draft who don’t bust end up getting traded to other teams for pennies on the dollar and then a good portion of those go on to be key players on play-off teams. And when a can’t miss player like Blake Griffin comes along this year…he breaks his kneecap in half before the season even starts. A franchise who’s history sometimes reads like a Greek tragedy holds no place in my heart and apparently no place in the NBA play-offs, as well.

Pittsburgh Pirates

If I were on the Jolly Roger, I’d set it ablaze and slowly sink into the abyss of Davey Jones’ Locker. At least that people might pay to watch that… It both angers and depresses people to watch the Pirate’s every year. I’m not sure they’ll ever make the play-offs again. That statement sounds harsh, but throw me an realistic number of years till these guys win the NL East. See? It’s just not happening.