THE WORST STORIES OF THE YEAR

1. BALCO

* We suspected it would worsen in 2004, and it did. The BALCO story that broke in the fall of 2003 had ample legs -- steroid-enhanced, of course -- in 2004, casting a shadow of suspicion over Barry Bonds’ home-run records, Marion Jones’ five-medal run in Sydney, Tim Montgomery’s 100-meter world record, Gary Sheffield’s power numbers, Jason Giambi’s dramatic weight loss and who knows who and what else?

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2. NO HOCKEY LEAGUE

* With attendance and TV numbers dwindling, a league in dire need of resuscitation decides to shut down the season until the players agree to accept a salary cap. Result: a lockout approaching four months, with no one particularly motivated to end it. The owners say losses are down, the players are getting paychecks in Europe, and south of the Canadian border, fans don’t seem to care.

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3. PANIC IN DETROIT

* The Nov. 19 Indiana Pacer-Detroit Piston brawl underscored a tense year in player-fan relations (Milton Bradley’s bottle-throwing tantrum, Texas Ranger relief pitcher Frank Francisco lobbing a chair into the stands). Why so much hostility? What can be done about it? Um, we’ll get back to you, right after we catch ESPN’s 2,347th replay of Ron Artest climbing into the seats.

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4. KOBE BRYANT

* If 2003 was the worst year in Kobe Bryant’s young life, 2004 pushed it into overtime. The best thing that happened to Bryant: Charges in his sexual assault case were dropped. Elsewhere, his cold shooting and ball-hogging undercut the Lakers in the Finals, he was blamed for the postseason breakup of the team, his endorsements dried up, his jersey stopped selling and by the end of the year, he seemed to have alienated everyone. As Charles Barkley understated, “He has not handled fame very well, I can say that.�

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5. BCS, THE SAGA

* “If we don’t address it, you should kill us,� former BCS coordinator Mike Tranghese said about the farcically flawed system major college football uses to (ahem) determine its national champion. This was after USC placed No. 1 in the AP’s 2003 poll yet failed to break into the BCS’ title game. So they tweaked the formula a bit. And they play the 2004 regular-season schedule. And three BCS conference teams -- USC, Oklahoma, Auburn -- finish undefeated. No good formula for that. And Cal gets bumped out of the Rose Bowl by a set of rules seemingly concocted by a drunken dart toss. Time to address it again, or run for cover.

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6. CHARLIE, HUSTLED

* What was the lowest point of the year for Pete Rose? Was it when he finally confessed he bet on baseball by publishing a book, thereby coming clean and pulling a profit at the same time? Was it the fact that Rose’s confession, expressly intended to trigger his swift reinstatement and Hall of Fame eligibility, left the commissioner’s office and the public cold? Or was it watching Tom Sizemore lurch around in an absurd Moe Howard wig portraying Rose in an awful ESPN movie?

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7. LARRY BROWN IN ATHENS

* The flight from the States to Greece can be draining and unsettling. You might lose some sleep and energy along the way, but very rarely IQ points. So what happened to Brown, who boarded the plane a post-NBA Finals genius and then couldn’t do anything right once he hit the ground in Athens? His U.S. Olympic basketball team was as dysfunctional as his Pistons were synchronized, losing more games -- three -- than the U.S. program had in all previous Olympics combined and giving new life to the “ugly American� stereotype.

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8. HAMM AND EGG ON THEIR FACES

U.S. gymnast Paul Hamm’s all-around gold medal was marred by a scoring error. Bronze medalist Yang Tae Young of South Korea was given too low a start score for his parallel bars routine, the international gymnastics federation asked Hamm to forfeit his gold medal to Young, Hamm refused, the U.S. Olympic Committee dragged its feet, the media chastised Hamm as a poor sport -- the rare sports story where everybody involved loses.

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9. NEEDED: FOOTBALL COORDINATION

Once the proud home of the Lombardi Packers, the Landry Cowboys, and the Montana 49ers, the NFC turned into a halfway house for half-good teams and stultifying mediocrity. With one game left, only three NFC teams -- Philadelphia, Atlanta, Green Bay -- are assured of winning records. With two games left, the 5-9 Arizona Cardinals still had a chance to win the NFC West title. Meanwhile, in the AFC, where three winning teams could miss the playoffs, the cry has gone up: Realignment!

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10. DESPERATE NETWORKS

Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. Nicollette Sheridan on “Monday Night Football.� Greed got CBS, ABC and the NFL into a couple of bookend embarrassments this year, as the quest for bigger ratings -- even for the Super Bowl! -- produced some ridiculous brainstorms, leading to backlash, retrenchment and this booking for the next Super Bowl halftime show: Paul McCartney.

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-- Mike Penner