Forgettable sports teams

[IceCap]

Yeah, it's the Panthers, hands down. No need to even go through it league by league.

[infrared41]

Irrelevant to me means you've been around a while and you've never, ever, mattered much. That's not to say that these teams haven't risen up for a season or something. It's saying that when you go to sporcle.com or somewhere and try to list all the teams in the league off the top of your head that, unless you're a fan, you're always going to forget these guys.

So using that as my criteria I humbly submit the following teams...(when using a "newer" team I also listed a longer tenured equivalent)

MLB: The Texas Rangers (they take the number one overall spot)

NFL: The Houston Texans or The Atlanta Falcons

NBA: The Memphis Grizzlies or The Utah Jazz

NHL: The Columbus Blue Jackets or The Vancouver Canucks

[Firefly]

The problem with this game is that the teams you don't think about rarely come to mind. So, it a whole lot of, "Oh, right. I didn't think of them."

Such is the case for the Jacksonville Jaguars. They're a playoff bound team with an empty stadium in a division where they are usually third or last. The biggest news items from them have been a uniform change due to being indistinguishable from the Ravens and the fact that all their games are blacked out.

And rumor that they may move to a city that isn't ready to take in a football team.

[Saintsfan]

I don't tend to think of the awful teams as irrelevant, its the teams forever in the middle of the pack I tend to think of as irrelevant. For instance in the NBA what have the Sacremento Kings ever added? Or the New York Jets (at least since Joe Namath) in the NFL? Teams that with careful managing, could make it up to the next step, but just don't seem to have the drive, and are happy just drifting and making money for the owner.

[WJMorris3]

As a fan, it pains me to say it, but...

Notre Dame football, the last 40 years or so.

[Hat Boy]

No football team is irrelevant as they are all on national TV at some point.

Bad baseball teams usually get the spotlight at the trade deadline.

Bad basketball tems get to shine on the Draft Lottery night.

Hockey has the lowest profile of any of the "Big Four" sports, so tally another vote for the Florida Panthers.

[Don]

To me, irrelevant means people in your own town forget you exist.

Another tally for the Florida Panthers.

[The_Admiral]

"Forget" means they used to know. I think plenty of people have never been aware of the Panthers. rawr!

[Still MIGHTY]

Florida Panthers

Milwaukee Bucks or Sacramento Kings

Milwaukee Brewers or San Diego Padres or Baltimore Orioles

Seattle Seahawks

[chestnutz]

Panthers

Bills were the first team that came to mind. I hear about them all the time because they're really the only pro sports team close to me in Rochester (besides Sabres) and everyone HERE talks about them, but I honestly never, ever see them on sportscenter or being talked about, especially until Owens came. Just nobody cares about them.

[HedleyLamarr]

The Oakland Athletics.

They have no stars. Their All-Star rep from last season is still an unknown guy. They aren't a threat to make the playoffs, yet are rarely the worst team in baseball. Their attendance sucks. And, since they're out on the West Coast, they rarely make any headlines that deals with their play.

The only thing I can think of about the Athletics is that they had a 20-game win streak a few years ago. I even went to an Athletics-Rays game last year, and didn't know a damn thing about Oakland's roster, and I consider myself to be somewhat up-to-date on my baseball info.

[rentz]

The Seattle Seahawks.

Outside of their 2003-07 glory days, they are 8-8 pretty much every year.

[raysox]

For me.

MLB- Padres

NBA- Bob's Cats

NFL- Jaguars, or Seahawks

NHL- Coyotes.

[BBTV]

I think some of you are confusing "irrelevant" with "worst".

Some? I think you mean "most". Someone actually said that the Cleveland Browns are irrelevant? They suck, but they're hardly irrelevant.

If a team just vanished off the face of the earth, would anyone notice? I'd say the Clippers and Grizzlies in the NBA, the Panthers and Coyotes in the NHL, the Jaguars in the NFL (seriously - they're the only option here), and the Nationals, Rangers, and Royals in MLB, with possibly the Diamondbacks, Rockies, and Marlins included also.

[ZapRowsdower8]

I remember starting a thread that posed this exact same question a few years ago, probabaly three by now. My answer remains the same, the Texas Rangers. Everything about them is blah. Hardly any history of success, but are also never the worst team in baseball. (This is what saves the Reds, Pirates, and Royals.) They have some of the most uninspired uniforms in pro sports. Their stadium is a mix of every classic ballpark yet it lacks personality. Their all-time best player, Nolan Ryan, played for three other teams.

It is hard to argue against the Florida Panthers though.

[The_Admiral]

The Oakland Athletics.

They have no stars. Their All-Star rep from last season is still an unknown guy. They aren't a threat to make the playoffs, yet are rarely the worst team in baseball. Their attendance sucks. And, since they're out on the West Coast, they rarely make any headlines that deals with their play.

The only thing I can think of about the Athletics is that they had a 20-game win streak a few years ago. I even went to an Athletics-Rays game last year, and didn't know a damn thing about Oakland's roster, and I consider myself to be somewhat up-to-date on my baseball info.

Billy Beane and the Athletics radically changed the way teams evaluate talent and have provided many teams with valuable players (or at least players who were valuable till they got off the BALCO needle and fell apart). Furthermore, the A's are one of the most decorated teams in the American League with a weird colorful history: before Moneyball, you had the Bash Brothers, the Charlie Finley era, Connie Mack's fiftysome years in the dugout. You have Giambi, Tejada, McGwire, Canseco, La Russa, Rickey, Catfish, Reggie, Rollie, on and on. To call the A's irrelevant is to completely miss the point of the exercise. They're in a downturn now, but nothing they can't get out of. They're still a cornerstone of the major leagues.

[The_Admiral]

Sorry, I'm oddly protective of Oakland sports and I don't even live there. I love the A's and Raiders in kind of an abstract conceptual way, if not in a day-to-day following way.

[dfwabel]

I needed to spend time on this, so I used the afternoon and talking to Sailor Jerry in the last hour.

NBA: 1-Charlotte Bobcats. Outside of uniform changes, when does even this board talk about them? Poor draft picks and trades.

2-Memphis Grizzlies: See #1.

NHL: 1-Vancouver Canucks: They have three players which most MAY people know, the Sedin twins and Luongo.

2-Nashville Predators: The 2nd team in a one pro team town. And the 1 team is NFL.

3-Colorado Avalanche: What occurred with them in the last eight years? No new talent, just trading for olds.

MLB: 1-Washington Nationals: All we hear about is their draft picks and a hitting streak. The have no real talent to trade for or look at a box score for.

2-Kansas City Royals: See #1

3-Texas Rangers: Big city income...small city budget and attitude.

NFL: This is the hardest as the salary cap and draft makes then the best of all of them. I really do not think that any NFL team is as irreverent as any other N/A sport team. HOU was to make a leap this year, but did not; CIN was notoriously poor, so I may go with them still.

1-STL Rams: If there was not Rush, then we would have little news.

2-SEA: They are what they were before moving to Husky Stadium and Holmgren...nothing.

[HedleyLamarr]

Sorry, I'm oddly protective of Oakland sports and I don't even live there. I love the A's and Raiders in kind of an abstract conceptual way, if not in a day-to-day following way.

I totally get what you're saying. But looking at the MLB landscape, where exactly do the Athletics fit in? They're not a World Series contender, they're a longshot for the AL West, yet aren't that awful a team. They hardly get a mention on SportsCenter or nationally-broadcast sports-talk radio unless they're playing the Yankees or Red Sox. They've only been to the ALCS once in the last 20 seasons. They hardly sign a known star unless it's for a 1-year deal, and that player eventually gets placed on waivers or gets traded to a contender. They play their games in a stadium that's awful for baseball. And being on the West Coast doesn't help them either.

They aren't that good, but they aren't dreadful.

They aren't an interesting team.

They don't have a big-name star to follow.

The Athletics are....just there. They aren't in danger of folding, but they also aren't poised to be much more than a middling team.

[BBTV]

Plus, they're overshadowed in their own market. I don't think the A's are irrelevant... but they're damn close. It's a shame too, being that they're such a historical team, going back to Connie Mack and Jimmy Foxx in Philadelphia.