Top 10 Tragic Sports Figures

A tragic hero is someone who has remarkable ability, but is fatally flawed. If Terrell Owens continues to acts like, well, Terrell Owens, he could go down as one of the most tragic sports figures in history.

For most of his career he dominated his position, and turned in one of the gutsiest Super Bowl performances when he played with a newly installed door hinge for an ankle. After winning the championship he sat out the following season because he wanted more money, and was eventually run out of Philadelphia. He found a new home, with new problems, in Dallas. It started when he blew off practices and physical therapy sessions in the preseason, culminated with an apparent overdose on painkillers, and now he's hocking loogies on cornerbacks.

If history continues to repeat itself for TO he could join a poignant list of athletes who let personal demons get the best of them ruining a bright career or destroying a historic legacy.

10. Gene "Big Daddy" Lipscomb - He defined what the pass rushing end is today: Big, fast and mean. During his heyday with the Colts in the '50's Big Daddy tipped the scales at over 300 pounds, but was still one of the fastest guys on the team. He fancied wine, women and heroin despite the fact he was petrified of needles. He overdosed in 1963.

9. Len Bias - During his senior year at Maryland, every time he got within 8 feet of the rim an arena-rattling dunk would quickly follow. He had Jordan like hops and Bird like touch. Smooth when he needed to be, but could also bang down low with just about anybody. He died of a cocaine overdose less than two days after the Celtics made him the number one pick in 1986.

8. Shane Hmiel - He was once NASCAR's most promising star. Young and extremely talented he tested positive for marijuana in 2003, but just two years later he was all set to start working with one of the biggest names in racing. However, he only had a hand full of Nextel Cup races under his belt with Dale Earnhardt, Inc. when he tested positive again, this time for cocaine. Just for good measure, he failed a third drug test less than a year later. Because of the sport's strict policies it's unlikely he'll ever drive in another NASCAR event.

7. John Daly - Things could be worse for JD. And that's taking into account that he's lost sponsors for his drinking and gambling escapades, he's come with in inches of doing himself in by driving off a cliff, and his fourth wife is locked up for her role in a drug ring. What would his career (and life) have been had he not been sauced for most of it?

6. Eric Show - The Padres starter dominated the team's rotation during the late '80's, and led San Diego to the 1984 NL pennant over the Cubs. Played a mean classical guitar, was physics major at UC Riverside, and had a knee-buckling overhand curve. But after he gave up Pete Rose's record-breaking hit he was never the same. It may have been the nasty drug habit that diminished his skills, drove him insane and to an early grave.

5. Dwight Gooden & Darryl Strawberry - The sky seemed the limit for the two young Mets who were the 1983 and 1984 Rookie Of the Year, respectively. Strawberry came to New York as a 21 year old and began hitting balls from Queens to Staten Island. The next year, a 19-year-old Gooden won 17 games by throwing wicked heat and nasty sliders past National League hitters. The two were fast friends and very similar off the field: They both liked guns, drugs and women who had a penchant for calling authorities after they'd been slapped around. All of that affected the success of their careers.

4. Maurice Clarett - Could anyone imagine that the freshman sensation's last football game would be when he led Ohio State to a National Championship in 2002? Clarett is just a common felon these days. Busted for holding up some New Year's Eve partiers with a .45 was bad, but leading Columbus cops on a high-speed chase only to be found with a cache of weapons and an open bottle of booze was enough to get him seven and a half years in Ohio's penal system. His game had dropped so much since his college days he'd be lucky to be the back-up punt-return guy on his prison team.

3. Barry Bonds - Just imagine the story you'll tell your children when they look at his numbers and ask why everyone hates him. Where do you start? His eye-popping feats in Pittsburgh? His sullenness he developed in San Francisco? Or the allegations he thought Mark McGwire got too much attention so he started doing 'roids? You can safely tell your little ones that he changed the game forever, and not in a good way.

2. Pete Rose - During his playing days I always wondered why a guy making that much money couldn't get a decent haircut. I thought it was because he spent hours and hours obsessing over the swing that would make him one of the game's greatest hitters. Apparently, he was too consumed with the Reds' money line dropping to -120 against the Braves with Mario Soto pitching to go to a decent barber. Instead of being remembered as the best all-around player now he's just a punchline.

1. Mike Tyson - Do modern day sports tragic figures get any better than this? Kid Dynamite brought boxing back from the dead, then bit it's ear off in front of millions. In between he's been in jail for rape, said he wanted to dine on infants, and was accused of wife beating by Robin Givens. Now he's tattooed his face so we won't recognize him. Unfortunately for everyone, we probably have yet to see the worst in this hapless tale.

Our culture loves to build people up to almost unattainable heights only to gleefully knock them down to the same level of a Wal-Mart greeter. While it's easier to do this to some of these men than others it makes none of their tales any less tragic. Unfortunately for Terrell Owens he seems to be following the same path as some of his peers.