- 6 months ago
From icons of inspiration to figures of infamy, these athletes experienced dramatic downfalls. Join us as we explore the shocking scandals that forever changed their legacies. Our countdown includes sports stars who lost it all through scandals involving doping, criminal activities, and personal misconduct that shocked fans worldwide!
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00:00I was asking for them to come after me, and it was an easy target.
00:04Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for 10 athletes who had a dramatic fall from grace.
00:09It doesn't fit. If it doesn't fit, you must acquit.
00:15And Tiger Woods.
00:16Tiger Woods was a crossover superstar who was in the middle of making his goat case concrete.
00:20He was the ultimate competitor. He did what he had to do to win.
00:25It certainly created Tiger and everybody else.
00:28Lucrative endorsements, video game deals, and more major trophies than anyone of his era.
00:33Tiger was truly the gold standard.
00:34But when it emerged that he was a serial cheater and that his infidelity had largely been covered up to preserve his image,
00:39it changed the way we looked at him forever.
00:41I owe a lot of people an apology. I hurt a lot of people.
00:44Not just my wife, my friends, my colleagues, the public, kids who looked up to me.
00:52There were a lot of people that thought I was a different person.
00:56Tiger lost everything. His status in the golf world, his credibility as a public figure, and a number of big money deals.
01:02Sure, he pulled off one hell of a career comeback to win the Masters in 2019, but that comeback was so great because of how far he had to fall.
01:08Many doubted we'd ever see it. But here it is. The return to glory!
01:17Ben Johnson
01:18Ben Johnson was a hero to many Canadians and athletes worldwide when he pushed the boundaries of what was possible for an athlete in 1988.
01:25Ben Johnson, fastest man alive. Fastest ever. For Canadians, a classic where were you moment.
01:31Winning Olympic gold in the 100-meter sprint was quite the achievement, of course, but to do so with a record-setting 9.79 seconds elevated his status to a totally different level.
01:40But when it emerged that Johnson had been doping, it all fell apart.
01:42The urine sample of Ben Johnson was found to contain the metabolites of a banned substance, namely, stanozolol.
01:52Stanozolol, the name of that infamous drug, haunts still.
01:57He went from national hero to the guy who betrayed the love and trust of millions, and according to Johnson himself, he is still being punished for it to this day.
02:04It does make you wonder whether it was all truly worth it.
02:06It was necessary at the time. I didn't have any second opinion. I was a young boy. That's it. Then, you know, I win the gold medal, and I lost it. So, that's life.
02:21He remains a legendary figure, but his reputation is truly beyond repair.
02:25Roger Clemens
02:25Baseball has been rocked by many PED scandals over the years. Who can forget Mark McGuire's feeble attempts to downplay his own clear steroid usage?
02:33Like I've said earlier, I'm not going to go into the past and talk about my past. I'm here to make a positive influence on this.
02:40Or how about Barry Bonds having his entire legendary career called in question after he got caught red-handed?
02:46Well, for our money, few have fallen further than Roger Clemens, and it wasn't just his PED usage either.
02:50That perjury case just reinforced all the negative things that people felt about him. He took no responsibility for anything.
02:58Nah, he spent years lying to the fans about playing the game clean, and then lost even more respect from the masses when he engaged in an extramarital affair with an underage country singer.
03:08Roger Clemens is proof that having both your personal reputation and professional reputation is a damn near impossible thing to bounce back from.
03:15We know we've closed the chapter on that. I don't worry about that.
03:19Mike Tyson
03:19As the youngest champion in the history of the heavyweight division, Iron Mike Tyson could not go anywhere without being mobbed by fans.
03:26Tyson was one of the most dynamic athletes in the world. The youngest heavyweight champion in history. He was a marquee attraction with enormous power.
03:34And though a shocking loss to Buster Douglas exposed some issues of overconfidence, he was still very much in his prime.
03:40But when he was sentenced to six years in prison for the assault of Desiree Washington, everything changed.
03:44He completely changed. The look on his face completely changed. Everything about him completely changed.
03:50He changed from a sweet and nice person that I thought he was earlier to just this animal, like a demon or something.
03:59In minutes?
04:00And in seconds.
04:01Not only did he cause public opinion to do a 180, he also lost out on a large portion of his best fighting years.
04:06The Tyson who returned to the ring a few years later was more of a loose cannon and far less successful in terms of fighting.
04:12Biting Evander Holyfield's ear off didn't help things either.
04:15Seems to be some kind of altercation going on.
04:19It looks like he could have been disqualified. The fight could be over.
04:22Michael Vick
04:23Michael Vick might have been a very good quarterback once upon a time, but these days he's known for one pretty unflattered reason.
04:29Bad news, Kennel just started us wanting to breed pit bulls with the patches and the ones that, you know, look pretty and show dogs and we was going to sell them.
04:39And it just went from one aspect to another.
04:44Vick was revealed to have a very odd interest in illegal dogfighting.
04:48In fact, he personally sponsored and ran a dogfighting operation on his own property.
04:52Athletes are certainly no strangers to all manners of irredeemable behavior,
04:55but there's just something particularly cruel about messing with dogs.
05:08And for Vick, even after he served 21 months behind bars, his reputation never fully recovered.
05:13People tend to take it personally if you profit from the pain of man's best friend.
05:17Best thing for me that ever happened to me in my life was me getting shipped off to Kansas, man.
05:23Because other than that, I wasn't going to change.
05:27Tonya Harding.
05:28Spending much of her early life training as a figure skater, Tonya Harding reached the highest of highs, and then ultimately the lowest lows.
05:35I don't think I need to tell you, but you are in first place right now.
05:38After nailing a triple axel in competition, Tonya was truly on top of the world.
05:41But when she allegedly orchestrated a brutal attack on her rival Nancy Kerrigan during a practice session,
05:47it was seen as one of the dirtiest tactics in the history of sport.
05:49The attack plunged Kerrigan's Olympic dreams into doubt and focused suspicion on rival skater, Tonya Harding.
05:57Footage of Nancy's immediate reaction is hard to watch, even to this day.
06:01And seeing Harding turn to trashy reality TV in order to save her career gave people a greater insight into just how desperate she was.
06:08Harding says she's done apologizing about Kerrigan's attack.
06:11Enough apologizing. She's got her life, I've got my life, we both have wonderful lives, and that should be all that matters.
06:22Oscar Pistorius.
06:24The story of Oscar Pistorius is a pretty tragic one.
06:26He was once seen as a role model to any athlete who competed with some form of disability.
06:30Its place on South Africa's track team is the culmination of a difficult and at times controversial quest
06:36to become the first amputee track athlete to ever compete at an Olympics.
06:40And his performances at the Olympics and Paralympics were the stuff of legend.
06:44The Blade Runner was bringing a whole lot of positive energy and attention to his sport.
06:48But in 2013, everything changed.
06:49Pistorius shot and killed his girlfriend, Riva Steenkamp.
06:52The verdict was unanimous and unexpected.
06:55South Africa's Supreme Court calling Pistorius' original jail sentence inappropriate and raising it.
07:02According to Oscar himself, he believed that she was an intruder, but many things in his story simply did not add up.
07:08He ended up serving nine years of a 13-year sentence and has virtually disappeared from the public eye ever since.
07:13For five years, he'll live under conditions.
07:15He could be returned to prison if he breaches them.
07:18Aaron Hernandez.
07:19The story of Aaron Hernandez's life was one that grew increasingly chaotic up to his very sudden death.
07:24Superstardom on the field, overshadowed by violence and the victims he left behind.
07:31Once regarded as a star tight end in college and later the NFL, Hernandez was indicted for the double homicide of Daniel Day-Abreu and Zafir O'Furtado, although he was later acquitted.
07:41However, in 2013, he was arrested for the murder of his friend Odin Lloyd, who was dating Hernandez's fiancee's sister.
07:47Aaron Hernandez is found guilty of murdering Odin Lloyd.
07:52You are sentenced by order of the court for the term of your natural life without the possibility of parole.
07:57He would eventually be sentenced to life in prison on first-degree murder charges, but just a few days after being acquitted of the first double homicide, he took his own life at the age of 27.
08:06It's important to note, while the conviction will stand now, the court record will say the conviction was never affirmed or reversed because the defendant died while the appeal was pending.
08:16Lance Armstrong.
08:17No P.E.D. saga in the history of sports has managed to leave so many disappointed as the story of Lance Armstrong.
08:23He went from survivor to victor in what was called at the time, one of the most unbelievable comebacks in sports history.
08:31Armstrong wins the Tour de France.
08:33For seven straight years, he dominated arguably the hardest sporting event in the world.
08:38He was the face of cycling, won the Tour de France seven consecutive times, a cancer survivor and a consistent supporter and organizer of charitable endeavors.
08:45He was truly a model athlete, but after years of vehemently denying any form of steroid use when his house of cards collapsed, it was a truly epic spectacle.
08:54We did what we had to do to win.
08:56Armstrong eventually was caught out, later revealing that he had lied through his teeth to millions for his entire career.
09:01Cycling as a whole was shown to be ravaged by P.E.D. use, but Lance's attempts to shift blame onto the culture just made him look even worse.
09:08The true hero to zero story.
09:10But I wouldn't change a thing.
09:11I've said that three times and I'll say it again.
09:13I would not change a thing.
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09:31OJ Simpson.
09:32The trial of OJ Simpson was one of those cultural events that shook an entire nation to its core.
09:36The scene was set for what would eventually be called the trial of the century.
09:41Simpson was once revered as one of the standout running backs in NFL history, but his stellar credentials and crossover success only made his eventual fall that much worse.
09:50Simpson was arrested after a dramatic police chase for the murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her friend Ron Goldman.
09:55The name OJ Simpson eventually divided the country along racial lines as well.
10:00Many blacks proclaimed his innocence, while whites were far more skeptical.
10:05The subsequent trial was truly one of the biggest media cycles of the decade.
10:09Ultimately, Simpson was controversially acquitted of the crime.
10:12His lawyer, Johnny Cochran, managed to pull off a legal miracle, but Simpson's reputation was forever ruined.
10:18But in the end, at least publicly, OJ Simpson felt content about his place in the world.
10:24Which athlete do you think had the most shocking fall from grace?
10:27Let us know in the comments.
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