Cheating Controversies

SI Staff | May 21, 2007

Cheating Controversies

Floyd Landis

AP

After turning in what many in the cycling community deemed the most impressive Tour de France in memory, it turns out that Floyd Landis may have impressed for different reasons. While his predecessor, Lance Armstrong, emerged unscathed from allegations of performance-enhancing drugs, Landis is being investigated after illegal levels of testosterone were discovered.

Michael Waltrip

Jeff Gross/Getty Images

Michael Waltrip's crew chief, David Hyder, and competition director, Bobby Kennedy, were suspended indefinitely by NASCAR after an illegal substance was found in the engine of Waltrip's car during a qualifying for the Daytona 500. Waltrip was docked 100 championship points and his wife, car owner Buffy, was penalized 100 owner points.

Diego Maradona

Leo Mason/SIPA/SI

It's perhaps the most notorious cheating episode in the history of sports. In the quarterfinals of the 1986 World Cup, Argentine legend Diego Maradona scored a goal with his hand. The referees didn't see it, despite the English team's protests, and the goal stood. Argentina went on to win the game 2-1 on its way to claiming the World Cup. It would be 14 years until Maradona admitted he was the one who punched the ball, and not, as he called it, "the Hand of God."

Danny Almonte

David Bergman/SI

After blowing through the Little League World Series with a Koufaxian performance for the Rolando Paulino All-Stars, Bronx wunderkind Danny Almonte proved to not be so little, after all. The Dominican was revealed to have been born in 1987, not 1989, thus rendering him two years beyond the Little League age limit. His recent history does little to refute that discovery: recently, he wed a 30-year-old woman.

Mike Tyson

V.J. Lovero/SI

Mike Tyson's match against Evander Holyfield on June 28, 1997, was promoted as "The Sound and Fury." And it was Holyfield who wound up furious after Tyson bit both of his ears. Saying that the biting was the only reasonable reaction to Holyfield's unregulated head butts, Tyson was disqualified by referee Mills Lane at the end of the third round.

Rosie Ruiz

AP

In 1980, Rosie Ruiz (left) won the Boston Marathon in 2:31:56 with nary a bead of sweat on her brow. How does one accomplish such a feat? By entering the race in the final half-mile. Ruiz had also earned her spot in the race by dominating the New York Marathon. Of course, in that competition, she reportedly rode the subway most of the way.

Sammy Sosa

AP

Sammy Sosa, once the cherubic Hercules of the Chicago Cubs, shattered that image when his bat shattered against the Devil Rays in 2003. The bat broke apart, and the cork hidden inside his bat peppered the infield grass. Sosa stated that he had mistakenly taken his BP/exhibition bat to the plate, but he earned a seven-game suspension. Little known fact: after his penalty was up, he went on to hit 40 home runs.

Ben Johnson

AP

When Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson ran a 9.79 in the 100 in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, he beat his own world record and Carl Lewis. Unfortunately, after Johnson's urine sample was analyzed, stanozolol, an anabolic steroid, was discovered. His coach, Charlie Francis, would confess that Johnson had used steroids since 1981.

Albert Belle

Rick Stewart/Getty Images

To some, Albert Belle was an easily unlikable figure, earning jeers for being in rehab, chasing down delinquent trick-or-treaters with his car and going after fans in the stands. He also famously corked his bat. Belle was caught with a corked bat in 1994, but the problem, according to former teammate Omar Vizquel, was worse than that. Quoth Vizquel in his autobiography: "...all of Albert's bats were corked."

Olympic Figure Skating Judging

Heinz Kluetmeier/SI

Blame the French. That's what Canadian figure skating pair Jamie Salé and David Pelletier did when French judge Marie-Reine Le Gougne placed Russia's Yelena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze ahead of them following the free skate in 2002's Salt Lake City Games. While four other judges had voted the same way, Gougne insisted afterward that she had been pressured by the head of the French federation, Didier Gailhaguet, to put the Russians first as part of a deal to give the ice dancing gold to the French team.

Joe Niekro

AP

As a knuckleballer, Joe Niekro was known for his ability to heave pitch after pitch. The most famous thing he threw, however, wasn't a baseball. When an umpire asked Niekro to empty his pockets on the mound, an emery board floated to the ground. He instantly earned himself the label of cheater and a 10-game suspension.

Chicago White Sox

AP

Few things have rocked the sporting world like the fateful year of 1919, when eight Chicago White Sox players (most notably, Shoeless Joe Jackson and Eddie Cicotte) were implicated in throwing the World Series against the Reds. Their reputations and names would forever be marred in the history books. The "Black" Sox scandal ruined the game for many, giving rise to the famous story of a newsboy yelling to Jackson, "Say it ain't so, Joe!"

Tonya Harding

AP

On Jan. 6, 1994, Tonya Harding, one of America's top figure skaters, helped cover up an attack on fellow American starlet, Nancy Kerrigan, during a practice session at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. While Harding initially claimed innocence, it was later found that she helped plan the attack with her ex-husband, Jeff Gillooly, and his hired henchman, Shane Stant, who clubbed Kerrigan on the knee.

Don Sutton

AP

While his creativity didn't net the vitriol of some other cheaters, Hall of Famer Don "Black & Decker" Sutton was infamous for changing the baseball to his advantage. One famous story goes like this: after Gaylord Perry -- a fellow "doctor" of baseball -- presented him with Vaseline (his grease of choice), Sutton reciprocated, thanking him with sandpaper.