So this is what we remember.
Tiger Woods limping, grimacing, gloriously winning the 2008 U.S. Open.
And this. A parade of women claiming they have been intimate with Woods, who is married with two children.
Glorious. Tawdry. That's sports during the last 10 years.
Lance Armstrong wins six Tour de France titles in this decade and doesn't fail a drug test - but almost everybody else in his sport did. Glorious. Tawdry.
Now we are enthralled again. The Indianapolis Colts may be on their way to perfection, quarterbacked by Peyton Manning. Will it happen? We don't know. That's why we watch, in ever increasing numbers, on television, in stadiums. We want to see something, something special, amazing, inspiring.
We still want to believe in perfection.
What follows is an imperfect recounting of some of the best and worst sports moments - the defining moments - of the 2000s.
Baseball On Dec. 13, 2007, Sen. George Mitchell unveiled his report on baseball's steroid era, after a 20-month investigation ordered by Commissioner Bud Selig and funded by major league owners.
Mitchell listed dozens of names, among them Roger Clemens, who loudly challenged the report and whose tattered reputation stands as the greatest testament to its accuracy.
Yet Mitchell's triumph was not in looking back but in looking ahead. He urged amnesty for the players he listed, a recommendation Selig resisted but ultimately accepted. He persuaded owners and the players union to adopt all but one of a series of reforms (drug testing still is not outsourced to an independent entity). And because Mitchell carries enormous clout in Washington, Congress got off baseball's back about steroids.
The drug problem cannot be eradicated, in baseball or in any other sport. However, home run totals have returned to mortal levels.
- Bill Shaikin
College basketballNot long after the final buzzer, after Florida had secured a second straight NCAA basketball title, the fans began chanting, "One more year." It seemed like a bit much to ask.
With championship victories over UCLA in 2006 and Ohio State in 2007, the Gators became the first repeat winners in more than a decade, joining elite company that included the Bruins, Duke and the University of San Francisco.
Even better, they did it with veteran players - Joakim Noah, Al Horford, Corey Brewer, Taurean Green and Lee Humphrey - who could have turned pro after the first title. Instead, they put off NBA money for another season together, maturing into one of the best college teams in history.
- Chris Dufresne
College footballThe sport's defining moment actually was a series of dramatic snippets that played out over two minutes as college football held its collective breath.
It started on one side of the 50, in the Rose Bowl on Jan. 4, 2006, with USC needing 2 yards on fourth-and-2 at the Texas 45 to clinch its second straight national championship. Trojans running back LenDale White, though, got stuffed 2 inches short with 2:09 left. Why wasn't Reggie Bush in the game?
Everyone knew what was coming next. Standing on the sideline, Vince Young, an unstoppable football force at this point, looked at young redshirt quarterback Colt McCoy and said, "You'll be in this position someday. Watch what I do."
What Young did: Down by five, he drove USC crazy as he drove Texas downfield, scoring the title-winning touchdown with 19 seconds left when he raced 8 yards, on fourth down, to the right corner of the end zone.
Final score: 41-38.
- Chris Dufresne
Auto racingThe crash at first glance appeared rather ordinary by NASCAR standards. But when Dale Earnhardt's black No. 3 Chevrolet careened into the wall on the final lap of the Daytona 500 on Feb. 18, 2001, it claimed the life of NASCAR's most iconic driver and shook the nation's most popular form of motor racing to its core.
The death of Earnhardt - a fearsome, rugged driver known as "The Intimidator" whose blue-collar roots endeared him to a legion of fans - at 49 and at the height of his popularity triggered an outpouring of grief that drew nationwide attention, including the cover of Time magazine.
In the years to come, Earnhardt's death helped lead to dramatic safety changes. They included stronger head-and- neck restraints and a completely new chassis for the sport, dubbed "The Car of Tomorrow," designed mainly with added safety in mind for other drivers, including Earnhardt's son, Dale Earnhardt Jr., NASCAR's most popular driver today.
- Jim Peltz
NBAThe NBA's start of the 21st Century was defined by something that happened in the 20th - Michael Jordan's 1999 departure - and then scarred by the 2004 Auburn Hills riot that haunted the league for years. TV ratings that nose-dived without Jordan went even deeper after the breakup of the Lakers' mini-dynasty that won titles in 2000, 2001 and 2002 but was gone by 2004 when Shaquille O'Neal was traded.
Instead of defining the decade, however, those crises set up the NBA for an improbable turnaround, symbolized by the event that showed how much, and how fast, things could change: the 2008 Finals, in which the Lakers and Celtics played for a title for the 11th time but first in 19 years.
The Celtics ran the Lakers over as in days of yore, but a year later the Lakers came back and won a title of their own. With both teams No. 1 in their conferences, they could get one last shot at each other. TV ratings haven't gone back to their old heights but have firmed up, with the 2008 Finals beating the 2008 World Series.
- Mark Heisler
NFLSomewhere in the world, someone is wearing a prematurely printed T-shirt proclaiming the perfect season that never was.
The 19-0 Patriots?
Well, almost.
The upstart Giants derailed that dream, stunning the then-undefeated Patriots 17-13 in Super Bowl XLII on Feb. 3, 2008, and turning back the would-be perfect team at the doorstep of history.
The thing about that game was it wasn't terribly interesting until crunch time, when the Giants mounted a winning drive marked by perhaps the greatest, most improbable play in franchise history.
On third-and-5 from the Giants' 44, Eli Manning, seemingly sacked by a swarm of Patriots, twisted out of that scrum and heaved a 32-yard pass down the middle to David Tyree. The little-known receiver made a leaping grab, pinning the ball to the top of his helmet as he fell to the turf.
That kept the winning drive alive and, amazingly, pushed a pin into the dream season we thought would never pop.
- Sam Farmer
OlympicsThe judging scandal surrounding the pairs figure skating competition at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games confirmed what most Olympics watchers had long suspected: Subjectively judged sports were crooked, and votes were available for sale or barter.
There always had been rumors of deal-making among judges, but nothing had been proved on the world stage. Who knew how many medals were tainted before a French judge, Marie Reine Le Gougne, tearfully declared she had been pressured to vote for a Russian pair over a Canadian pair? The Canadians, Jamie Sale and David Pelletier, were presented duplicate gold medals in a supplementary ceremony, but their Olympic moment was ruined - as was any remaining faith in impartial judging.
The International Skating Union rammed through a new judging system designed to eliminate deals and make the evaluation of each skater or couple more objective through awarding points for specific moves. Judges got anonymity, and scores were chosen at random by a computer to rank competitors' performances.
But the changes eliminated the familiar and TV-friendly 6.0 perfect score and alienated many fans. And the subjective scores within the system - for performance, choreography and skating skills, among other categories - still leave plenty of wiggle room for bending the rules and politically oriented judgments.
- Helene Elliott
NHLCanceling the 2004-05 season to get a collective bargaining agreement that included a salary cap stands as the NHL's defining moment in ways both good and bad.
The good: The league returned with new rules that minimized obstruction and promoted skill and scoring. Setting a salary floor and a cap helped small-market teams compete with their big-market rivals.
The bad: Losing an entire season curtailed the careers of some players and denied others a chance to achieve records or milestones. The NHL lost ESPN and gave its cable contract to hard-to-find Versus. The schedule became badly unbalanced, creating gaps of three years between visits by marquee players.
As the decade ended, the NHL smartly positioned itself as an Internet innovator for its tech-savvy fans. It also looked toward Europe to expand its audience, staging regular-season games there as a possible prelude to international play - even while Canada clamors for a seventh franchise and can't seem to get it.
- Helene Elliott
GolfBefore his Cadillac Escalade hit a tree - and TMZ started reporting on birdies and bogeys - and the chinks in his Tommy Armour became incredibly, and indelibly, exposed, the man who would be named the greatest athlete of the decade by the Associated Press stood over a 12-foot putt on the par-5 finishing hole at Torrey Pines in 2008. It was supposed to be the final day at the 108th U.S. Open.
Back then, Tiger Woods was in a different bind. Rocco Mediate, a likable 40-something journeyman, had a one-shot lead in the clubhouse but gave Woods hope by making only par on the relatively easy final hole. You don't give Woods hope. After hitting his tee shot into a bunker, Woods laid up in the fairway and then strafed an iron into tying distance. Woods slithered home the putt, his fist pump the cover photo of forever's sports page, to force an 18-hole, next-day playoff.
Except the 18 holes went to 19, with Woods limping along on a bum knee and Mediate being carried by adrenaline. Woods finally knocked out Rocco to claim his undisputed 14th professional major title. Turns out Tiger was playing on a torn ACL. Woods was escorted by golf cart back to the 18th green, where he kissed the trophy, his wife, Elin, and the kids. Those were golf's days.
- Chris Dufresne