The Dumbest Professional Athletes

The dumbest professional athletes might not be the least intelligent athletes overall, but each is responsible for at least one really dumb decision, incident, or mistake that forever tainted their reputations. From the dumb football players who can't seem to stay out of jail to the dumb baseball players who lie about steroid use and the dumb basketball players who can't seem to stop cheating on their gorgeous NBA wives, all of these men and women are known nearly as much for their very public gaffes as they are for their athletic ability.

It's really easy to single out the many NFL players who have, or currently are, serving time in the clink for legal issues, but few measure up to the many (alleged) crimes of O.J. Simpson. After being acquitted of murdering his wife and her friend in 1995, the former Heisman Trophy winner found himself sentenced to 33 years in prison after an armed robbery/kidnapping incident in Las Vegas.

Though other pro football players have done horrible things, few can compare to the idiocy of Simpson. Or idiot quarterback Michael Vick fought dogs on his own property. Plaxico Burress shot himself with his own gun in a night club. Brett Favre (allegedly) sent pictures of his junk to a team staff member. All stupid moves and all, with the exception of Favre, paid a huge price for their poor decisions.

Other dumb athletes either are not very book smart, like Vince Young and Morris Claiborne who scored record lows on the Wonderlic aptitude test (which measures how smart a football player is based in a series of different styles of questions), or thought they could cheat without anyone noticing. No one will ever forget those baseball players connected with the steroid era, like the shamed Sammy Sosa or Barry Bonds, or even athletes like Tonya Harding who decided to hire a hitman to take out her closest competitor, Nancy Kerrigan. Spoiler: All of them were caught and it wasn't pretty.

So from the stupid athletes who did dumb illegal things to the ones who lost the respect from their fans after public adultery incidents to those who are just not smart, all of these athletes are examples of why it's important for NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL players to abide by the law and play nice. Just because you're a rich and famous professional athlete doesn't mean you can get away with anything.

Who cares if you can't beat them on the field? Take a look at this list of the dumbest athletes of all time, and you'll immediately feel superior. Because who doesn't want to sit around and think about who the dumbest NFL players are while eating a giant bowl of nachos while downing it with an inhuman amount of beer?