At the end of the year, it’s always interesting to look back at all that has happened in the world of sports over the last 12 months. 2008 brought us a host of compelling sports stories, including the culmination of the Patriots’ (unsuccessful) quest for perfection, a Bejing Olympics that featured incredible accomplishments by the likes of Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt and the Redeem Team, and, of course, Brett Favre’s unretirement, which managed to hold the sports news cycle hostage for a solid month or more.

As is our tradition, we’ve once again broken our Year End Sports Review into three sections. The first is “What We Learned,� a list that’s packed with a number of impressive feats. And when there are feats, inevitably there are also failures.

Don’t miss the other two parts: “What We Already Knewâ€� and “What We Think Might Happen.â€�

The New England Patriots weren’t so perfect after all.

After rolling through the 2007 regular season unscathed, the Patriots entered the 2008 Super Bowl as overwhelming favorites to roll over the pesky, but seemingly inferior New York Giants. The Pats were just one win away from staking their claim as the best football team in NFL history. But thanks to a dominating Giants’ defensive line, an improbable catch by David Tyree, and a virtually mistake-free performance by Eli Manning, the unbeatable New England Patriots were beat. It’ll go down as one of the biggest upsets in Super Bowl history, and considering Tom Brady’s season-ending injury in 2008 cost the Pats a chance for redemption, it seems that many have forgotten how New England stood just one win away from perfection. – Anthony Stalter

Michael Phelps is part fish.

Eight gold medals in one Olympiad? No problem. Michael Phelps made the seemingly impossible look (relatively) easy en route to one of the most – if not the most – impressive Olympic performances ever. Phelps had to swim all four strokes, compete in both sprint and endurance races, and deal with the constant media attention and pressure that came along with his quest. Sure, NBC turned up the hype, but what Phelps accomplished is simply incredible. – John Paulsen

Usain Bolt is part cheetah.

First, Usain Bolt made Jamaica proud by setting a new world record (9.69) in the 100-meter sprint. Then, he broke the 12 year-old 200-meter world record with a time of 19.30 seconds. He showboated during the first race but cleaned up his act to win the second race in a professional manner. Some even say that Usain Bolt – not Michael Phelps – was the biggest story to come out of the Bejing Olympics. – JP

The Big 12 has the best quarterbacks in the nation.

The Big 12 housed some of the best quarterbacks in all of college football in 2008. Texas’s Colt McCoy, Oklahoma’s Sam Bradford, Missouri’s Chase Daniel and Texas Tech’s Graham Harrell were all considered Heisman candidates at least at one point during the season, while McCoy and Bradford are still in the running. Amazingly, Bradford and McCoy aren’t done; both will return in 2008. And although they don’t receive as much attention as the top signal callers in the conference, Kansas’s Todd Reesing and Baylor’s Robert Griffin certainly turned heads this year as well. In fact, the highly versatile Griffin is only a freshman and could make the Bears a very dangerous team for years to come. – AS

A woman being charged with impaired driving is not a big news story, unless she is arrested at work. An off-duty Windsor, Ontario police officer observed a Zamboni operator driving in an erratic manner. She was hitting the side boards as she had apparently fallen asleep and was slumped over the steering wheel during the re-surfacing of the ice in-between periods of a local game.

At around 9:40 p.m. Thursday, an off-duty Kingsville OPP sergeant who happened to be at the arena was approached by a number of citizens telling him “I think the Zamboni driver is drunk.”
The sergeant observed the 34-year-old driver operating the machine erratically, with speed fluctuating and missing large portions of the ice surface.

The female driver was released on a promise to appear in a Windsor court on the charges of impaired operation of a motor vehicle. Her name will not be released by authorities until her first court appearance.

There’s a Sarah Palin joke in here somewhere.

Sarah Palin is killing John McCain in Pennsylvania. First she flat out cursed the Philadelphia Flyers and now more recently, she didn’t realize what kind of baseball fans she was speaking to when she touted the Phillies winning the World Series at a rally…in Pirate territory.

It was a throwaway line meant to be a crowd-pleaser. But it fell flat.

On Thursday at a rally in Erie, Pa., Sarah Palin touted the victors in the World Series to thousands of supporters. “I am thrilled to be here in the home state of the world-champion Philadelphia Phillies,” Palin said.

The crowd booed.

Philadelphia is a seven-hour drive from Erie, which is in the state’s far west. Erie’s baseball devotions are split between the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Cleveland Indians. (Pittsburgh and Cleveland are about two hours away.)

Palin has been booed by Pennsylvania sports fans before. Earlier this month, the Republican vice presidential candidate was loudly heckled at a Philadelphia Flyers game.

Are you telling me nobody in her group could have told her where the hell she was and that a line like that wouldn’t go over well with the crowd? Maybe she should just leave sports out of her shtick from now on.

The last time vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin dropped the ceremonial first puck before a NHL game was during a Flyers-Rangers contest in mid-October. The Flyers haven’t won since.

Apparently Palin will soon cast her destruction on yet another hockey team.

Vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will drop the ceremonial first puck Friday night before the St. Louis Blues’ game against the Los Angeles Kings.

The Alaska governor and self-described “hockey mom� also dropped the first puck Oct. 11 before Philadelphia’s home opener against the New York Rangers.

Palin will attend a rally Friday morning in southwest Missouri. Demand for tickets for the Springfield event prompted the GOP to move it from a university arena to the parking lot at Bass Pro Shops to accommodate the expected crowds.

Sorry Blues fans. You had a nice run, but that 4-2 start will be nothing but a distant memory once “Jinxsy� gets through with you.

Many political experts view Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s easy win in the 2004 Illinois United States Senate race as the victory that catapulted him into the national spotlight and set him on his current path to the White House. But looking back at that victory, for a few days in 2004 there was a real possibility that Obama’s Republican opponent could have been Chicago Bears coaching legend Mike Ditka.

Ditka spoke about his possible candidacy to CNN News in an interview, and he does play the “what if� game:

“It would have been interesting, I’ll tell you that,â€� Ditka said, “I don’t know what would have happened if I had run. I really don’t. Could I have beaten him? Maybe. Maybe not.â€�

Ditka added that he gave serious consideration to running as the Republican nominee, but citied family and business obligations in declining the invitation. A staunch conservative, Ditka stated that he is firmly behind the McCain/Palin ticket come November.