The 5 most hated men in Detroit sports

5. The Detroit Lions QB - Currently Jon Kitna: No matter who quarterbacks the Lions, he makes the list. There is no such thing as a free pass given to a Lions QB. The honeymoon between Lions fans and whomever becomes the Lions QB lasts only a matter of minutes, or until the first turnover. Jon Kitna was no exception.

His 4th quarter implosions snatched defeat from the jaws of victory several times in 2006. Sure, Ktina did throw for over 4ooo yards, but it was the emptiest, least effective, and least celebrated 4000 yard season in NFL annals. Yet the Lions brass continue to insist that Kitna was the QB of the here and now, and will be for the length of his contract, which is for another (Gulp) 3 seasons.

Not that the Lions aren't hedging their bets. The next man to be on this list was drafted in the 2nd round of the 2007 NFL draft, the Lions QB of the future, Drew Stanton. He claims to be excited to have been drafted by his hometown team. Ah, the sweet naivete of youth. He chooses to ignore what a buzzsaw of hatred he's walking into.

Stanton will learn soon enough.

4. Robert Lang: Lang is unquestionably uber-talented, but is also uber-lazy. Not since the days of Keith Premeau, another notorious underachiever, has a Red Wings player frustrated fans to the point of such hatred.

Robert Lang was acquired with much fanfare in 2004, and was expected to carry a big part of the scoring load. He turned out to be just a load.

iwoCPO at Abel to Yzerman tagged Lang as "The Enigma," for good reason. You never knew what Robert Lang you were going to see on any given night. Unfortunately, the longer his tenure in Detroit, the less we saw of the "Good" Lang.

Lang's 2007 playoffs may have been his crowning underachievement. His lackadaisical effort was only topped by his playing much smaller than his considerable size, bringing not just his line, but also the entire Red Wings team, down to his level.

The screams for Lang's benching were heard long and wide, but ultimately ignored, this past spring. During the Calgary and Anaheim series, he was public enemy number one. In most fan's minds, the Red Wings won despite of Lang, and lost because of him.

3. Neifi Perez: The Black Hole of Suck is the worst offensive player in the major leagues. Let me qualify that... The Black Hole of Suck is the worst offensive player in the history of baseball.

TBHoS is the 25th man on the Detroit Tigers roster, but he's numero uno on every Tigers fan's hit list. TBHoS may just be the most hated Detroit Tiger since the one-two cock punch that was Bobby Higginson and Juan Gone.

What of Jose Mesa, you ask? The hate for Joe Table burned with a white hot intensity, but it was mercifully short lived. The bubbling hate for TBHoS has been a constant Tigers fan companion since his senseless acquisition by a temporarily insane Dave Dombrowski in August 2006.

TBHoS has made enemies everywhere he goes. The fact that TBHoS somehow has a multi-million dollar contract riles every fan's ire to the point of becoming irrational. There isn't bigger proof of baseball's fiscal insanity than TBHoS, and his 2.5 million dollar per season contract.

Fans rejoice whenever TBHoS gets shipped unceremoniously out of town. Every fan in Detroit eagerly awaits the moment when we get our chance to rejoice the departure of TBHoS. Those tears of joy cannot happen soon enough.

2. Flip Saunders: Flip is number 2 with a bullet. He managed to generate a shitload of fan hatred in an impressively short period of time, thanks to his unfathomable decision making against the Bulls and LeBron's.

Starting the 4th quarter of a win or go home game with your offensively challenged backup guards, while your All-Star backcourt watches the season go down in flames on the bench, was the final straw in most fan's minds. By coaching game 6 of the NBA ECF like it was game 50 of the regular season, Flip pegged the hate meter right then and there.

Flip has become the poster coach for those who do less with more. He might be the best regular season coach around, but unfortunately for Flip, playoff basketball is his kryptonite. He somehow manged to burn up all the goodwill built up over a decent 2007 regular season.

With the news today that Flip was somehow keeping his coaching gig, and will come back for a 3rd season of cluelessness, we just may have Matt Millen's heir apparent as the most hated man in Detroit.

1. Matt Millen: Placing the incompetent boob in the number 1 spot was a no-brainer, much like Millen himself. Do I really need to say anything more? So I'm just going to use something I wrote earlier this year as to why Millen is hated with such burning, scathing, all-encompassing rage by the long suffering Detroit Lions fanbase...

Millen is historically bad. Legendarily bad. The sort of bad that will be talked about for generations. When you look up bad in the encyclopedia, you'll see Millen's picture. Millen will be the comparison used when talking about how low a GM can take a franchise. Millen is so bad, that no other GM will ever be allowed to surpass Millen's ineptness, as they would have been canned long before they could do Millen-esque damage to a franchise.

That's why Millen is the most hated man in Detroit.