ESPY 2012 Winners: Award Finalists That Got Screwed over in Voting

All too often, the world proves that they don’t deserve a vote.

When the 2012 ESPY Winners were announced, one of those instances was revealed. Here are three awards that the world completely whiffed on this year.

3. Alabama Football/Kentucky Basketball

The Alabama football and Kentucky basketball team should’ve been the only squads even in the discussion for the Best Team award. But somehow, someway, the Miami Heat were called on stage to accept the honor.

Fan voting…what a mistake.

Compared to other teams in NBA history, Miami wasn’t anything special. In the regular season, they finished with just the fourth-best record in the league and it took them seven games to defeat a Boston Celtics team long past their prime that likely had the worst bench to ever participate in an Eastern Conference Finals.

Alabama and Kentucky were literally dream teams. Each dominated their opponents from the first game of the regular season to the national title. Both also boasted an unrivaled amount of future pros on their roster.

The Crimson Tide and Wildcats were legendary teams. The only thing that the Heat had legendary was individuals.

2. Mike Krzyzewski

Sure, Duke has plenty of haters, but there’s no logical explanation as to why Drew Brees won the Record-Breaking Performance of the Year Award over Coach K.

First off, the most wins in NCAA Division I men’s basketball history is a far more prestigious record than the regular-season passing yards record. To break a career record, it takes dominance of the course of many years. A single-season record only takes, well, one good year.

And to top it off, Brees broke the record in garbage time by controversially running up the score against the Atlanta Falcons. Krzyzewski broke his record by defeating Tom Izzo and Michigan State. Not only was Coach K’s record more prestigious, but he broke it in a more impressive manner.

1. Lehigh

I know the world has a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately mindset, but are you serious?

The Los Angeles Kings won the ESPY for Best Upset, which is complete joke. Sure, they were an eighth seed, but this is the same squad that also had their goalie, Jonathan Quick, win Best NHL Player. You can’t have the best player and be the best upset—that’s ludicrous.

Lehigh’s victory over Duke shocked the world. No one outside of the Mountain Hawks’ own fans picked them over the Blue Devils in their brackets—and only Lehigh homers were bold enough to do that. LA was an NHL team beating other NHL teams while the Mountain Hawks were an unknown beating the most prestigious school in college basketball.

It isn’t even close.

David Daniels is a featured columnist at Bleacher Report and a syndicated writer.

Follow @TheRealDDaniels