sport

In 1985 Boris-mania started in Germany when 17-year-old Boris Becker won Wimbledon for the first time. During the tournament my father always told me "Boris is in the quarter-final", "Boris is in the semi-final" and so on. I had no idea how tennis tournaments were organized, so I believed quarter final, semi final and final were all the ranks a player could reach in his entire career. I thought Boris was very successful reaching this in two weeks at the age of 17!!!

By the way, I believed his opponent (Kevin Curran from South Africa) was called Curren Curren.. ;)

Stefan, Germany

I never realized as a child that on a golf course, the hole was just a cup. I thought that each hole was a tube, and they all led to a building where the golf balls were collected.

Stacy

I use to beleive that the silly midd on position in cricket was actually a name of player, I'd imagined him being a very poor fielder who dropped a lot of catches because his mind was of cricket an on other things instead causing him to be nick named "silly midd of".

Zainub

When I was young I used to believe that magicians would be perfect NFL football players because they could easily let the ball disappear and show it back up when they wanted it.
I would tell this theory to friends and parents when there was either football or magic on TV.
I had this theory from when I was 4 till when I was 6.
Then I saw a quarterback -Steve deBerg- do some play action plays and I shouted "they've listened! they've listened!"
He could just let the ball disappear in the hands of a running back and pop it back up to throw it, he got everybody fooled.
From then on, up to this day, I never abandon a theory I truly believe in.

Sjaak

I believed that the men jumping over hurdles in slow motion on TV must have practiced very hard to run so slowly. I practiced too but never got very good at it!

Bob Masse

For a very long time I believed that skydivers were just floating in the air. After all, it didn't LOOK like they were falling incredibly fast.

Andrew

In hockey, they have awards given each year that are named after famous people, like the Conn Smythe trophy, the Norris trophy, the Vezina trophy... So, when a player would be penalized with a misconduct penalty, I thought it was actually a penalty named after someone named Miss Conduct.

Anon

I used to believe that baseball pitchers didn't have to go to games if they weren't starting that day.

I finally got things straight I saw Roger Clemens in the dugout and he wasn't pitching that night.

cindy

I used to believe that snow skiers jumped off the ski lift while it was still high in the air. I believed this until I learned to ski and realized that the ski lift ends at the top of the mountain where you just stand up on the ground to get off the chair.

Misha

my daughter used to stand in front of the t.v. alot. Her dad(being a very big CUBS fan)would tell her if she didn't move, the pitcher was going to throw the ball at her.

Tece

In the NBA basketball, when the team needed to take time-outs, I thought they did something wrong and they have to be grounded.

Anon

When I was about 6 I wanted to be a professional baseball player, but I was very upset to see that they all chewed tobacco. I was very excited to discover that when you chewed on lots of tootsie rolls that it looked like you were chewing tobacco. I figured when I got to the major leagues I would fool them that way

Laci

When I was little I guess 3 or 4 the Housont Oilers fired Bum Phillips as their coach. So my mom came to me and said the Oilers fired Bum Phillips and I started bawling. It took her a while to figure out that in my mind I thought they had shot him. As in Ready, Aim ,Fire.

Scot

All Ohio State players were from Ohio, all Michigan players were from Michigan, all Illinois players were from Illinois, all Texas players were from Texas etc. A good high school player in, say, Ohio automatically went to Ohio State and would never play in Michigan or Pennsylvania, etc.

Similarly, all Chicago Cubs players were from Chicago, all Pittsburgh Pirates players were from Pittsburgh etc.

Becky

i used to believe that the "team fouls" thingy on the basketball scoreboard was the number of fouls that the WHOLE team did.. like if all five players beat up on an opponent. i imagined lots of doggy piles. i remember noticing that their were so many more team fouls than personal fouls, and wondered why i didnt remember seeing any.

Emily

I used to believe that the Purdue University Boilermakers referred to the cocktail, rather than "people who make boilers."

Cindy

When I was little, and until I was probably 8 or 9 I thought that "Volleyball" was said "Bolleyball." Well, you play with a "ball," right? Ballyball? My mom had to break it to me that it was pronounced with a "v" when I went to try out for the team in grade 4.

Les

When i was little i was eating cheerios and i said to my dad "there is a picture of your friend on the cheerios box!!" he looked at the box and saw that it was a picture of basketball player Larry Bird.. he finally figured out from me who i was thinking of and told that friend of his that i thought he looked like Larry Bird. Today, about 10 years later, i picked up the phone and he said "hi this is Larry Bird". they will never let me forget this....

Emily

I used to beleive that when plaing volleyball, you can only serve from one spot. Later did I find out that you can serve from anywhere on the back line. oops.

me