What the world looked like last time LeBron's team missed the playoffs

George W. Bush won re-election late in 2004 when he beat John Kerry in the general election. He was then inaugurated in January of 2005. At the time, many considered this the nadir of the Republican Party. No comment.

John Paul II was the only pope a generation of people knew before he passed away early in 2005. The Polish pope took the role in 1978 and was followed by Pope Benedict XVI, who took over in April of this year.

We don’t want to talk about this much. Katrina was a huge tragedy that devastated the Gulf Coast, especially in New Orleans. It was a life-changing natural disaster even for those who didn’t live in the affected area. It did bleed into sports and pop culture as well. Who can forget Kanye West declared “George Bush doesn’t care about black people” while Mike Myers stood on?

Television icons like Carson simply don’t exist anymore. Monoculture was still a thing in his time. Carson ruled late night television as the host of “The Tonight Show” for 30 years. He is perhaps the iconic talk show host of all time. When he died, David Letterman revealed that Carson had been contributing monologue jokes to his show after retiring.

This one ties into sports, given Thompson's affinity for all manner of sports. The gonzo journalist was writing for ESPN’s Page 2 at the time of his death, and his work in the realm of sports writing remains memorable to this day. The always eccentric counterculture figure committed suicide by gunshot and then proceeded to have his ashes fired out of a cannon.

Yes, sexual texting had become prevalent enough by 2005 to earn its own portmanteau. Here are a few more words that were purportedly first used in this year: glamping, locovore, microblogging, and truther. Language is always evolving…for better or for worse.

People still bought physical albums back in 2005, which should make it feel like forever ago. Sure, music streaming existed in some sense, but Spotify didn’t even exist until 2008. Mariah Carey’s “The Emancipation of Mimi,” a comeback album of sorts, was the highest-selling album on the American charts, just beating out “The Massacre” by 50 Cent.

Green Day’s “American Idiot” was one of the other prominent albums dropped into the world this year. Kanye West had yet to go completely off the wall, releasing the relatively subdued but still critically adored, “Late Registration.” Oh, and do you remember that song “Bad Day” by Daniel Powter? That was 2005.

It was not all good news for pop music fans in 2005. For starters, that Crazy Frog song came out. Also, Destiny’s Child announced it would break up after completing its world tour. Of course, Beyonce would be just fine. The political Welsh punks of Mclusky also broke up, but that impact was felt on fewer people.

Yes, “Million Dollar Baby” came out in 2004, but the Oscars that honored Clint Eastwood’s boxing movie were held in 2005. Chris Rock was the host. “The Incredibles” won Best Animated Feature. That was so many Pixar films ago! As for the Academy Awards that rewarded films released in 2005, “Crash” won Best Picture. That means we have been complaining about “Crash” winning this award for as long as we’ve watched LeBron play postseason basketball.

This was the year that “Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith” was released. We finally saw Anakin Skywalker become Darth Vader and…we were kind of bored? It seemed like we would never see another “Star Wars” film. Then Disney got involved, and now we can’t go a year without getting a new adventure set a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

It would take a while for the “Star Wars” universe to be salvaged, but 2005 was when the rebuild of the Dark Knight began. After the disaster that was “Batman & Robin,” the Caped Crusader was persona non grata. Then Christopher Nolan dropped “Batman Begins” on us, and everything turned around.

That honor goes to “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.” The fourth film in the series grossed almost $900 million domestically. Other big money movies include Peter Jackson’s “King Kong,” “Madagascar” and Tim Burton’s “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”

Early in 2005, Pierce Brosnan said he would no longer portray James Bond, everybody’s favorite problematic British spy. Later that year, after a few months of searching, Daniel Craig was pegged to replace him. Now Craig is working on what will be his final Bond film.

Doesn’t it feel like “Dancing With the Stars,” the reality show where C-list celebrities learn to cha cha or whatever, has been on forever? Well, it kind of has. It debuted in 2005! That just shows you how long it’s been since LeBron missed the playoffs. We hadn’t even seen Rick Perry try to dance yet!

Stephen Colbert had been serving as a correspondent for “The Daily Show” since before Jon Stewart was even the host. Then in 2005, he branched off on his own to launch “The Colbert Report.” The show made Colbert a star. Now the entire run of the “Report” has ended, and he’s been ensconced as the host of his own late-night talk show on CBS for years.

OK, so that doesn’t really narrow it down. Let’s be more specific. This was the year the Patriots beats the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl — the Eagles team with Donovan McNabb under center and Andy Reid as the head coach. There was an ad about an Abe Lincoln french fry that was available to bid for on Yahoo! Auctions. Think about that. Yahoo! Auctions.

While Cubs fans would have to wait another decade or so, the White Sox nabbed a World Series this year. It was a long drought for the South Side crew, to be fair. The White Sox had failed to win a title since 1917 before sweeping the Houston Astros.

It’s not surprising when the Tar Heels win March Madness glory. This team was led by the likes of Sean May, Raymond Felton and Marvin Williams, and it was Roy Williams' first title as the North Carolina coach. They took down Illinois in the championship, and it really does feel weird now that Illinois was in the finals of March Madness.

Hockey fans are going to be mad about this article, because it’s going to conjure up bad memories. This was infamously the year when nobody won the Stanley Cup because there was no NHL season. The players were locked out by the owners for an entire campaign. It was ugly for hockey and ugly for sports. It took a lot of years for the NHL to regain fans’ trust. It took even longer for LeBron to miss the postseason.

Back then Tiger Woods was still the king of golf. He won two majors, the Masters and the British Open. Meanwhile, Phil Mickelson won the PGA Championship, and somebody named Michael Campbell won the U.S. Open.

Roger Federer never took a nose dive like Tiger, so the fact he won two major titles in 2005 maybe feels less like a blast from the past. However, wait until you hear who he beat in the finals. At Wimbledon, he took down Andy Roddick. At the US Open, Federer defeated…Andre Agassi. Yes, in 2005 Andre Agassi was still playing high-level tennis. Meanwhile, both Williams sisters also won Grand Slams in 2005, oddly both beating Lindsay Davenport in the finals.

In 2005, Armstrong won his seventh and final Tour de France. Back then, this was still something we celebrated. Then, of course, time would reveal that he had been cheating all along, and he’s now been disgraced.

Technically, “World of Warcraft” was released at the end of 2004. That just allowed it to find its footing and dominate the charts in 2005. The immensely popular MMORPG was the highest-selling video game of the year and a true cultural event that would linger for years after.

Let’s end with the league that LeBron wasn’t quite dominating yet. The San Antonio Spurs beat the Detroit Pistons in seven games for the NBA title. Allen Iverson led the league by scoring over 30 points per game. Steve Nash was MVP. Emeka Okafor was Rookie of the Year. And the Cleveland Cavaliers finished 42-40, losing a tiebreaker for the eighth seed to the New Jersey Nets.