Social media can be considered a wonderful addition to our lives. Since the introduction of sites and apps such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, hordes have been entertained without so much as leaving a room. All it takes is a click or the use of a fingertip.

Of course there are downsides, like the manipulation of personal data for helping decide elections and what not. But that's for another story and I'm here to bring happy, not negativity. So unless you're actually one of the guys mentioned below, you're likely to get a real kick out of this.

As I was saying, the advent of social media has done quite a lot to change our lives for the better. We have access to almost anyone and while contact may be limited, there's always the thrill of simply seeing how sports stars, celebrities and other persons of note get on with their day-to-day lives - well the parts they want us to see.

One does have an advantage as a professional athlete when it comes to contacting people via social media. Who wouldn't want a pro player in their inbox? On many occasions, though, sliding into the DMs - as it's called - has backfired and famous athletes have been exposed getting themselves shot down.

Below are some of the maddest examples on offer.

15 J.R Smith's Pipe Dream

Cleveland Cavaliers star J.R Smith is possibly the most famous athlete DM-fail subject. In 2013, whilst still playing for the New York Knicks, the 32-year-old was put on blast after flirting with a high school senior.

The guard, who was probably used to having his way with a lot of the females he came into contact with, wasted no time offering the teenager some "pipe". Following a Twitter message informing the star of her intention to attend one of his games, he promptly asked: "You looking to get the pipe?"

Apparently, she wasn't. And she let the world know about it by posting a screenshot soon after. "I was very immature and stupid," Smith said some years later. "But I learned from it too: Watch what you say on social media."

14 Food For Thought

NBA players seem to be quite direct when it comes to offering fans a night of fun, or at least that's what they'd probably describe it as.

Marco Belinelli has also found himself shut down by a female after sliding into her DMs. The Italian forward, who now plays for the Philadelphia 76ers, got exposed less than three months after J.R Smith was outed for his bold offer. "What's up? Wanna see something big to eat?" he asked a Twitter user going by the handle of @G0ldbluntz. After she sent him a confused "What?", he proceeded to explain.

"Yes, something long and thick to eat! Lol," he sent back, only to be shut down by the female, who said she was good and already had a man.

Who know's, though, Belinelli could have been referring to a banana.

13 Wrong Place, Probably Right Time

This particular bit isn't about a direct message either, but it should have been - and probably would have been if Darnell Dockett had sent it the right place and then got put on blast.

Dockett, a former defensive end who spent all of his 10-year career with the Arizona Cardinals, was trying to woo model Katherine Webb before a certain game by dropping his number and a proposal in her inbox - only it wasn't her inbox.

Dockett was left with plenty of egg on his face after realizing he had tweeted his intended DM out to the world. "S----, that was supposed to be a DM!" he tweeted seconds later.

The ex-player has since denied his tweet was serious, and is probably still claiming that he could have gotten with Katherine if he wanted to. "And I would have got her if I really wanted her," he said later on. "But I don't think she's my type. I'm not into the thinner girls and the modeling thing like that. I like hood chicks."

Surrrre...

12 Dwight's Trust Issues

NBA big man Dwight Howard has made quite an easy target of himself since coming into the league in 2004. The 32-year-old center was drafted as the No.1 selection by the Orlando Magic and spent eight years with the Florida-based outfit before moving to the Western Conference to join the Los Angeles Lakers in 2012.

The eight-time All-Star is yet to win a championship, but should have, given his talent. It's probably too late now, yet you just never know. Howard, now with the Charlotte Hornets, having gone through the Houston Rockets and Atlanta Hawks, was probably a bit silly to trust someone on Twitter - whom he probably didn't even know personally - with criticism of the team he was on.

But he must have learned his lesson after getting burned by the user.

11 Random James

This one is a little weird. And it doesn't appear that there was any ill intent on LeBron Jame's Part, but that could also be because it wasn't allowed to reach anywhere.

Two years ago, Instagram model Rachel Bush posted a screenshot of a message she received from the Cavaliers star simply saying: "Hey what's up!" She proceeded to screengrab the one-sided convo and post it on her page along with the caption: "Haha wut"

Rachel, though, seemed a bit regretful a few days later and told the Billy Madison Show that LeBron probably wasn't even the one who sent her the message.

"He has a wife and two, three kids. He respects them, I respect him. They have certain people running their pages sometimes," she remarked. "You get DMed by multiple people. That has been the scenario, where their friends or their manager have tried to talk to me pretending to be them."

10 Super Inquisitive Mario

Those of you familiar with Italian striker Mario Balotelli must know how entertaining he is off the field. The colorful forward, now at Ligue 1 side OGC Nice, has made the news for some reason outside of football on many an occasion, so it came as no surprise when some guy outed him for being flirty with his girlfriend.

Balotelli apparently tried chatting up a pretty female going by the name 'mariasifthorvalds' on Instagram after joining Liverpool in 2014. Unfortunately, however, the girl's beau caught on and promptly posted a screenshot of the conversation to Twitter with the caption: “The moment when Mario Balotelli tries to steal your girlfriend :(”

While that would have been extremely embarrassing for just about anyone, the Italian probably didn't even blink as he must have grown some really thick skin from his many gaffes.

9 Another Mia Victim

Mia Khalifa does have a thing for exposing star athletes who slide into her DMs. And Chicago Cubs centre fielder Wilson Contreras found himself embarrassed on Twitter as well after persistently sending the erotic star messages.

She hardly gave him the time of day, only saying, "Bye" after his attempts. But that did not slow the baseball player down. He probably wasn't going to stop until she posted screenshots of his grovelling online, but can she really blame the guy?

One man has since stepped up to avenge all others, however, with former Washington Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas doing her the very same after she wandered into his DMs to ask him out a few times.

"@miakhalifa would slide in my dm," Arenas posted on Insta along with a screenshot. "The thirst is real since Backpage is gone. #Bihhh has no room for negotiations with me."

8 Shaq Of All Trades

Yup. Big Shaq - not the Man's Not Hot guy - has been caught snooping in the inbox as well. But he wasn't trying to hook up, he only popped in there to let an awestruck female know he's a man of many talents.

The former NBA centre is indeed a jack of all trades. We all know he was a basketball player and is now a TV analyst. However, the Diesel was also a rapper, a movie star, and he owns a few businesses. Oh yeah, he's a cop too...

Last year, the young beauty - Roxanne Watlington - posted a pic of Shaq deejaying (another one of his trades, apparently) as part of her Instagram story and captioned it: "@shaq I thought you only played basketball." The four-time champion was quick to dispel the notion by sliding into her DMs and letting her know he's also a cop.

"I'm also police shhhh," he messaged, to which she replied, "Wow Shaq what don't you do?" Of course, Shaq went on to say: "I do it all Roxy."

She didn't 'shhhh', though.

7 Ignorance Isn't Always Bliss

Troy Aikman is a former NFL quarterback who spent all of his 12-year career with the Dallas Cowboys. The team drafted him as the No.1 overall pick in 1989, and he led them to three Super Bowl wins, also getting named MVP of Super Bowl XXVII. Aikman now works as a sportscaster for Fox Sports.

The 51-year-old ex-player - five years younger at the time - seemed to have some trouble understanding Twitter in 2013, particularly how to send a direct message. He totally crashed and burned after a comical attempt to send actress Mari Morrow a DM.

Apart from sending it as a regular tweet, with DM hilariously included at the beginning, he also got her handle wrong. The tweet was duly deleted, but not before Deadspin got a hold of it.

6 Tyrann Mathieu's Due Diligence

Houston Texans safety Tyrann Mathieu is another athlete who has rather embarrassingly fallen victim to the luxury of screenshots. Back when he was a rookie playing for Arizona, the then 21-year-old tried flirting with a teenager via Twitter direct messaging.

After finding out what was up, he quickly got down to asking her name and age. The young lady, who identified herself as Alexis, also pointed out that she was 17. "When you make 18," was Tyrann's next question, obviously.

While his flirting can be considered poor simply because he was exposed by Alexis, there's nothing wrong with trying to remain on the right side of the law. The age of consent in the US, as it relates to unrestricted sexual activity, is 18. So you really can't knock Tyrann on that front.

5 Messed With The Wrong Guy's Girl

LeGarrette Blount, a running back who has played for the Tenessee Titans, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New England Patriots, Pittsburg Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles - now with the Detroit Lions, got his game exposed by a nosy boyfriend on Twitter last year.

Blount had just come off a neat performance, having rushed 136 yards to help the Eagles beat the Los Angeles Chargers, and attempted to treat himself to a fine young lady on Twitter. Unfortunately for him, her boyfriend caught on and called him out on Twitter by posting: "This man LeGarrette Blount , just dm'd my girl lmao."

"Update, he's tryna fly her out to Philadelphia," the thread continued.  And even the girl's brother joined in on it, tweeting: "This man LeGarrette Blount been In my sisters Dms.."

Quite a shame, that.

4 Daunte Culpepper Flaunts His Wealth

Daunte Culpepper made quite a good payday in his time as a quarterback in the NFL and he felt the need to share it with a fellow Instagram user. Well, not just any Instagram user. It was an Instagram model by the name of Jenna Shea who got quite the interesting offer from the former Viking. Culpepper was sure to point out that he was an 11-year pro and that he had $25 million in the bank. He then offered $80,000 of that money to the young lady if she agreed to spend a weekend with him. The young lady responded with: "honey retired NFL players don't blow that." It's unknown if the woman ever agreed to the weekend getaway, but our guess is no.

3 Poor-Zingis

Kristaps Porzingis certainly keeps track of things, by the looks of this DM in-sliding at least. The New York Knicks star seemed awestruck by Croatian Instagram model Inez Nikic sometime in 2016 but was informed by one of her followers that she was still below the legal age (I already explained it above, your fault if you just ran through).

After seeing pics of her celebrations for sweet 18, the player got down to business and waded in the DMs, practically begging for a follow back - imagine an NBA star having to beg for a follow back, this world now...

Anyway, Porzingis' persistence paid off, despite him sounding corny. While he may not have gotten a follow back or a date, Ines did send the star a raunchy snap. He was not at all phased by her posting a screengrab of their convo as her Insta story either, tweeting: "Shooters shoot" with laughing smileys after getting outed.

2 Even More Random from The King

LeBron hasn't been exposed trying to flirt with women via social media, which is good as he's married with kids. But he'd probably rather it if that went down rather than what's actually happened.

The Cavs superstar, mentioned earlier for a random "Hi, what's up," went even weirder after messaging Instagram model Heidi Hoback to ask for hunting lessons and offering basketball lessons in return. "Teach me how to hunt and I'll teach you how to play ball. Deal? Lol," the message read. And to be fair, it would have looked less awkward without the Lol at the end.

"You know, the message was pretty innocent as far as I know," Heidi explained after LeBron fans got on her back.

"And then some of my followers informed me that he was married, which I had no clue because I don’t follow him. I wouldn’t consider myself a fan so I wasn’t aware of that at all. I guess that’s why it’s been made into a bigger deal than I originally thought it’d be.”

1 RG III's Final Hour As A Bachelor

Robert Griffin III was still trying to hook up with another female on the day of his wedding. The former Cleveland Browns quarterback seemed like he wanted to engage in all of the debaucheries he could have before tying the knot.

RG III was embarrassingly exposed by Hooters waitress and student Meredith Barber, who sent a screenshot of an extremely thirsty, one-sided conversation to Busted Coverage. In the photo, the player can be seen messaging "Come on bae," prior to the sending of a shirtless photo.

After getting ignored, he promised to see her in a few weeks."Well ok I give up I guess," he wrote. "See you in a few weeks kid."

Needless to say, the marriage didn't last, with Robert and wife Rebecca Liddicoat splitting three years after the wedding. That seems an unreasonably long time to stay with a guy who was flirting on the day of his wedding, though.