I think you're onto something there. How about Darwin Awards for these characters?
At our gaming convention (
Conception), we run the Golden Badger Awards, for the most embarrassing PC death during the con, named after an incident in which a PC was gnawed to death by a badger after he crawled into its den and got wedged too tightly to crawl out again.
As for 'goof' incidents, there are a couple that come to mind...
In an old 3.0 game, we're travelling between two planar gates in separate wooded areas with savannah-like grasslands between them. It's night time, and we're already pretty beaten up by the time we get out of the first woods - all low on HPs, most of the wizard's attack spells and the cleric's healing expended, and my rogue PC is limping as a result of having fallen into a ravine.
As we make our way through the head-height grassland, we realise that we're being stalked - there are howls on the breeze, and we catch occasional glimpses of canine forms through the grasses. Spooked by this, we decide to double-time it to the next woods, my rogue being carried for the duration, and to our surprise we manage to make it, and promptly start climbing the trees, intending to wait out until morning, the Cleric (with Travel domain) casting Fly to assist my limping rogue.
At that point, I have an idea. "Hey, you've still got a few minutes of Fly left - go see what those things were. You should be safe in the air." So, with the wizard providing comms via Message, the cleric flies off back up our trail, until he can just glimpse some canine forms slinking through the grass.
"Get down lower so you can identify them!" we encourage him.
"It's not like they can fly up after you."
He does so, and manages to get a clear enough look to identify the creatures as...
Yeth Hounds. Which promptly take to the air to attack him.
So now, our tactics are all backwards. Instead of putting ourselves out of reach of our pursuers, we've made ourselves sitting ducks -
and we're at penalties to make attacks due to balancing and clinging to tree limbs. Our poor heavy-armoured cleric is being pursued by a pack of hounds who can fly faster than him. And all hope of avoiding another combat that day is lost.
On the bright side, I did get to say to the cleric, "Quick, fly back to the trees - you don't want to get into a dogfight."
The second incident was more recent, but still a few years ago. We're exploring a set of caves inhabited by an Orc raiding party, and we've encountered a group including some warriors, a worg, and a shaman who's already hit one of us with mind-affecting magic. The barbarian has just enough movement to get into the chamber this turn, and mentions that he's also going to Rage.
"You shouldn't Rage yet," I advise him. "It'll drop your Will saves against that shaman. Do it at the start of your next turn." He takes my advice.
Next turn is the worg, which charges forwards, bites the barbarian, and attempts to trip him. He rolls his Strength check to oppose, and fails by 1. If he'd had even a slight extra bonus to his strength at that moment, he'd have stayed on his feet, but instead he crashes to the floor.
The barbarian's player looks at me, and in the most innocent tone, I say "You know, you really should've Raged."
Ever since then, "you should've Raged" has become our standard catch-phrase whenever a player finds his character in trouble as a result of following another player's advice.