But in the end, I'm also talking about whose the greatest athlete, physical talent and what they did in their sport. In other words, we're also talking about natural genetic talent.
That's what makes these kinds of lists so hard. And what makes talking about these kinds of lists so much fun when you include beer and trash talking! In other words, what criteria do we use to evaluate an athlete?
As a parallel, what if we start a thread about the 10 greatest albums of all time? Is there any question that we'd all use some of the same criteria but also use different as well?
For me, someone like Al Oerter is arguably the best athlete of all time. The only four time gold medalist -56-60-64-68 in Olympic history in the shot put. Pyros Dimas almost did it in Olympic weightlifting with three gold and a bronze as did Suleymanoglu of Turkey. Suleymanoglu probably was the worlds strongest, most explosive athletes who at 5 ft tall and around 130 pounds, clean and jerked 3X his body weight, a record that stands today. Everyone made fun of Alexeyev's stomach at the '76 Olympics but the man was an incredible athlete too who at 300 lbs had a 44 inch vertical jump (most NBA players top out in the high 30s-with the best I think being David Thompson at around 41 inches). The man was a freak of nature.
One other thing about Oerter - he did it without the benefit of modern technology, be it a computerized brakedown of his motion, a theoretical optimal motion, or training/diet regimens.
If were talkin' Olympics, one has to consider that fish, errr, Michael Phelps. Most gold medals. Greatest swimmer of all time.
Actually I tend to look at Oerter being at the beginning of the modern era of athletic training- eg. stimulated by the ideas of the Russian coaches such as Matayev, Verhoshansky, Zatsiorsky, Issurin, Roman, etc. He was probably one of the first to embrace the Russian idea that the joint velocity and movement pattern should match that which the athlete must to in competition. In other works, Oerter was probably one of the first T&F athletes to incorporate explosive training into his program. (It's amazing to watch some of the field athletes workouts where they do sprint and hurdle work!)
And actually they did film their practice and competitions. For instance the Russians would have assistants spend hundreds of hours taking still photos of say a lift or throw and assemble it into a "film." They called it cyclo something.
What about Dwight Howard's Superman dunk in the dunk contest, when he threw the ball down into the hoop from a few feet away. Talk about genetics. Is that guy incredible, and incredibly sculpted for an almost 7 footer?
Great to have a list of all time greats but maybe a list of the top 10 in each sport and then take the top 10 of all of these
I don't see any female athletes listed
Billie Jean King comes to mind in tennis as do some other greats in that sport
I would be remiss if I did not mention the original American athlete Jim Thorpe. Despite being stripped of his awards he was drug free and would be considered a choir boy in todays climate.
Mike, you are correct, Roger Bannister was the first man to break the 4 minute mile in running. IMHO, a momentous achievement and one that should guarantee him in any top ten list of male athletes.
Lance Armstrong's seven consecutive Tour de France victories should not a priori prevent considering Miguel Indurain. He won five consecutive Tours from 1991-1995, an era when aero bars were about as high tech you could get. No heart rate monitors, power monitors and reams of data. He didn't even need that much cover from his teammates. Big Mig would just blow the field away in the time trials and then watch the climbers cannibalize each other in the mountains trying to make up the deficit. He even took a gracious victory lap around France in 1996 instead of abandoning when it was clear he wasn't going to get #6 (he finished 11th). A true champion.
And, if you're still not convinced, consider this. Indurain is the last TdF winner not to have been suspected of, if not convicted of, doping.
Jim Brown - possibly greatest lacrosse player of all time; not a bad football player
Wilt Chamberlain
Secretariat
Jack Nicklaus
Oscar Robertson
Willie Mays
Bill Russell
Bo Jackson
Dave Winfield
Rafer Johnson
Maradonna thought he was better than Pele as well. I disgree. I do believe that Lionel Messi is in a great position to sit on that throne! The beauty about his play and style is that you never see it coming. The other is...he's the antithesis of what Maradonna was...a legend in his own mind, with a substance abuse issue to match!
Mike, you are correct, Roger Bannister was the first man to break the 4 minute mile in running. IMHO, a momentous achievement and one that should guarantee him in any top ten list of male athletes.
Maradonna thought he was better than Pele as well. I disgree. I do believe that Lionel Messi is in a great position to sit on that throne! The beauty about his play and style is that you never see it coming. The other is...he's the antithesis of what Maradonna was...a legend in his own mind, with a substance abuse issue to match!
We'll have to agree to disagree about Maradonna. Definitely a wasted talent, but incredible at his best. I agree about Messi. He very rarely makes anything of the constant hacking that he has to endure, which is exactly the opposite of Ronaldo at Real.
We'll have to agree to disagree about Maradonna. Definitely a wasted talent, but incredible at his best. I agree about Messi. He very rarely makes anything of the constant hacking that he has to endure, which is exactly the opposite of Ronaldo at Real.
