lessthanluke Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 8 minutes ago, DMC said: ...and then I said literally in the next sentence: You really suck at arguing. There was LOTS of room for nuance that you missed. You're quite clearly an idiot though so I shall leave it here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lessthanluke Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Anyway Phil Taylor is quite clearly the GOAT. What an athlete. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darryk Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Football: Maradonna Tennis: Federer The rest I don't know anything about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigFatCoward Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 The number of sports where the goat of that sport is undisputed is pretty small. Cycling - Eddy Merckx Cricket - Bradman Hockey - Gretzky I'm struggling already. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DMC Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 25 minutes ago, lessthanluke said: He was saying skills are more important than athleticism in team sports. Which is true... obviously they are still athletic. Which is SO obvious it shouldn't have needed to be said. LOL, it's not SO obvious at all. Hitting a baseball takes unbelievable hand-eye coordination that is part and parcel of athleticism. An edge rusher in (American) football requires burst and an "engine" that can't be taught and is all about athleticism. Anybody that thinks otherwise and thinks simply running or jumping encapsulates athleticism has an incredibly narrow-minded definition of the term. But, yeah, I guess my opinion is just "idiotic" because you disagree. Give me a fucking break. Arakasi and lessthanluke 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raja Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Honestly find it hard to picks GOATs like Bradman when I haven't seen them play, to be honest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Chatywin et al. Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 1 hour ago, Which Tyler said: Best athlete =/= Best sportsperson Best / Greatest We finally get the thread I've been asking for for years AND WE CAN'T EVEN AGREE WHAT BOAT VS. GOAT REALLY MEANS. And all opinions opposing mine are wrong!!!! Interesting wrinkle to the topic, Andrew Luck was far more talented than Tom Brady, but cannot claim either title while Brady is clearly the GOAT even though he might be at best the 5th most talented QB to play in his era. Sports are weird sometimes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Chatywin et al. Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 11 minutes ago, Raja said: Honestly find it hard to picks GOATs like Bradman when I haven't seen them play, to be honest. Same goes for Babe Ruth. He's still considered the GOAT by many in baseball despite the likelihood that he'd be a terrible player today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Chatywin et al. Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 33 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said: The number of sports where the goat of that sport is undisputed is pretty small. Cycling - Eddy Merckx Cricket - Bradman Hockey - Gretzky I'm struggling already. Phelps probably deserves to be on that list. baxus 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DMC Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 I think with Ruth it really depends on whether he gave a shit or not. If he played today that necessarily assumes everything else in terms of training/conditioning/etc. would be available to him as well. If he bought into that...who knows. Then again, he probably wouldn't, so.... Mr. Chatywin et al. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DMC Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 59 minutes ago, lessthanluke said: You're quite clearly an idiot though so I shall leave it here. Didn't see this til now. Classy! lessthanluke 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigFatCoward Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 24 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said: Phelps probably deserves to be on that list. It's hard with individual sports that also do relays. He won a shit ton of individual. But if he was the same swimmer from Canada he wins a lot less. Like with the Norwegians at cross country skiing/Biathlon. They are so dominant they get a shit ton of relay golds But yeah, he is clearly the Goat swimmer regardless of that. Mr. Chatywin et al. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigFatCoward Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 45 minutes ago, Raja said: Honestly find it hard to picks GOATs like Bradman when I haven't seen them play, to be honest. Normally yes, I mentioned in the other thread re Sugar Ray Robinson. But his stats are so otherworldly I can't not have him as the greatest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spockydog Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 3 hours ago, ljkeane said: What I'm saying is that it's rarely athleticism which makes great players in team sports 'great' at their sport. Erling Haaland would like a word. As would literally thousands of professional footballers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaxom 1974 Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said: Interesting wrinkle to the topic, Andrew Luck was far more talented than Tom Brady, but cannot claim either title while Brady is clearly the GOAT even though he might be at best the 5th most talented QB to play in his era. Sports are weird sometimes. Well doesn't that just add the wrinkle of, "Most Accomplished"? Can't argue that Brady accomplished more than anyone else...but if he's not the overall best player... And DHs that only DH don't really belong in the Hall of Fame... And as soon as I saw this thread title I knew ot was going to be about effing Cricket, and I don't read the Tennis threads... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DireWolfSpirit Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Secretariat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheLastWolf Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Tiger woods is an athlete? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polishgenius Posted September 7, 2022 Author Share Posted September 7, 2022 2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said: Interesting wrinkle to the topic, Andrew Luck was far more talented than Tom Brady, but cannot claim either title while Brady is clearly the GOAT even though he might be at best the 5th most talented QB to play in his era. I think this is true across a few sports tbh. Like at this point Messi and C.Ronaldo are pretty clearly the two greatest players of all time, thanks to the consistency and longevity of their absurd peak- but Ronaldo was in my book pretty clearly more talented than either of them, and Maradona was Maradona. And in boxing Roy Jones Jr is pretty clearly the most gifted boxer I know of, and that remains true even if I talk to people far more historically knowledgeable than me. The dude was an alien, in his prime. But he's nowhere near the GOAT conversation because a combination of circumstances, some his fault but others largely because his divisions in boxing just weren't very strong during his era, he only really has two genuinely elite wins on his record. To add more on the athleticism-in-team-vs-individual-sports argument- I'd say in some respects many team sports require more all-round athletic ability than most actual out-and-out athletic competitions, because those are very strictly measuring one thing whereas many team sports (and things like tennis) require more of a spread. Like if you asked a weightlifter and a marathon runner to compete in each others' competitions alongside a footballer, they're going to be barely competent at each others' discipline whereas the footballer (or rugby player or gridiron guy) will be in between them. Mr. Chatywin et al. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aceluby Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 One name that deserves mention and never does is Tony Hawk. Mr. Chatywin et al. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baxus Posted September 7, 2022 Share Posted September 7, 2022 Are we talking about greatest sportsmen/women or best athletes? Because those are very different things. GOATs are people who have taken their respective sports to a whole other level, whether when it's the quality of the sport itself or it's popularity or whatever. Those are people after who their sports have never been the same. Best athletes is a bit trickier. There's a lot of talk about athleticism in this thread, but how do we define athleticism in the first place? World class marathon runners are clearly athletic, but their athleticism is rather narrowly focused, as is world class weightlifters', for example. How do we rank those? Is strength aspect of athleticism more important than endurance? Or agility? Or whatever else? Or are we talking about some imaginary competition where all this is tested and evaluated and the score is tallied in the end? Funny thing is that I'd say team sports athletes would have much better shot at scoring well in this imaginary athleticism competition. Which Tyler 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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