The best athletes

[wilt the stilt]

last night I went over to my son's best friend's house whose father is Bobby Butler(12 year pro with the Falcons). Bobby;;'s two son's are playing D-1 sports and one is at the USC. We got into a discussion who are the best athletes and I used to play basketball against all the Falcons including obby.

His argument was that it is football players. He didn't agree that basketball players were the best because that is the only sport they can play. He said some baseball players could play multiple sports but that football players could play all the sports and then he started to talk about them.

Montana- football and basketball
Marino, Elway, Chris Miller, Brady and most of the QB's.

Many wide receivers could really play multiple sports

Linebacers like Tom jackson and Buddy Curry were great basketball players


Finally,

offensive linemen like Jamie Dukes. a 6'1'' butterball whoa was an absolutely great basketball player. I once went baseline right on him and laid it up with my left hand(normally I went baseline left). He caught the ball in midair. I can't tell you how much athleticism that takes and this guy was 6"1 and 260lb.

By the way he has played against all the pro athletes in Atlanta and he said without a doubt Smoltz is the best athlete he has ever seen.

weigh in.

It has made me think about it. Weigh in.

[JonLP24]

1. I think that

playing multiple sports helps one to become better in any specific sport. There are things you can use to help you. When you say receivers play multiple sports I think I know why. I was a WR in HS and basically all it is being an athlete, running, sprinting, until the ball gets close then you use techniques such as "making a basket" to catch the ball. I remember when I tried out for baseball, I was a good outfielder because in many ways it was like being a receiver. I was an athlete until the ball got close, then you used techniques to help you. They were almost the same. The issue with baseball was I couldn't hit and no I don't mean that I couldn't hit because baseball is 1 vs 9, no I couldn't make contact with the ball unless I was lucky.

I'm not sure there is one main sport that indicates how well they could play other sports. Pure athletic ability can help you succeed in many sports but in each one certain techniques must be learned to help you that sports. I think baseball is the most fundamentally driven sport I played but playing just outfield was similar to playing receiver, except that in baseball I had to throw the ball the ball, follow through, and find the cutoff man. Other than that I was just an athlete trying to catch up to a ball.

[lazarus]

2. I've always thought

that for pure athleticism it has to be water polo players. Those guys are in shape.

The reason two sport athletes tend to come out of football is football's short season, I believe. You never, or least rarely, see a basketball/baseball athlete because both seasons are long and overlap quite a bit.

[Goblinmonger]

3. Wrestlers

Maybe the water polo players mentioned above, but the combination of speed, strength, and insane stamina it takes to be a good wrestler does it for me. (disclaimer: my son is a high school wrestler. Also a football player.)

[wilt the stilt]

11. I played basketball against some wrestlers

In terms of Basketball they were not the most coordinated guys I have ever run into but they were by far the strongest guys I have ever run into. Trying to move them out of the key for rebounds was like pushing a boulder.

[Goblinmonger]

13. Their coordination may not translate into basketball.

I know my son sucks at it. But it WAY translates into football. QBs and Receivers should play basketball. All the rest should wrestle. Best tacklers on my son's HS team are wrestlers--hands down. My son wrestles 160 this year and played center and D-end on his freshmen team. They are moving him up to varisty next year to play D-end (though he will probably be wrestling 189 next year because he held back on weight lifting so he didn't have to wrestle 171 lb seniors this year). He took on 260 pound noses and held them back the whole game.

[trotsky]

4. I'd have to go with soccer.

As much as I can't stand the sport, the athletes who play soccer simply have to be in awesome shape just to do the running, and then must have superb coordination on top of it.

[JonLP24]

5. I agree

I know the OP likely disagrees but Soccer was extremely hard for me out of all the sports I played. Full court basketball is very hard without regular breaks. Soccer requires incredible endurance. The field is much larger than a court and it gets very, very tiring. Also controlling the ball while running and making accurate passes or shots requires great coordination. The only position I could play well was goalie.

[Goblinmonger]

6. " Mass genocide is the most exhausting activity one can engage in . . . next to soccer." n/t

[Lions_fan]

9. Not really

Soccer is a lot of light jogging and standing around with outbursts of sprints from time to time.

[Goblinmonger]

15. They track the world cup guys and the pros

Midfielders run about a 10K during the course of a game.

[Lions_fan]

20. A light jog

If being in great shape makes you a great athlete boxers are the best athletes. I don't think boxers are the best athletes but just because soccer players run a lot doesn't make them great athletes. My neighbor runs a lot i wouldn't call him a great athlete.

[HuckleB]

45. The gymnastic maneuvers needed to score a goal in today's game also argue well for soccer, however.

[Iggo]

46. You're watching American soccer.

Watch the other guys.

[bluedigger]

7. It's endlessly debatable.

Not that there's anything wrong with that!:-)

I've always felt that basketball players are the best overall athletes - they all have to run, jump, throw, and catch - my four basic activities. Strength and speed are the qualitatively measurable abilities that athletes bring to the game, with some sports emphasizing one over the other. Football is about power, baseball, eye-hand coordination.

Swimmers have the best overall conditioning, and cross country skiers have to be in good shape to compete as well. Nordic skiing is definitely the most grueling event I've competed in!:hurts:

The fact that you judge superior athletes by their ability to play basketball is itself telling. :hi:

[wilt the stilt]

22. It's not jsut baskeball

look at all the football players who were excellent baseball players. Brian Jordan was an all pro football player and an All=star baseball player

Elway- drafted by NY yankees
Chris Miller- draftede in baseball
Brady- drafted in baseball.
Bo Jackson- pretty good baseball player.

It is rather astounding

[bluedigger]

25. Even more basketball players also play baseball.

http://nbahoopsonline.com/History/Leagues/duelleagues.html

(I knew about Chuck Connors, but Hondo almost played in the NFL?!:wow:)

I think your view is distorted by the fact there are so many more football players - only a few dozen NBA hopefuls are drafted every year vs. several hundred NFL prospects. :shrug:

[wilt the stilt]

27. actually I copied my game after Hondo

Hondo was drafted by the Cleveland Browns because he was a good basketball player and I so think he would have been a good football player.

[Poiuyt]

8. Decathletes

That sport has all the events to test one's strength, speed, agility, and endurance. My guess is that a world class decathlete could make it in any sport.

[NoGOPZone]

41. Bryan Clay, the 2008 Olympic decathlon winner, set the record

for the highest scored achieved in the SPARQ football test

http://viewer.zmags.com/showmag.php?mid=fgpww&pageid=79#/page80/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARQ_Training

[wilt the stilt]

10. Conditioning is only one aspect

The question is who can play multiple sports. Do soccer players play other sports? The ones I know play only soccer. Same with decathletes or any number of other sports. basketball players really only play basketball. I guess the thing that surprised me is the versatility of football players. I had never really thought about it. I also confirmed this with my friend who was invited to the NFL combine( he finally told me why he turned it down- he wouldn't have been able to survive the hits who was a 3 sport star(baseball and basketball). He is also in the Michigan records for most HR's in a single season at the high school level(17)

He also thinks football players are the best all around. I find it interesting.


Bobby Butler had an interesting insight into Jerry Rice and Dwight Clark. He said Jerry Rice had great heart and incredible conditioning and Dwight Clark was really slow and he loved guarding Clark.

[JonLP24]

12. There does appear to be a large number of NFL players that played other sports

However the list I'm looking at includes being drafted by a MLB team(even though never playing) like they list Michael Vick as a two-sport athlete because he was drafted by the Rockies despite not playing college baseball. It also includes those who played other sports in college, McNabb & Tony Gonzales. There are a few soccer players there as well. They also have a primary Soccer sport thread and few of those played multiple sports though the list isn't as large as the American Football one.

Anyways I think it largely depends on the athlete more than the sport but the NFL has a lot of versatile athletes.

[KamaAina]

16. So you're not counting dogfighting as a sport?

:sarcasm:

[Poiuyt]

24. But the decathlon is not just one sport

It's ten sports, and you have to be good in all of them. They are all from the track and field arena, but they are really different. Pole vaulting is quite different from the shot put, which is quite different from running a 1500 meter race. Etc. You have to be extremely versatile to be a decathlete.

[Broken_Hero]

14. I'd have to say its probably football players....

I'm biased, because I love/played football exclusively. But as an athlete there are many things in football that cross over to other sports, in terms of base skills.

With football you have running, endurance, strength skills, precision, timing, power/leverage, and a different style of mindset.

I was an O/D lineman, with me the base skills I needed were power/leverage, strength, endurance....

With those base skills I needed/worked on as an O/D lineman, almost all of those skills are needed in wrestling, and interior play for basketball.

Many other positions in football, the base skills are basically the same for other sports...as a wide receiver the endurance, leverage, and timing are similar to those who will play guard, or even forward in basketball, with the quarterback position I can see how the base skills for a QB can transcend into baseball.

[caraher]

17. People in the highest-profile sport?

Leaving aside the inherent inability of anyone to define an objective set of standards for "best athlete," it would be a mistake to point to characteristics of the sport itself as developing the best athletes. I think it works exactly in reverse; sports that are most popular in a particular country or region will have, as their stars, the best athletes overall simply because that sport is drawing from a larger pool of good athletes and thus will have better athletes among their best athletes.

For instance, in the US let's say "the best athletes" are football players. Well, no big surprise there; there's a lot of money at the pro level in football, it's played in just about every high school, it's constantly on TV, it's a huge part of our culture. Even if there were something about, say, lacrosse, that would in principle develop "better athletes" than football, you simply don't have many lacrosse players, and therefore it's exceedingly unlikely that the best lacrosse player would be "better" than the best football player.

Now if you go to a country where soccer rules, I think you'll find the best athletes are generally soccer players. Take someone like Hakeem Olajuwan. He first developed his athletic skills as a goalkeeper before discovering basketball very late in life by American standards. Had he been born in the US the trajectory would have been very different.

[JonLP24]

18. Excellent points

I think you are dead on with this. This line reminded me of Jim Brown "exceedingly unlikely that the best lacrosse player would be "better" than the best football player." I've read that he is considered one of the greatest lacrosse players ever as well as one of the best football player ever.

[Broken_Hero]

19. Very good points,

:thumbsup:

[Lions_fan]

21. It would be interesting to ask GM's

Take 10 General Managers from Baseball, Football, Basketball & Hockey and take the top player 5 players in each sport. Hold a draft, the only rule would be that you can't draft a player from your own sport with your first pick. I think LeBron James would be the top player chosen.

[chollybocker]

23. HOCKEY players.

By a (s)mile.

[givemebackmycountry]

28. I agree...

Any sport that you can't play for more than three or four minutes at a time without a break HAS to require a special athlete.
There is no such thing as a FAT hockey player.

[flvegan]

26. Rugby, football (soccer) or ice hockey.

You can't play any of those sports at even the worst level and not be a superior athlete.

[El Supremo]

29. Why do you hate America?

Son, it's Baseball, Football and Basketball, in that order, in this country.

[getting old in mke]

36. Hey!

I can't play ANY sport for more than three or four minutes. I must be truly superior...

Ok, maybe that bends the meaning just a tad.

[fishwax]

30. I think football accommodates a wider variety of athletes than any other sport

That's an interesting point that so many great football players also excelled at other sports. But I think there are other factors in play, such as the fact that football accommodates a wider variety of athletes than other sports. Obviously you have to have a certain level of speed, agility, and strength to play in the NFL, but there's a greater variety of combinations of skill sets that can be successful in football than in other sports.

In basketball, for instance, you have fairly strict height requirements to get in the door at the highest levels. Yes, there has been the occasional Mugsy Bogues or Spudd Webb over the years, but the average player is 6'7" and the vast majority of players are over 6 feet. And it's not just that you have to be of a certain height to have a realistic chance--you also have to have a specific skill set for your height. Antonio Gates played power forward in college and was an honorable mention All-American. But at 6-4, Gates is not nearly tall enough to play PF in the NBA. But his combination of size, strength, and speed is enough to dominate as an NFL Tight End.

I think an additional/related reason you're less likely to find an NBA player who played multiple sports is that basketball players are more likely to be funneled into the sport, since it requires a more limited set of skill/attribute combinations. There's relatively little risk in letting a kid whose a prototype QB play on the high school basketball team, but there's a huge risk in letting the prototype center or power forward play football. Could Shaq have made a decent lineman or tight end? I think probably so. Lebron was a good WR in high school. And so on.

Finally, the NFL also has far more players than top leagues in the other major sports. The NBA has 450 players (including practice players) and Major League Baseball has 750. The NFL has 32 teams with 53 players for a total of 1696. (Compounding the fact that the NBA has fewer slots available is the fact that the average NBA career is longer than the average NFL career.)

[H2O Man]

31. Muhammad Ali.

Enough said.

[ProfessorGAC]

33. I Beat Tommie Hearns In Bowling, Though!

LOL! Tommie was a pretty good athlete and incredibly fit. Couldn't bowl none, though!
GAC

[H2O Man]

37. I think his son

was pretty good at basketball. I imagine Tommy could have been scary in most sports, though not bowling! I'll have to get out some of the photos my brother took, back in the days he hung out at Kronk watching the "Hit Man" train.

[ProfessorGAC]

32. Danny Ainge and Dave Debuscher

They both got drafted and played pro baseball. I can't recall if Ainge made it to the show, but it was at least high minors, and Debuscher (am i spelling that right?) did play in the show and the NBA on a championship team.

And, per his own statements, Deion Sanders was a baseball player before he was a football player, and he said he actually likes baseball better, just felt he was better at football.
GAC

[JonLP24]

34. Ainge played a little with the Blue Jays

I remember Ainge from his time here coaching Phoenix. He took a 0-13(IIRC) team to the playoffs.

[wilt the stilt]

35. DeBusherre was a pitcher and was

a decent minor leaguer. He gave it up for basketball. Ainge couldn't hit.

[ProfessorGAC]

39. David Played For The White Sox

In the majors. Might have just been a September call-up, but it was Chicago sports legend in the 60's and 70's that a new York Knick played in Comiskey Park.
GAC

[wilt the stilt]

48. i think he was september call up

and I think he won quite a bit in the minors.

[fishwax]

40. I've got an Ainge baseball card, so he made it for at least a cup of coffee

:)

[underpants]

50. Dave Winfield was drafted in MLB and NBA. Namath was drafted by three teams

Namath was drafted by the NY Jets(AFL) St. Louis Cardinals (NFL) and Baltimore Orioles

He was born and raised in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, twenty miles from Pittsburgh, growing up in the city's Lower End neighborhood.<3> He was a standout in football, basketball and baseball. In an age where dunks were still uncommon in high school basketball, Namath regularly dunked in games. Coached by Larry Bruno at Beaver Falls, Namath's football team won the WPIAL Class AA championship with a 10-0 record in 1960. Coach Bruno would later be his presenter in Canton to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.<4>

Upon graduation, he received offers from six Major League Baseball teams, including the Yankees, Mets, Indians, Reds, Pirates and Phillies, but football prevailed. Namath has told interviewers that he wanted to sign with the Pirates and play baseball like his idol, Roberto Clemente, but elected to play football because his mother wanted him to get a college education.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Namath

[HuckleB]

38. Depending on one's size, it's much easier to go to football and succeed...

... for people who have already done well in other sports, such as baseball, basketball and soccer. The reverse does not seem to happen, however. I don't think it's as difficult for a good athlete to into football later, compared to someone trying to break into the other sports.

Thus, I would say the argument against football is quite obvious.

[NoGOPZone]

42. delete, misplaced

[NoGOPZone]

43. There are several examples of college basketball players making the NFL

without any college football experience. Antonio Gates is the most obvious example. Five time Pro Bowler Cornell Green and Preston Pearson, who played in five Super Bowls, are others. I don't know if anyone has done the converse. Charlie Ward played in the NBA after winning the Heisman but he did have college basketball experience.

[HuckleB]

44. Exactly.

Many people turn to football late in high school or college, and they're still very successful. You just don't see that switch from football to other sports.

[caraher]

47. I think it's mainly because of the specialization in football

To succeed in football, with different squads for offense and defense and specialized positions within each, you need only play your generally fairly-constrained role on the team well. Athletes from other sports who excel in the chief attribute required for success in a particular football position have a good chance to succeed (e.g. if you're a track star you can be a good receiver provided you get the hang of running routes and can hang onto the ball).

I think this really puts the lie to the term "skill player." Apart from quarterback, it's really only the so-called "skill positions" where an athletically talented player with little experience have a good shot at having a positive impact. Has anyone ever succeeded at the pro level playing, say, an offensive line position without substantial experience at the college level?

By contrast, while you do specialize in basketball and baseball, in both sports a complete player needs to master disparate aspects of the game, and those who do not perform at least adequately in all phases of the game noticeably handicap their teams.

[underpants]

49. Water polo

go to the gym and swim for say 20 minutes and then lift weights for 20 minutes.

I have never played water polo (don't think I can) but THAT is a workout.

I used that as my base when I started losing 70 or so pounds.

Soccer and basketball (like all ball sports a derivative of soccer) are a close second.

BTW- runners. I am a runner so take that into consideration. The 10K track guys. Imagine running 100 meters (a football field with one endzone - 109 yards) in 13 seconds. The world record is 9.something. Then run 100 such 100 meters at 13 seconds each and you may be able to compete at their level.