Is Gretzky the most dominant athlete ever in any major sport?

[Cursed Lemon]

Has there ever been an athlete that has statistically destroyed all competition to the level that Gretzky achieved with a combination of talent and longevity?

In the sports of hockey, football, soccer, baseball, and basketball, were there any players that could compete with his sheer number of records and hardware?

I couldn't answer this question myself - I'm fishing for opinions.

Click to read more...

 

[Epsilon]

Joe Posniacki's analysis of Babe Ruth's career was incredibly eye-opening in terms of how much he dominated the sport of baseball once you go beyond the basic counting numbers.

 

[Pominville Knows]

One thing we need to be aware of is that hockey is a smaller sport than baseball, soccer, basketball and perhaps football(Dont know much about it, just that pee-wee is not very grass root and that they prefer physical monsters instead at college). A hockey player needs to have been MORE dominant than the average same era star player in bigger sports.

 

[tjcurrie]

I always compare him and my boy Jerry Rice. NHL and NFL are the two biggest for me and those guys lead the pack statistically by quite a margin. In their respective sports you have them, a huge gap, and then the rest.

 

[brianscot]

These apple and oranges sports comparisons are always tough, but since it's imperfect, here's another contender: Jim Brown.

During his NFL career, Brown rushed for 12,132 yards. The second place player in rushing yards during that era was the Packers Jim Taylor who rushed for 7502 yards whle playing on the era's dominant team.

That's only 61% of what Brown was able to accomplish. Naturally their respective team situations were far different as Brown was totally Cleveland's offensive focus, while Taylor had to share plays with other talented offensive players.

Still.

 

[Uncle Rotter]

Joe Posniacki's analysis of Babe Ruth's career was incredibly eye-opening in terms of how much he dominated the sport of baseball once you go beyond the basic counting numbers.

He sometimes had more HRs than some teams

 

[gudzilla]

yep, was going to post babe ruth here.

i'm not sure how dominant michael jordan was, but i guess he's up there too

 

[feffan]

When this threads pop up from time to time som fo the usual suspects are:
Donald Bradman: has the best case for the number one place based purely on statistics.

Roger Federer: is the best tennisplayer ever, but it doesn´t show in statistics by how far (Sampras and others being quite close in Grand Slams for one...).

Leo Messi: is dominating he´s peers in an unparalleled way in the biggest sport in the world. No one is even thinking about not saying he is the best soccerplayer in the world, and that says alot considering Christiano Ronaldo who´s also playing now could be made a case for being the second best ever. Not that I think he (Ronaldo) is. A succesfull World Cup and Messi is up there with the greatest.

Usain Bolt has won the arguably four most prestige Olympic medals over the last two OG. In a sport who allows absolutely no margin of error. If he does the same in 2016 he will be at the top of 99% of lists of greatest athlete ever.

 

[Plural]

Agreed on Bolt. If he manages to win gold in both 100 and 200 runs next Olympics, he is the greatest athlete of all-time. I don't think he can do it tough.

 

[Pominville Knows]

Agreed on Bolt. If he manages to win gold in both 100 and 200 runs next Olympics, he is the greatest athlete of all-time. I don't think he can do it tough.

That could be true. But we shall not be shocked if he has changed to the 200 and 400 metres by then, although he wants to become historic on the 100 so that might not happen until the 2020 Olympics. He talked about it early in his career and this season he actually started the year with running a 400. I want to see him challenge Carl Lewis 7 individual Olympic Gold Medals(Needs to either win two in 2020 as well, or move to Long Jump as well). And Michael Johnsons WR at the longer distance.

 

[Mayor Bee]

Joe Posniacki's analysis of Babe Ruth's career was incredibly eye-opening in terms of how much he dominated the sport of baseball once you go beyond the basic counting numbers.

A few years back at one of their conventions, SABR came up with a list of their 100 greatest players, then determined the rankings by voting in reverse, one by one.

At the end of the day, the last two standing were Ruth and Honus Wagner. Wagner was offensively dominant in his day in the sense of consistently leading or being near the top of the league in every major category. But as a shortstop, he was also one of the greatest in history defensively as well. Imagine Ozzie Smith's defense combined with exceptional offense.

Ruth not only dominated offensively, he annihilated the field year in and year out. And beyond that, he revolutionized and fundamentally changed the way that the game was played.

 

[gudzilla]

When this threads pop up from time to time som fo the usual suspects are:
Donald Bradman: has the best case for the number one place based purely on statistics.

Roger Federer: is the best tennisplayer ever, but it doesn´t show in statistics by how far (Sampras and others being quite close in Grand Slams for one...).

Leo Messi: is dominating he´s peers in an unparalleled way in the biggest sport in the world. No one is even thinking about not saying he is the best soccerplayer in the world, and that says alot considering Christiano Ronaldo who´s also playing now could be made a case for being the second best ever. Not that I think he (Ronaldo) is. A succesfull World Cup and Messi is up there with the greatest.

Usain Bolt has won the arguably four most prestige Olympic medals over the last two OG. In a sport who allows absolutely no margin of error. If he does the same in 2016 he will be at the top of 99% of lists of greatest athlete ever.

messi is playing behind one of the most stacked teams of all time.

i still hold ronaldo di lima (? real ronaldo, brazil one), maradona, pele and a few others above him until he can win a gold

That could be true. But we shall not be shocked if he has changed to the 200 and 400 metres by then, although he wants to become historic on the 100 so that might not happen until the 2020 Olympics. He talked about it early in his career and this season he actually started the year with running a 400. I want to see him challenge Carl Lewis 7 individual Olympic Gold Medals(Needs to either win two in 2020 as well, or move to Long Jump as well). And Michael Johnsons WR at the longer distance.

bolt himself have said his knees won't make it possible for him to go for the long jump gold

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Donald Bradman: has the best case for the number one place based purely on statistics.
.

Right. I don't now anything about cricket, but someone posted his statistical dominance last time one of these threads came up, and it was insane.

 

[Harry Waters]

Many good answers in this thread already.

In Federer's case, while I think he is at least one of the best ever, he hasn't been as dominant as he needs to be to enter that conversation because Nadal has beaten him regularly. If Federer had continued his 2003-2006 trashing of opponents, he would certainly be up there, but he hasn't.

Bolt has a case because of the margins he wins by - if you had suggested his times 5-10 years before, you would have been laughed at (and rightfully so).

If we are talking the 4 sports the OP has mentioned, Gretzky certainly has a case - while I don't know much about baseball/football, he is a relatively clear number one in hockey; it's not that easy to find a number one in soccer (albeit Messi is working on it), and from what I have heard, it's the same case in football, baseball and basketball (please correct me if I'm wrong).

One thing we need to be aware of is that hockey is a smaller sport than baseball, soccer, basketball and perhaps football(Dont know much about it, just that pee-wee is not very grass root and that they prefer physical monsters instead at college). A hockey player needs to have been MORE dominant than the average same era star player in bigger sports.

I give you soccer and basketball, but I sincerely doubt that hockey is smaller than baseball/football. Outside the US (and Japan for baseball), those aren't major sports at all, while hockey has a lot of supporters and players in so many countries: central, eastern and northern Europe, Russia. Even in Japan there is a respectable hockey league. Do you have a little more insight/sources that say otherwise regarding baseball/football vs hockey?

 

[Pominville Knows]

I give you soccer and basketball, but I sincerely doubt that hockey is smaller than baseball/football. Outside the US (and Japan for baseball), those aren't major sports at all, while hockey has a lot of supporters and players in so many countries: central, eastern and northern Europe, Russia. Even in Japan there is a respectable hockey league. Do you have a little more insight/sources that say otherwise regarding baseball/football vs hockey?

Perhaps you're right on both. I just dont care to know what those two sports grass roots are all about. But the United States is the United States. 300 million people that lives in a country that loves competing and becomes true experts in what they truely desire. Of course this could be said about Ping-pong in China as well but it's the same thing there, i just dont care. I love hockey partly becouse its not a sport that is played all over the world. I'm swedish and we just cant compete in say soccer or basketball. At the same time i have no regrets since i feel no competition with for example Brazil. I'm totally fine with us competing only with Russia(Yo, the Cold War), USA(What cant be said about those guys, good and bad?), Finland(Our arch-nemesis and Brothers), Canada(Is said to be a big rival in terms of society model, in my view better than us though. Also, it's the True White North, god oh wholy!), Switzerland(Those crazy bankers but also probably the worlds best democracy), Czech-o-Slovakia(You know, real classic European peoples really), Germany(Hopefully they will get better becouse almost all europeans have "special" feelings about their different impacts on history, again, good and bad).

 

[brianscot]

A few years back at one of their conventions, SABR came up with a list of their 100 greatest players, then determined the rankings by voting in reverse, one by one.

At the end of the day, the last two standing were Ruth and Honus Wagner. Wagner was offensively dominant in his day in the sense of consistently leading or being near the top of the league in every major category. But as a shortstop, he was also one of the greatest in history defensively as well. Imagine Ozzie Smith's defense combined with exceptional offense.

Ruth not only dominated offensively, he annihilated the field year in and year out. And beyond that, he revolutionized and fundamentally changed the way that the game was played.

Ruth also has the distinction of helping save the entire professional baseball business. After the 1919 Black Sox scandal fans were rightfully wary and the business could have slowly drowned.

Ruth comes along in 1920 and hits 54 home runs. That total is more than any other entire team hit for the season (the St. Louis Browns were second with 50.) Combine that with Ruth's legendary bigger than life persona and an eager, burgeoning, sports journalism industry and the American popular entertainment culture changed forever.

 

[pluppe]

Some good names but I will post what I always post when this is discussed.

I also think that Donald Bradman, Michael Phelps, Edvin Moses and Sergei Bubka should be mentioned.

(if you are also considering major sports from the rest of the world)

 

[Mayor Bee]

I'll disagree with the overall post, but go in reverse order to explain why.

Ruth comes along in 1920 and hits 54 home runs. That total is more than any other entire team hit for the season (the St. Louis Browns were second with 50.) Combine that with Ruth's legendary bigger than life persona and an eager, burgeoning, sports journalism industry and the American popular entertainment culture changed forever.

This is accurate. Ruth was popular for a variety of reasons, not just because of his superlative play. Off the field, he was basically a big kid; he liked to drink and sleep around, but he was personable and charismatic as well. The stories about him with "the common man" are legendary.

Ruth also has the distinction of helping save the entire professional baseball business. After the 1919 Black Sox scandal fans were rightfully wary and the business could have slowly drowned.

This is the part I don't agree with. Baseball was enormously popular pre-Black Sox, but that insidious element of gambling had existed from the beginning. It certainly reached its peak in the late 1910s, when Hal Chase found a couple of impressionable youngsters (like Heinie Zimmerman) and succeeded in undermining the integrity of the game.

In 1919 and 1920, the only people in baseball who had the balls to see what was going on and address it were Christy Mathewson (universally respected) and Judge Landis (seen as a pompous blowhard more than anything). Mathewson had the respect to be able to put his neck on the line and say, "This is what is happening, and we have to stop it." Landis was the one who said, "We are going to stop it by using a sledgehammer to stop it, and I have the absolute authority to do it and make it stick."

To me, Ruth no more "saved baseball" than McGwire/Sosa did in 1998. It happened in close proximity to a major event that devastated the entire landscape of baseball, but it ignores the other factors. Landis expelling players restored the confidence of the public, and Ruth carried it to new heights.

The Landis ruling was a monumentally important event in American and Western history as a whole. Up until then, the idea of juries being bribed and judges being paid off and massive corruption in law enforcement in government was seen as something that was simply a cost of living in a free society. Mathewson continually hammering home how wicked corruption was, and Landis taking an unprecedented step, nearly wiped out the tolerance for corruption all at once. Nearly everyone who took an American history class in the last 100 years is familiar with the Teapot Dome Scandal, which is regarded as the worst presidential scandal in history. In reality, it was a minor affair, but the massive backlash that had resulted within two years post-Black Sox permanently relegated President Harding to the bottom of presidential rankings in perpetuity.

 

[Nalens Oga]

Michael Schumacher?

 

[Harry Waters]

Perhaps you're right on both. I just dont care to know what those two sports grass roots are all about. But the United States is the United States. 300 million people that lives in a country that loves competing and becomes true experts in what they truely desire. Of course this could be said about Ping-pong in China as well but it's the same thing there, i just dont care. I love hockey partly becouse its not a sport that is played all over the world. I'm swedish and we just cant compete in say soccer or basketball. At the same time i have no regrets since i feel no competition with for example Brazil. I'm totally fine with us competing only with Russia(Yo, the Cold War), USA(What cant be said about those guys, good and bad?), Finland(Our arch-nemesis and Brothers), Canada(Is said to be a big rival in terms of society model, in my view better than us though. Also, it's the True White North, god oh wholy!), Switzerland(Those crazy bankers but also probably the worlds best democracy), Czech-o-Slovakia(You know, real classic European peoples really), Germany(Hopefully they will get better becouse almost all europeans have "special" feelings about their different impacts on history, again, good and bad).

I totally get where you are coming from, and I love hockey too because it isn't the biggest sport in the world. One thing I don't like about soccer is that you always have to deal with so many people who have absolutely no clue what they are talking about - even if, especially here on hf, us hockey fans question other's knowledge of the sport all the time, let me say that people's dedication and knowledge following a non-major sport always seems to be ahead of the casual soccer-fans.

And btw, very nice one-line characterisations of the countries above, not bad at all

But to get back to the thread: yeah, I thought about that there are 300 million americans who are potentially engaged with baseball/football, which is a huge number, especially when you consider the few millions living in Scandinavia or eastern Europe, where hockey is strong. With regard to that, it might be closer than one assumes.

But since I'm really interested in sports and it's numbers and followers, I might be spending the evening digging up some information about the topic.

On another sidenote: yeah, Karelin always is a good call if it comes to domination, albeit wrestling isn't a major sport. His accomplishments are just absurd.

 

[billcook]

 

[jeffl97]

Right. I don't now anything about cricket, but someone posted his statistical dominance last time one of these threads came up, and it was insane.

Can you link me? I tried googling his achievements, but I know nothing of the game so I wasn't able to follow what I was reading.

 

[PKV Jungle Friends]

Richard Petty was pretty dominating in NASCAR back in the day as was Earnhardt

 

[feffan]

messi is playing behind one of the most stacked teams of all time.

i still hold ronaldo di lima (? real ronaldo, brazil one), maradona, pele and a few others above him until he can win a gold

No denying Messi has a great team, built mostly for him. Kind of what Gretzky had most of the years in Edmonton. Would be interesting to see him on a lesser team. Kind of like Ronaldo (de lima, one of my favourite players ever) in PSV and Maradona in Napoli. And as everyone of these strikers and few more, along with a few midfielders, central defenders and sweepers could be argued the best or near best ever if their case is correctley presented. So I guess you really can´t say Messi dominated as other mentioned.

Some good names but I will post what I always post when this is discussed.

I also think that Donald Bradman, Michael Phelps, Edvin Moses and Sergei Bubka should be mentioned.

(if you are also considering major sports from the rest of the world)

Karelin sure should be one of the first mentioned in this thread. Moses and Bubka is no arguing that they are clear number one in their sports. But ain´t Mark Spitz considered at least Phelps equal? I do not follow swimming closely, so could be wrong.

Haven´t really thougt about the female side, as Bubka was mentioned my first thougt was Yelena Isinbayeva. Navratilova? But there you have Graf near. Sörenstam? Wickenheiser? Flo-Jo, even if probably drugged?

 

[The Saw Is the Law]

Master of the hardest sport to be on top, Roger Federer.