Introduction
This topic should not start with a list of athletes. The criteria matters and most of these lists spend little or no time of the criteria. The list makers have biases, and the biases and values of the list maker underlie all conclusions.
I'm planning to make a list because this is a fun topic that always comes up. But before I continue, I want to evaluate what criteria I should consider.
My biases, I love running as an activity and sport. Basketball was my favorite sport for a lot of my life. Baseball was the first sport I loved. I like both cycling and watching cycling. I never got into European football. I find American football very entertaining, but I don't like to and rarely watch it.
With all that said, I'm going to try to be objective.
Leave a comment if you have an idea I left out, or a disagreement!
Global Participation
Soccer/football has been the most popular sport globally for most of the last 100 years (one exception for running as a physical activity), if not all. A 2023 FIFA report found "there were 128,694 professional male footballers at 3,986 clubs in 135 countries around the world." Footballers have been consistently among the highest paid athletes in modern sports, especially in recent decades.
The pool of footballers is greater than any other sport. All else equal, being successful in football deserves more acclaim than success in other sports,
Athleticism vs Skill?
Tom Brady has one of the most impressive careers in any sport. He dominated the NFL into his 40s. Brady's success with multiple teams in his last seasons is incredible. Brady is a greatest contender, but he was not an exceptional athlete by raw athleticism standards. He isn't that fast, strong, or explosive for a professional athlete, let alone an NFL player; but his skill development, intelligence, decision-making, and cognitive abilities are among the greatest of all time in any sport. Brady is a contender.
Individual vs Team Success?
Jordan won six titles, but it's difficult to say how many of those championships were due to Jordan vs Jordan's teammates and coaching staff. The Bulls made the playoffs and were still among the best teams in the NBA when Jordan first retired. After Jordan came back, the Bulls acquired Dennis Rodman. Adding Rodman and Jordan to a roster that was already a playoff contender was huge. It's hard to say how much of Jordan's success was due to having a really good supporting cast.
Longevity
LeBron James is a freak of nature. Like Brady, James continues to be a dominant force in the NBA into his 40s. But even with his longevity, he has yet to match Jordan or other NBA greats championship titles or MVP records. This gets back to the team debate.
James possesses all the skills and cognitive attributes along with the strength, explosiveness, and athleticism of world class athletes. And he has been able to maintain those levels for over 20 years. James is a contender.
Dominance
Usain Bolt is also a freak of nature, except unlike basketball, Bolt's dominance is undeniable. He was almost unbeatable in the 100m and 200m sprints from 2008-2016. He won the gold medals in both the 100m and 200m at three straight Olympics.
A great athlete should be judged by how much better they were than the next best athletes in their sport. Bolt is a contender.
Unprecedented
Shohei Ohtani takes the cake here. No other baseball player in MLB history has been one of the best pitchers and hitters at the same time. Babe Ruth was a great pitcher and then a great hitter, but never both at the same time. In addition, Ruth played in the MLB when black players were not allowed to play, let alone there being much global participation.
Ruth played in a MLB with a weak competitive pool due to segregation and geography. Baseball players of the early 20th century suffer from not being able to perform in integrated league like MLB, Negro League, and other Latin leagues. Player in the non MLB leagues did excell in pitching and hitting, but like Ruth's MLB, the competitive pool was significantly weaker.
For Ohtani, as a modern athlete, in one of the most competitive global sports, to be a multiple MVP winner while sustaining silver slugger quality hitting with CY Young quality pitching is unprecedented to say the least. Ohtani is a serious contender!
The fewer serious historical analogues an athlete has, the more their dominance should be rewarded.
Most dominant modern athletes have an analogue archetype. Michael Phelps was extremely dominant holding the Olympic record 23 gold medals, but Mark Spitz was similarly dominant-winning seven gold medals in a single Games. Even with Bolt's dominance, athletes like Carl Lewis and Jesse Owens had similar dominance, and both Lewis and Owens were dominant gold medal jumpers too.
Olympics
The Olympics are historically and globally prestigious, in addition to being an extreme source of national pride. Winning a medal is one of the greatest achievements in most sports.
But not all Olympic medals are created equal athletically. For some sports winning a gold medal is the pinnacle of their sporting achievement, like swimming, track and field, gymnastics, and wrestling. Whereas sports like football (World Cup), baseball (World Series), golf (majors), boxing (titles), tennis (majors), cycling (Tour de France), tackle football (Super Bowl), and basketball (NBA Finals) all have their greatest achievements outside the Olympics.
Some sports, like swimming, track, and gymnastics, have opportunities for athletes to win multiple medals in a single Olympic Games. Whereas events like the wrestling or team sports have only one medal opportunity.
Running, Jumping, and Throwing
Running is likely the oldest sport in human history. Humans have been running, jumping, and throwing for hundreds of thousands of years.
Track and field deserves special weight because it tests universal human athleticism. The Olympic motto "Citius, Altius, Fortius" (Latin for Faster, Higher, Stronger) captures it best. Running, jumping, and throwing are the foundations of human athletic performance. They test power, speed, strength, coordination, and endurance.Running is the most popular sport and activity, besides walking. People run for fun, sport, and transportation. If one is an exceptionally fast runner, they will most likely be found in nearly all societies. They may become a footballer or other athlete, but if they are fast enough, they will be noticed. Being the best and fastest runner deserves additional weight.
World Records
Like medals, not all world records are created equal. But for those records and events that have a long history and millions of participants, being a world record holder is a huge accomplishment. Having a WR stand for decades is a great sign of dominance across generations.
Unlike comparing players on teams-like Jordan and James- running, jumping, and throwing are very comparable over time. The main issues being technological advancements and performance enhancing drugs. Tracks and shoes make running times a lot faster. Drugs can improve several factors that increase performance-like recover, strength, mass, power, speed, endurance, training tolerance, etc.
PEDs
Performance-enhancing drugs must be considered and weighed when evaluating athletes. If it wasn't for PEDs, Barry Bonds and Lance Armstrong might be on some longer lists of contenders.
Not all athletes who used drugs were caught or banned, so eras and sports need to be weighed on their enforcement and probabilities of using drugs.
It was a lot easier to use PEDs in the 1990s than it is now in the 2020s.
Money
Money signals excellence in sports. People like sports because people like competition. The most entertaining sports attract the most fans, and in return the most athletes. So income for playing sports should be considered. It will help compare athletes across sports and in some cases time.
Athletes can only make los of money if the sport is extremely popular. Popularity brings in bodies and money. The richest athletes cannot be the richest without being among the most dominant.
Contracts are somewhat speculative. So a player can get a big contract and not live up to it, but that athlete will to get another big contract. So athletes continuously getting big contracts earned it!
League structures and salary caps will have to be considered too. Money doesn't work well historically, see below.
Opportunity vs Exclusion
Athletes need to be judged based on the competitive pool. Ruth played in the MLB before integration, so his pool was relatively weak, extremely weak compared to Ohtani.
Historically, many sports excluded many athletes by race, sex, social class, nationality, amateur status, and professional access.
Achievement Opportunities
Sports have different competition cycles. Some sports have multiple events each competition, like swimming and gymnastics. The best swimmers and gymnasts typically win multiple championships in different events. Footballers and other athletes may compete in multiple leagues during a single year.
Obviously, counting medals and championships does not work across sports.
Athleticism Broadness
Sprinters maximize the universal, but narrow, trait of power. The track event decathlon is very broad- included many of the classical skills, but the event is far less popular than the single events like the 100 meters.
Sports should be judged by the varying athletic and cognitive demands.
ProfessionalizationObviously, the “greatest athlete” does not mean one thing. It really depends on the evaluator's biases and values. It could mean the most dominant, the most skilled, the most physically gifted, the most versatile, the most decorated, the most valuable to their team, the most unprecedented, or the highest paid.
Until next post, what did I miss?
