Greatest Ever Sportsman?

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Moderator: Jon O'Neill

Greatest Ever Sportsman/woman?

Poll ended at Mon Dec 21, 2009 12:40 pm

Diego Maradona
0
No votes
Pele
2
3%
Alfredo Di Stefano
1
2%
Georgi Kinkladze
2
3%
Johann Cruyff
1
2%
Roger Federer
5
8%
Pete Sampras
0
No votes
Bjorn Borg
0
No votes
Rod Laver
1
2%
Martina Navratilova
1
2%
Steffi Graf
1
2%
Gary Sobers
0
No votes
Brian Lara
0
No votes
WG Grace
1
2%
Don Bradman
5
8%
Lance Armstrong
3
5%
Nadia Comaneci
0
No votes
Muhammed Ali
7
11%
Sugar Ray Robinson
0
No votes
Tiger Woods
3
5%
Jack Nicklaus
0
No votes
Ben Hogan
0
No votes
Joe DiMaggio
0
No votes
Usain Bolt
7
11%
Michael Johnson
1
2%
Jesse Owens
0
No votes
Carl Lewis
1
2%
Michael Jordan
0
No votes
Michael Phelps
1
2%
Mark Spitz
0
No votes
Juan Manguel Fangio
0
No votes
Michael Schumacher
1
2%
Steve Davis
0
No votes
Stephen Hendry
1
2%
Ronnie O'Sullivan
1
2%
Phil Taylor
4
7%
Wayne Gretsky
0
No votes
Mark McGuire
0
No votes
Tony McCoy
0
No votes
Babe Ruth
1
2%
Haille Gebreselassie
1
2%
Steve Redgrave
2
3%
Ed Moses
1
2%
Jim Brown
1
2%
Craig Beevers
5
8%
 
Total votes: 61

Marc Meakin
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Marc Meakin »

There are almost as many cases of brain damage caused by heading a football, back in the day when they were leather
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JimBentley
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by JimBentley »

Marc Meakin wrote: Fri Nov 09, 2018 3:03 am I've seen many a stoppage caused by a good body shot
But that's a stoppage, not a knockout, they're completely different things! I'm not making any kind of value judgement on boxing here, I quite enjoy watching it, but let's not pretend it doesn't engender risks for the participants, most often manifested as loss of cognitive function.
Marc Meakin wrote: Fri Nov 09, 2018 3:25 pm There are almost as many cases of brain damage caused by heading a football, back in the day when they were leather
Yes, possibly (although I would argue with "almost as many", I don't think the numbers are remotely comparable), but it wasn't recognised until long after the leather balls were phased out, so I'm not sure what could have been done about it. Boxing on the other hand has always been recognised as being potentially harmful to the fighters, right back to the bare-knuckle days.
Marc Meakin
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Marc Meakin »

I think boxers know the risks before taking up the sport as do Motor sport drivers/riders.
By all means do anything necessary to make its as safe as possible but banning the sport will drive it underground
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Gavin Chipper
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Gavin Chipper »

Marc Meakin wrote: Sat Nov 10, 2018 5:49 pm I think boxers know the risks before taking up the sport as do Motor sport drivers/riders.
By all means do anything necessary to make its as safe as possible but banning the sport will drive it underground
I think there's a difference between a sport where there is a risk of injury and a sport where the actual aim is to injure your opponent.
Marc Meakin
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Marc Meakin »

That includes all combat sport then .
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Paul Worsley
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Paul Worsley »

JimBentley wrote: Wed Nov 07, 2018 5:39 pm
Ian Volante wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 11:39 pm I concur again with Bradman.
I find this weird. I don't think I could say who the greatest ever sportsman would be, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't choose a cricketer. Cricket doesn't test athletic abilities in any meaningful way and one person's influence over the team performance is only ever going to be limited at best. So I can't understand why anybody would choose a cricketer as "greatest ever sportsman". I mean, it's barely even a sport. Mike Gatting used to play it when he was basically just a barrel of lard and didn't do too badly, that's got to say something.
One way to quantify how great someone was is to look at how much better they were than the guy who is considered to be the second best. When you do this you see that Bradman was extraordinary. Several cricketers achieved batting averages ranging from 59-61, but Bradman stands out alone at 99.9. I'm not a cricket fan, but I don't know of anyone who has dominated his/her sport as much as Don Bradman, and he is certainly a contender for Greatest Ever Sportsman.
Marc Meakin
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Re: Greatest Ever Sportsman?

Post by Marc Meakin »

Jahangir Khan and Joe Davis spring to mind
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