Is Tiger Woods the best athlete of all times? Does he beat Barry Bonds, Michael Jordan, and Wayne Gretzky?

I've posted a poll about it on polls boutique, would love to get some serious sports fans' opinion about this poll.

You have to define athlete. Accomplishments? Fame? Actual explosiveness? Speed, strength, agility, vision, flexibility, body control, jumping ability on and on and on. Almost an impossible topic. Obviously MJ is the best pure athlete of the group. Tiger might end up being the most dominant when it's all said and done. Gretszky is the most dominate team sport athlete of all time based on stats for sure. Bonds.......best cheater. However, steroids or not, you can't hit 700+ homeruns without tons of talent. This is a very tough Subject.
Strictly comparing MJ to Tiger i think people will always lean towards MJ for one reason. Visual appeal. To the eye, MJ did things that are, for the majority of people in this world, utterly incomprehensible. Golf, no matter how difficult it is, and how impressive Tiger Woods is, doesn't create the same sense of "awe", visually speaking as watching an athlete fly through the air with spellbinding grace, or speeding through obstacles and contorting the body in crazy ways only to finish with a bucket and a foul. You get the idea. Hitting a golf ball 260 yrds and landing it 6 feet from the pin is obviously ridiculous in itself, just not as captivating to the eye and/or common folk. I think for that reason, people will always be more in awe than Tiger Woods, and therefore consider him greater.

This post has been edited by Mjr. Diarrhea: Apr 27 2008, 05:16 PM

michael johnson - 43.18 seconds for 400m and 19.32 for 200m is pretty damn great!

Wilt Chamberlain, and no one else is even close.

Both in terms of athletic ability and in terms of sports domination.

How about athletic ability? He was a marathon runner in high school. He was a multi-event track star at Kansas U., which included being the Big-8 high-jump champ two years in a row, as well as a member of their 440 yd relay team. Everyone knows about his basketball skills, but most people don't realize that he was given a try-out by Hank Stram and the Chiefs in the mid-60's. Without benefit of training, Wilt out-ran the Chiefs fastest running back, Curtis McLinton, in the 40 yd dash (Chamberlain reprtedly ran a 4.4 ), and he was so impressive that Stram said he could have been an All-Pro at not one, but three positions...Tight-End, Defensive End, or Linebacker. Of course, Wilt, who could throw a football 80 yds, wanted to be the QB. In the late 60's Wilt had a LEGITIMATE offer to fight Muhammed Ali for the world heavyweight boxing title. Ali later lost to Joe Frazier, and the fight never materialized. There is actual footage however, on World of Sports, with an interview conducted by Howard Cosell, in which Cosell makes the comment that Wilt was probably the strongest man on the planet at the time, and with his 92" wingspan, there were thsoe who felt he might have beaten Ali. Wilt dominated the NBA for 14 years, and in his last year in the NBA, he led the league in rebounding (the 11th time in those 14 years), was voted 1st team All-Defense (for the 2nd consecutive year), and set a FG% mark of .727, which still stands today, and will probably never be broken. Not only that, but he was LEGITIMATELY pursued by NBA teams into his 40's and even into his 50's! Most of the current generation marvel at Michael Jordan's leaping ability, with his 44" vertical leap. Well, Wilt recorded a vertical leap of over 48". How high could Wilt jump? There are only two recorded dunks on a 12' basket. One, by Michael Allen in 2000, and assisted with a lob pass, and the other by Chamberlain in the 1950's, with the more conventional run-and jump dunk. Wilt was also quite possibly the fastest player in the NBA, and he routinely out-raced teammate Hal Greer, who would probably compare with Allen Iverson today, from one end of the floor, to the other. How strong was Wilt? He reportedly was bench-pressing over 500 lbs back in the 60's, and before steroids came into vogue, and even more unbelieveable is the fact that there is documentation of him benching 465 lbs, at age 60!

How about statistical domination of a team sport? First of all Wilt has been called the "Babe Ruth" of basketball...which is completely inaccurate. Most of Ruth's legendary slugging records have been surpassed. How about Chamberlain's? Wilt currently holds 72 NBA records, 68 by himself. Jordan, Ruth, and Jim Brown probably don't hold a third of that COMBINED. And many of Chamberlain's records will never be broken, either. Not only that, but in many cases, Wilt also holds the next best mark, too.

For those Jordan lovers out there. Yes, MJ holds the all-time career ppg mark of 30.1 (Wilt's is also 30.1, but he is a decimal point behind someplace in the equation.) However, there is no question that Wilt could have scored much more. MJ's highest scoring season was 37.1 ppg (and the runner-up was at 29.0 .) Wilt not only holds the top mark at 50.4 (the runner-up that year was at 31.6 BTW), but he also holds the next three season highes as well. MJ's best season only ranks #5 all-time. In fact, in Wilt's first SEVEN years, his ppg average was 39.6 ppg...which is, once again, ahead of MJ's best single season.

And while the NBA legislated rules to benefit Jordan (to counter the Bad-Boy Piston's "Jordan Rules"), there were at least 4 major rules changes put into effect to attempt to limit Chamberlain's domination (disallowing tapping in jump balls; eliminating th dunking of FTs...Wilt could take a couple of steps from behind the line, jump, and dunk; the widening of the lane; and the elimination of offensive goal-tending.)

I won't go into any more detail about Wilt's astonishing statistical records. Here is a link that lists them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Career_achiev...ilt_Chamberlain

Best ATHLETE of all-time? Not even close.

This post has been edited by jlauber: Apr 30 2008, 09:24 PM

You forgot to mention he was the only 7 footer in the NBA with a key that wasn't wide for many seasons. The 48 inch Vertical is complete and utter BS. Vince Carter's vertical is known to be around 38-40. These are tall big dudes. When you see the NFL combine, with some of the most explosive people on the planet, and they're jumping 36-40in, at around 6ft tall, there is no way a 7ft 2 or whatever Wilt was could jump 48 inches. I've seen plenty of Wilt Highlights, no 48in vertical. HE would have been getting his neck at the rim if this were the case.

You forgot to mention he was the only 7 footer in the NBA with a key that wasn't wide for many seasons. The 48 inch Vertical is complete and utter BS. Vince Carter's vertical is known to be around 38-40. These are tall big dudes. When you see the NFL combine, with some of the most explosive people on the planet, and they're jumping 36-40in, at around 6ft tall, there is no way a 7ft 2 or whatever Wilt was could jump 48 inches. I've seen plenty of Wilt Highlights, no 48in vertical. HE would have been getting his neck at the rim if this were the case.

First of all, I am 53 years old, and I SAW Wilt play. Yes, he was the tallest player in the NBA for MOST of his career. Kareem came along in 1969, and was probably an inch taller. But so what? How many records does 7'-7" Gheorghe Muresan hold? How about 7-7 Manute Bol? 7-5 Chuck Neavitt? Who was the NBA's best rebounder in the 90's? Was it 7-1, 350 lb. Shaquille O'Neal? 7-2 David Robinson? 7-4 Rik Smits? No, it was 6-8 Dennis Rodman. And Chamberlain would have KILLED Rodman on the glass. The fact is Wilt DOMINATED the likes of Bill Russell, Nate Thurmond, Walt Bellamy, Elvin Hayes, Willis Reed, and Bob Lanier...all in the HOF. His high game against Russell was 62 points, and in the 61-62 season he averaged 40 ppg against him. His high game against Thurmond was also a 62 point game. His career high against Reed was a 56 point game. And while he had become primarily a defensive force and rebounder later in his career, he outplayed a 25 year-old Kareem in the 71-72 Western Finals...at age 36. In that series, he blocked 15 sky hooks...perhaps the single most dominant shot in the history of the sport. And Wilt outrebounded EVERYBODY!!! I have studied EVERY playoff series in which he went H2H with Russell...and he not only killed Russell in scoring, he outrebounded him in EVERY series. In fact, he outrebounded him in over 90 of their 142 games. And Russell is regarded as the 2nd greatest rebounder in NBA history.

Had Wilt had the luxury of playing against the likes of stumbling 7-3 Mark Eaton (and his career 7.9 rpg), or 7-2 Greg Ostertag (a career 5.5 rpg), and the MANY other uncoordinated 7+ footers that played in the NBA in the 90's, he would have probably gotten almost every rebound.

But how about that 48" vertical leap you ask?

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0150219/bio

"While in college at Kansas, he was recorded as having a 550 pound bench press.

At his athletic peak, he was said to have been measured with a vertical jump of 48-50 inches."



Wilt won the Big-8 high jump two years in a row, as well. But how about these feats?

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

"Wilt Chamberlain was known to have dunked on an experimental 12-foot basket set up by Phog Allen at the University of Kansas in the 1950s.[4]. Michael Wilson, a former Harlem Globetrotter and University of Memphis basketball player, matched this feat on April 1, 2000. Wayne Clark surpassed this recently and now holds this record dunking at 12'1."

"Jim Pollard, Wilt Chamberlain, Julius Erving, Clyde Drexler, Michael Jordan, and Scottie Pippen have each dunked while jumping from around the free throw line, which is 15 feet from the basket. Unlike the others, Wilt Chamberlain did not require a full running start, but instead began his movement from inside the top half of the free throw circle."


How about his legendary strength? I have already given you one link that mentions a 550 lb bench-press, but how about this one recorded in 1997 (Wilt was 60 at the time):

http://wiltfan.tripod.com/chat.htm

"Host Chris_MSNBC2 says:
M3 says:
Question for Wilt...watched you bench press about 465 lbs like it was a match stick at the Stanford gym when you were working out there for some reason...how much can you still push up?

Host Wilt_Chamberlain says:
Well, probably I can push up a little more than that right now, because I was bench pressing some great weights. I was a shot-putter and lifting weights was a great joy to me. I liked to show off, I don't do that anymore, but I could probably bench press more than 465 pounds now."


As for his skills, he was not some Frankenstein that dunked on 6-6 players. Wilt rarily used his massive size or strength to full advantage. He was a gentle giant. Had he played like Shaq did from the late 90's to early 00's, Wilt would have scored 100 ppg.

Here is one of MANY You-Tube footages of Wilt:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QmhTWmAaBc

Chamberlain, quite simply, was THE greatest athlete of all-time. But don't take my word for it...just "google" Wilt and you will read many more remarkable stories.

This post has been edited by jlauber: May 1 2008, 05:36 PM

This post has been edited by yourpressed: May 3 2008, 03:32 AM

Really not sure who is the best athlete of all time, but after watching Tiger play the back nine today (Saturday) injured as he was, I would have to say he is the best golfer of all time. To do what he does in golf, time after time, is amazing. I have watched golf for 50 years and have never seen any player, Nicklaus, Palmer, Trevino, etc, who excites the crowd as Tiger does. Wow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Doc