One word: Daley Thompson!

I changed my mind:

Bo Jackson.

Graycap23 said:

I'm sorry, we'll have to accept your first answer.

Graycap23 said:

Bo Jack was a beast. As an adult, I made the decision never to idolize an athlete by buying his jersey or shoes or image of him. There's only ONE athlete that I did that for - Bo. He would've been the greatest RB ever had he focused solely on football. Damn shame.

MuthaFunka said:

I've NEVER seen anything quite like Bo. NEVER.

Graycap23 said:

6'1 - 230lbs. - 4.3 40. Good lord!

MuthaFunka said:

Lebron may the next closest thing.....

Graycap23 said:

Someone gave the best description ever of Bron: "He's the perimeter version of Shaq" - Damn.

ThreadBare said:

that show's how sports may be a little too good for a person's self-esteem in some cases

MuthaFunka said:

Better than Jim Brown? Better than Barry Sanders? Better than Sweetness? I don't think so!

jockeyb4u said:

ONLY.....because of his hip injury. He would have surpassed them ALL.

Graycap23 said:

I was such a big Bo fan that I even watched a Royals game, but I still would put him behind these three and just abouve Emmitt Smith.

jockeyb4u said:

Uh...Yep. NONE of those cats you mentioned had the combo of size and speed that Bo possessed, not even Jimbo.

MuthaFunka said:

I used 2 go out and watch the Raiders practice when they were in L.A.
Bo was like a cartoon out on the field. Amazing.

Graycap23 said:

He wa a freak of nature.

Before there was Bo Jackson, there was this guy:



He may have been the greatest athlete of all time:

1. He won the 1912 Olympic gold medal in the pentathlon (long jump; javelin; 200 meters; discus; and 1500 meters)
2. He won the 1912 Olympic gold medal in the decathlon (100 meter run, long jump, shot put, high jump, and 400 meter run on the first day; 110 meter hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin, and 1500 meter run on the 2nd day). Thorpe won that event by almost 700 points. This was the only decathlon he ever competed in, and his points record stood for almost two decades. He won 8 of the 15 events in the decathlon and pentathlon, and placed in the top four in every event
3. He also made the 1912 Olympic team in the high jump and long jump
4. He was a collegiate All-American in football, and led his team to an 11 - 1 record his first year of ever playing, and then to the national championship his second year
5. He played professional football for 14 years, winning championships in 1916, 1917 and 1919. His team joined what eventually became the NFL, and was selected to the first All-NFL team in 1923
6. He played major league baseball for 6 or 7 seasons, and minor league ball for another 5 seasons
7. He played professional basketball, barnstorming for two years
8. He was inducted in the Halls of Fame for professional football; college football; U.S. Olympic teams; and national track and field competition
9. And if all that doesn't convince you, consider this: Jim Thorpe won the 1912 inter-collegiate ballroom dancing competition

The other guy I'd go with is Babe Ruth. Not only did he set just about every offensive record possible in baseball, not only did he set records for pitching in the World Series, but you have to remember that the Babe was a SERIOUS partier. And you also have to remember that there were no night games when he played - only day games.

Which means that the Babe did all that with a hangover most of the time!

RodeoSchro said:

How many Negroes did Babe play against?

Graycap23 said:

None. Nothing I can do about that, though.

RodeoSchro said:

He was another beast of an athlete.

I can't count Babe, he played when Blacks/latinoes weren't allowed.

RodeoSchro said:

Scratch off the greast list.....sub-par competition.

Graycap23 said:

Impossible to say that. How many Negro pitchers would he have faced, and how would he have fared against them? No one knows. But certainly, not every white pitcher he faced would have been replaced by a Negro had baseball been integrated.

Also, no way to tell how the greatest Negro hitters would have fared against the best white pitchers. Surely many of the white pitchers were better than many of of the Negro pitchers, so the records of the great Negro hitters would have been impacted to some extent.

Unfortunately, we will never know on this world how it would have worked out.

Graycap23 said:

Hilarious.

JustErin said:

Isn't it?

JustErin said:

Not hilarious. He's coming from a different place than you are, and he has a point.

RodeoSchro said:

But the issue is that he didn't face them, and we've seen the impact of the Black athlete across the athletic board, so it's easy to surmise that he would've had tougher competition to compete against for his records.

JustErin said:

Maybe not so much as "sub-par" but certainly - without a doubt - the talent pool was definitely compromised.

I think this might be a long thread!

MuthaFunka said:

No doubt. I'm sure that the 20 best Negro League pitchers were better than the 20 worst white pitchers, so his numbers would have suffered.

But the opposite is true for the Negro League players - the best Negro League hitters would have been facing some white pitchers that were much better than the lower-tier Negro League pitchers, so their numbers would have been impacted, too.

Unfortunately, it is what it is. Maybe in the next life, it'll be like "Field of Dreams", and we'll get to see who was the very best.

RodeoSchro said:

I'm not sure how anyone can unequivically say say the picthing in the Negro Leagues was THAT much inferior to that of MLB. What are you basing this on?