ESPN top 100 athletes since year 2000

[Hasbro]

An NBA comparable for McDavid would be Jokic who is 28th, so at the very least McDavid 70 spots too low.

Two years ago Jokic got left off the Top 75 NBA players all time list.

 

[JoVel]

Auto racers are not athletes. It takes a tremendous amount of skill but an engine is propelling the car. I mean come on here. Are people partaking in an athletic endeavour while commuting to work every day?

If you partake in a street race while going to work, I'd say yes.

 

[Rufus T Firefly]

To play devils advocate I do not define a sport as a direct skills competition devoid of any athletic prowess.

Dictionary.com defines sport as “an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess”.

Chess players do not rely upon athleticism as part of their game. Even esports or a thumb war with your grade school friend have chess beat in that regard.

To be honest, I shared your opinion about chess not being a sport before. But you should watch a high level blitz game that goes 70+ moves per player. It's really not that dissimilar to table tennis at that point. And if you still don't agree you should try to play in a blitz tournament and see how your body feels after that. It's much more demanding that it looks.

Magnus Carlsen is in very good shape, and part of what makes him so difficult to beat is that he can wear down opponents who aren't. In that way he's changed how chess is played (among many other ways). I think the "physical" aspect you site is maybe more stamina than agility or strength. And then too chess would not be dissimilar from cycling for instance which is sitting down most of the time doing the same repeated action or F1 drivers.

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

Joke of a list…how unsurprising. Not!!

ESPN drunk as usual.

 

[Acallabeth]

I know people hate him but LeBron should be #1. An actual freak of nature athlete. He could have picked football or tennis or swimming and would have dominated them all.

It's not about hate at all. Basketball's de facto requirement to be 6'4++ to play pro excludes 99% of human population (99.9% in many countries), so it's difficult to put him #1 over guys like Phelps or Messi, who are best ever at the sports everyone can participate in.

 

[67 others]

Tom Brady should be number 1 and that's coming from a Pittsburgher.

Crosby is fine where he's at, I guess, but should be higher. McRegularSeason should probably be top 50 at least.

And Jon Jones being 66? I'll just say one thing: Lock all 100 of those athletes in a room, where only 1 of them leave alive, and Jon Jones is leaving that room.

Well his specialty being mixed martial arts....yeah duh lol.

But Jon Jones has been busted for roids so many times, with strange excuses like "I took black market viagra" that his legacy is of a guy who needed doping to win, so he's off most serious lists. The fact that he found out the random drug testers were outside the gym so he hid under the gym octagon for like 10 hours is still peak comedy to me. Years later he claimed it was due to just smoking a joint. But it made no sense since they don't test for Marijuana in out of competition tests and everyone knew that.

 

[Midnight Judges]

It's not about hate at all. Basketball's de facto requirement to be 6'4++ to play pro excludes 99% of human population (99.9% in many countries), so it's difficult to put him #1 over guys like Phelps or Messi, who are best ever at the sports everyone can participate in.

Swimming severely narrows down the body types as well though. The average medalist in Tokyo was 6'2 for men and 5'9 for women - both well above average. This may not be to the extreme extent of basketball though.

There are other characteristics that prevent most people beyond height, such as a V shaped long torso, big feet, etc.

 

[Hasbro]

Swimming severely narrows down the body types as well though. The average medalist in Tokyo was 6'2 for men and 5'9 for women - both well above average. This may not be to the extreme extent of basketball though.

There are other characteristics that prevent most people beyond height, such as a V shaped long torso, big feet, etc.

Not as severe as hockey (or Polo), but swimming does have class barriers as well.

 

[Sampe from the 2000s]

There are so many continentally popular sports on this planet that unless you're a generational athlete at what you do, you should have no business being on this list. Certainly not in the top 50 anyway.

Regarding Zidane vs. Bonmati: neither should be on this list. Aitana only became the best female footballer on the planet in the 22-23 season. And Zidane only had three prime seasons plus one fantastic World Cup QF game vs. Brazil in the 2000s.

Plus unlike Aitana, Zidane never even had a year when he was unquestionably the world's best player. Not in 1996-97, when he only found his prime form midway through the season. Not in 1997-98, when Del Piero was every bit as important as him for Juventus and when Zidane was banned from a portion of the World Cup. Certainly not in 1998-99 when the entire Juventus team crashed and burned. Not even in 1999-2000 when his domestic season failed to match the Euro 2000 performance. Or in 2000-01 when he was personally at his best in Serie A but failed to win anything. Or in 2001-02 when Real Madrid underperformed in La Liga and an injury spoiled his World Cup. Or for that matter in 2002-03 when Henry and Nedved were clearly superior to him. And... that was it as far as his prime goes. Always near the top in his prime (aside from the 98-99 season), but never unquestionably the best.

 

[Midnight Judges]

There are 13 basketball players and 11 baseball players who are ahead of Ovechkin - who is easily a top 10 player of all time in 100 years of NHL history.

Adrian Beltre is above Ovechkin? ESPN recently had Beltre listed as the 97th greatest baseball player of all time.

Beltre is a 0 time MVP and led MLB in hits once and home runs once. Ovie is a 3 time MVP who led the NHL in goals 9 times and verging on the all-time goals leader despite playing in a fairly low scoring environment.

It's just a systematic underrating of hockey IMO.

 

[Satan]

I just dei’d and went to heaven

 

[Don'tcry4mejanhrdina]

If you drive to work at 200 miles per hour, maybe.

Yeah, because whenever I hear about somebody being caught speeding I think, "Wow, what an athlete!"

 

[DitchMarner]

It doesn't seem sensible that only three of the top 100 athletes of the century are professional ice hockey players, especially considering how much more athletic hockey is than sports like baseball and auto racing.

Not surprising, though. Would most people working for ESPN be able to name ten active NHL players?

 

[Don'tcry4mejanhrdina]

A car that if they lost control of for longer than one second they could easily die. Racers burn an insane amount of calories with the amount of focus it takes.

So do Esports players.

You lose weight sitting in a sauna too. I'd say you're more of an athlete than any driver, seeing the mental gymnastics you have to do to consider car racing as an athletic endeavour.

I knew this would ruffle some feathers, mostly of the rednecks.

I just got back from driving my truck to the lake, then driving my boat. If I lost control of either, I could have died. I must be an amateur bi-athlete.

This post is tongue in cheek. I realize I could never drive anywhere near that level and it takes an incredible amount of skill to do. But many things in life require skill and concentration without being athletic. Would taking steroids help them? No? Then they're not an athlete.


I also think anything involving horses should not be in the olympics. Otherwise give the damn horse the medal because it is the true athlete, not the tiny dude sitting on top of it. If animals are allowed in so-called human competitions, then I propose NFL teams should be able to use gorillas as their linemen.

 

[elmaco]

Tom Brady should be number 1 and that's coming from a Pittsburgher.

Crosby is fine where he's at, I guess, but should be higher. McRegularSeason should probably be top 50 at least.

And Jon Jones being 66? I'll just say one thing: Lock all 100 of those athletes in a room, where only 1 of them leave alive, and Jon Jones is leaving that room.

No one plays handegg outside of Murica.

 

[HabzSauce]

3 WNBA players before Kevin Durant was mentioned lol

This list is obviously a huge joke

 

[JoVel]

You lose weight sitting in a sauna too. I'd say you're more of an athlete than any driver, seeing the mental gymnastics you have to do to consider car racing as an athletic endeavour.

I knew this would ruffle some feathers, mostly of the rednecks.

I just got back from driving my truck to the lake, then driving my boat. If I lost control of either, I could have died. I must be an amateur bi-athlete.

This post is tongue in cheek. I realize I could never drive anywhere near that level and it takes an incredible amount of skill to do. But many things in life require skill and concentration without being athletic. Would taking steroids help them? No? Then they're not an athlete.


I also think anything involving horses should not be in the olympics. Otherwise give the damn horse the medal because it is the true athlete, not the tiny dude sitting on top of it. If animals are allowed in so-called human competitions, then I propose NFL teams should be able to use gorillas as their linemen.

I think you should just do one Google search on how physically demanding motorsports are instead of spouting this nonsense. If you can find even one article on the first page that agrees with you, I'll admit I'm wrong.

 

[JoVel]

It doesn't seem sensible that only three of the top 100 athletes of the century are professional ice hockey players, especially considering how much more athletic hockey is than sports like baseball and auto racing.

For every 100 athletes in the world there are definitely fewer than 3 hockey players. I can't think of any who would deserve to be listed apart from those three.

 

[Ceremony]

You lose weight sitting in a sauna too. I'd say you're more of an athlete than any driver, seeing the mental gymnastics you have to do to consider car racing as an athletic endeavour.

I knew this would ruffle some feathers, mostly of the rednecks.

I just got back from driving my truck to the lake, then driving my boat. If I lost control of either, I could have died. I must be an amateur bi-athlete.

This post is tongue in cheek. I realize I could never drive anywhere near that level and it takes an incredible amount of skill to do. But many things in life require skill and concentration without being athletic. Would taking steroids help them? No? Then they're not an athlete.


I also think anything involving horses should not be in the olympics. Otherwise give the damn horse the medal because it is the true athlete, not the tiny dude sitting on top of it. If animals are allowed in so-called human competitions, then I propose NFL teams should be able to use gorillas as their linemen.

I know you're not serious but if you wanted to do the "racing drivers aren't athletes" bit then the car arguably being more important than the driver is sitting right there for you to use.

 

[Voight]

It’s the accomplishments in their respective careers. Most of those WNBA players in the list are women who helped grow the sport and that are 4-5 gold olympics medalists with multiple championships won in the league.

Sure it's more popular than it was 20 or 30 years ago but the vast majority of people still dont give a crap about the WNBA/womens ball.

& yea they've won Gold Medals, but Women's Basketball at the Olympics is probably the least competitive sport. The US team hasn't lost a game in 32 years. It's almost impossible for them not to win a Gold Medal.

 

[Voight]

that’s a really good point. american football is literally a sport that no one outside of the us and canada plays or watches

for how incredibly magnified its importance is in the us, it’s a fart in the wind almost everywhere else

Yet it still generates almost 3x as much revenue as the Premiere League, the most popular soccer league in the world.

 

[Bounces R Way]

No. It can’t be assumed he would have dominated at football. Not everyone can handle the contact.

Also, LeBron had to team hop to win. He’s essentially a PG who doesn’t always make others better. Dwayne Wade, for example, has admitted he had to dial down his game so LeBron could thrive. He doesn’t have any definitive skill. He’s not a high level three point shooter. Doesn’t have a mid range shot. Doesn’t have a fadeaway. He’s not reallly very good with his back to the basket, especially for his size. Magic could actually play C and it seems like that was the plan for LeBron in LA when they brought in Rondo that first year - but LeBron is a one trick pony. Curry, Duncan, and Bryant each have at least as many rings (more depending on how you view the covid year when no one wanted to be there), while not team hopping to do it.

Also, there’s the matter of his agency, Clutch Sports, paying people in the media to force LeBron into GOAT discussions. They might have actually paid someone at ESPN to have him as high as #4.

That's what I mean tho. He's not even that insane of a basketball player but dominates offensively and defensively because of his athleticism. I don't know what criteria ESPN is using but if you strip away the fame/money/records/championships whatever and just look at an athlete for their athleticism he'd be tops for me.

It's not about hate at all. Basketball's de facto requirement to be 6'4++ to play pro excludes 99% of human population (99.9% in many countries), so it's difficult to put him #1 over guys like Phelps or Messi, who are best ever at the sports everyone can participate in.

That's a fair point.

 

[Albatros]

I think it's extremely biased towards female athletes and that's on purpose of course.

Only American female athletes though. Biles makes it to the top because of her Olympic success, but Marit Bjørgen doesn't make the list with more golds than Biles has total medals.

 

[Overrated]

Only American female athletes though. Biles makes it to the top because of her Olympic success, but Marit Bjørgen doesn't make the list with more golds than Biles has total medals.

Here in the Czech Republic there is this Sablikova speed skater. Not sure how well she fares overall against other athletes but she has had a very impressive career.

 

[John Mandalorian]

That's what I mean tho. He's not even that insane of a basketball player but dominates offensively and defensively because of his athleticism. I don't know what criteria ESPN is using but if you strip away the fame/money/records/championships whatever and just look at an athlete for their athleticism he'd be tops for me.



That's a fair point.

You’re overdoing it on his athleticism. A PGs job is to run an offense. It’s a skill. There have been less athletic PGs who were better because they have/had more skill.

There have been more athletic players who also had a lot more skill.