Has Messi surpassed Gretzky/Jordan and others as the GOAT for all sports?

[Gary Nylund]

Too much Gretzky the GOAT talk when Orr, Lemieux and Howe are on the same tier. Same goes for Jordan, he's flashier but Kareem also has an excellent case for being the GOAT. Then there's Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus ...

 

[Sasha Orlov]

It’s still easily Gretzky

He is wildly underrated as far as athletes go

Nobody has dominated a team sport like he did other than that fellow in Cricket (Bradshaw?)

 

[TBF1972]

No soccer player will ever supercede any of the real sports athletes

i hope we are talking about chess, figure skating, cycle ball, synchronized swimming and darts here?

edit needed for cycle ball

 

[TBF1972]

It’s still easily Gretzky

He is wildly underrated as far as athletes go

Nobody has dominated a team sport like he did other than that fellow in Cricket (Bradshaw?)

what about the pospisil brothers?

 

[Sasha Orlov]

what about the pospisil brothers?

I don’t think that sport is popular enough to count

 

[M88K]

i hope we are talking about chess, figure skating, cycle ball, synchronized swimming and darts here?

edit needed for cycle ball

Quite clearly said real sports.
Soccer belongs in that red headed step child category with
Golf, racing and basketball.
It's the country "music" of sports, it's not really music, it's audio based terrorism.

 

[Beau Knows]

Quite clearly said real sports.
Soccer belongs in that red headed step child category with
Golf, racing and basketball.
It's the country "music" of sports, it's not really music, it's audio based terrorism.

So your point is that someone can't be the greatest team sports athlete, if you don't personally enjoy that sport? Uh ok

 

[TBF1972]

I don’t think that sport is popular enough to count

and that's exactly the argument against gretzky in comparison to messi. football/soccer is plenty more popular than hockey. go to argentina and ask people on the street, if they think gretzky is better than messi. if you are lucky 10% of the people even know, who gretzky is.

 

[TBF1972]

Quite clearly said real sports.
Soccer belongs in that red headed step child category with
Golf, racing and basketball.
It's the country "music" of sports, it's not really music, it's audio based terrorism.

and i haven't brought up soccer, golf, racing, basketball and hockey. i was talking about chess, figure skating, cycle ball, synchronized swimming and darts. if you want we can discuss about including shuffle board on my list.

 

[WarriorofTime]

Quite clearly said real sports.
Soccer belongs in that red headed step child category with
Golf, racing and basketball.
It's the country "music" of sports, it's not really music, it's audio based terrorism.

"real sports" are "whatever M88K likes" got it.

 

[izlez]

As an American, I have never heard of Donald Bradman before this thread. And I hate to break it to you guys, but those stats are made up. There's no way one player was that much better than everyone else in history. Frankly, I doubt that this person ever really existed.

 

[Svedu]

Football is easily the biggest sport. Neither Ronaldo nor Mbappe are that close to Messi and they are freakishly good.

Messi has been dominating the sport since he was 18. His numbers are much more insane than Gretzkys in a lower scoring sport.
I mean come on, Ovechkin can pass Gretzky when it comes to scoring and the NHL is a lot tougher these days than back then.
I mean McDavid will probably be closer to Gretzky when it's all written, then Gretzky is too Messi.
This is really laughable to be honest. The lack of objectivity is complete. When Gretzky was growing up and playing hockey as a sport the competition was what? 1/8000 or 1/392000 of the competition in football today? Stop fooling yourselves.

 

[Machinehead]

Quite clearly said real sports.
Soccer belongs in that red headed step child category with
Golf, racing and basketball.
It's the country "music" of sports, it's not really music, it's audio based terrorism.

C'mon now. If they're music genres then soccer is very clearly British invasion rock n' roll. You don't have to like it, but it's objectively the big one.

 

[Sasha Orlov]

and that's exactly the argument against gretzky in comparison to messi. football/soccer is plenty more popular than hockey. go to argentina and ask people on the street, if they think gretzky is better than messi. if you are lucky 10% of the people even know, who gretzky is.

NHL is a major North American sport, cycle ball is probably played by 500 people worldwide

This is not an argument that makes sense

 

[danpantz]

Should at least have Brady as an option.

7 championship titles. Holds basically every record. Man has had three hall of fame careers in one.

 

[Lord Flashheart]

What is slightly above average to you? Just looking at the previous Olympics 12/144 players were under 6'3, 2/144 were under 6'0 and of course all those players being limited to two positions. There maybe successful player under 6'0 but they are outliers, The vast majority of successful players are 6'3 or taller which make up such a small portion of any population, likely 5% or less. Football (soccer) doesn't favor smaller players. Just look at World Cup Squads, if anything you'll see squads average heights come in above the national average.

I'm not suggesting there isn't high participation in the sport, and maybe I'm using niche in a way you aren't familiar with but I don't think there's any denying that the pool of potentially successful athletes is limited based on height. I think you'd find the physical attributes to succeed in football are far more common. The competition to reach top levels is just far higher.

Niche is niche, but let's not get into semantics.

There is no denying that both basketball is leaned more towards taller people and that football has larger talent pool. I also think that talent pool argument is flawed when it comes to players of Messi's ilk, because Messi is so far above all but very few in natural ability, that it can be argued he's not even in the same talent pool. If anything, because of higher exposure and easier to get going in football one can argue that such talents have higher chance of flowing to the top, than in ice hockey, motorsport, etc.

When it comes to average and good players talent pool argument is absolutely valid, and it is much harder to succeed.

 

[Puckstuff]

Lionel Messi
Wayne Gretzky
Michael Jordan
Lebron James
Tom Brady
Tiger Woods
Cristiano Ronaldo

These are the best players I think.

 

[SwedishFire]

I know people don't want to hear this but I think the GOAT at soccer is kind of at the top by default.

Well over a billion people watched that game yesterday.

It's a talent pool and a sphere of influence that no other sport touches.

Id say no. Talent rsnks ahead anyway.

Id say I come impressed more of some hockeyplayers than Messi.
I think Gretzky, Federer, Woods, Bolt, Jordan has a very good shot at it.
For how long, and in his older days

Federer took another step and re-eleveated himself.
Woods as well total dominance of the sport.
Bolt, here you has one of the most trained arhletes. Track and fielders are top trained.
Gretz, he was a wizard out there. Though, he had a great great team around him. Like an All star team in the 80s. Doubt 200p would come if he played in LA that timeframe.
He gutted confidence in players around him they know he would see them, and find them, if they searched for an open spot. That was just a greatness from Gretz.
Maradona. He has had the best touch and understanding of the ball EVER.

Id say
1 Maradona/Gretz/Jordan
2 Federer
3 Messi
4 Bolt
5 Woods
6 C Ronaldo


I feel Messi quite lost it a bit with all failed world cups. And how was his overall game? I always comes away more impresded by C Ronaldo. I really enjoys watchibg fotball seeing him.

 

[WarriorofTime]

Basketball is not a niche sport. There are 41 NBA players drawing a salary above $30 million per year, lol.

 

[norrisnick]

Basketball is not a niche sport. There are 41 NBA players drawing a salary above $30 million per year, lol.

Because you only need to pay like 4-5 guys per team.

 

[sdf]

As a soccer players? For sure

 

[Arthur Morgan]

This.

Statistically speaking, Bradman was the most dominant player of his sport out of any other player and their sport.

I dont understand Cricket at all. his stats are more dominant than Gretzky's?

 

[I am not exposed]

I always love how passionate people get over a completely unanswerable question. Trying to compare players from different sports is sort of silly

Even in the same sport to be honest. Especially team sports and comparing players from different eras.

 

[Korpse]

Niche is niche, but let's not get into semantics.

There is no denying that both basketball is leaned more towards taller people and that football has larger talent pool. I also think that talent pool argument is flawed when it comes to players of Messi's ilk, because Messi is so far above all but very few in natural ability, that it can be argued he's not even in the same talent pool. If anything, because of higher exposure and easier to get going in football one can argue that such talents have higher chance of flowing to the top, than in ice hockey, motorsport, etc.

When it comes to average and good players talent pool argument is absolutely valid, and it is much harder to succeed.

The point behind the talent pool argument is that football isn't limited in the way it is with hockey or basketball for example, therefore exceptional athletes are far more likely to participate and reach elite levels. Theoretically a players of Messi's ilk are more likely due to the sports accessibility and popularity worldwide, making his accomplishments all that more impressive compared to Jordan or Gretzky. Messi's path to stardom was anything but guaranteed, if anything he overcome challenges most elite level athletes don't have to face.

Basketball is not a niche sport. There are 41 NBA players drawing a salary above $30 million per year, lol.

Niche in the sense that it such a small portion of the population have any likelihood of reaching elite levels. Obviously wasn't speaking in regards to it's popularity or it's profitability.

 

[WarriorofTime]

Because you only need to pay like 4-5 guys per team.

NBA team payroll ranges from $111.290 million (minimum) to just over $123 million (maximum), which teams can go over by spending into the luxury tax.