OT: Greatest athlete ever?
- Thread starter tom1944
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I was at Belmont that day but just kid. It was like watching two races. Everyone knew Secretariat would win. A 2$ bet only won you 20 cents - everybody had a ticket. When Sec got the lead, everybody knew the TC would be won and that they got to see it. That was race #1 and against horses. But then the lead just grew and grew and the already boisterous crowd just started freaking out. They knew they were seeing a 2nd race vs history and the ordinary. Only other thing I would have liked to have seen was Lake Placid hockey.
I always remember the Preakness that year when on the first turn he went from last to first. The move was like he was shot out of a cannon and all the other horses were standing still watching him. It was over already.
The Sherriff!!
I love Hunter!
Big in Obstscle Course Racing and functional fitness.
Not a bad name to throw out there.
He’s around 200lbs and recently deadlifted 500lbs and ran a 5minute mile in the same day.
Very good combination of speed and power.
When Rulon Gardner from Wyoming beat “The Russian Bear” in the 2000 Sydney Olympics Greco Roman Wrestling it was considered by many to be the greatest upset in international sports history. The crazy thing is that no opponent even scored a single point against him for 6 years. Yeah Karelian was dominant.
Ha that's why I joined KofC and to travel the country playing softball. You'd go in there and buy the bar a round and pay like $6 and didnt pay for a beer the rest of the night
I will concur with Zap on softball and the hot corners. I had 3 or 4 guys that could hit the ball farther than me on my team. My max was like a 325 fence you have to step on it about 350 to get it out. But come tourney play I had a number of 3 sackers come up to me and tell me there were guys that hit it further but got scared when I stepped up because nobody hit it harder. After I tore both my rotatosr continually diving into bases and the outfield and my arm went from a cannonto a wet noodle I got moved to 1st my last ditch to stay on team I once commanded. I played 3 or 4 tourneys at 1st and said F that and softball career done at 31. The rockets to the right,or left mo problem. It's the ones that were hit right at you on an in between hop or were hit so hard and and square you got got a screwgie. One 1/2" bad guess/reaction and you have a busted up face. I've played in tourneys where pitchers took their last breaths. Never in a game I played in but a guy I played against had his jaw broken in multiple places. True story every now and then in outfield you had the ball hit so hard at you it was like playing 3rd base. I've had ball stitches in my leg with welts a size and a half of the softball they're hit so hard. The 2 hardest hitting teams I've ever faced was The US Army Team and Joe Klecko's team
Those 6-5 230 pounders who look like NFL tight ends with fast hands and create ridiculous bat speed hit the ball 400 feet.
When they get on top of the ball and hit it down 1st or 3rd, you are taking your life in your hands if you play the ball with basic fundamentals of fielding.
Better off getting out of the way if you want to go home and eat dinner with you family...lol
The good thing playing those teams as long as on open field or HR 5 or 10 limit. Give me a team that shoots the gaps and goes right field and runs the bases taking every extra base I'll destroy them. When you got guys rounding the bases the defense always on their heels. I used to hate when we were shooting gaps, running all over the place and someone hit an HR it gave the defense a chance to breath and reset. The 2 biggest teams I think we played was Witchita KS dont know wtf they feed them but every guy was like 6'5 and team from TX. JustBig ass dudes.. played a team from Lake Charles LA that were all under 6ft that were just great athletes and ran all over the place and great fielders
Zap maybe you can enlighten me I still do not understand. I've played catch with plenty of guys that threw the ball hard real hard....but there were maybe 3 irc4 guys that I played catch with that I was like WTF and my arm was magically loose after 10 throws. They threw mo harder than the other guys it was just they threw a very very heavy ball and every catch was defensive and hurt bad if it didn't hit pocket. I actually told one of the guys you throw too heavy a ball and wouldnt catch with him
No one knows why certain guys throw heavy balls.
Rule of thumb, don’t warm up with outfielders or pitchers.
Warming up with Winfield or Parker is like playing catch with a chain saw
John Lennon and I were in the Bamboo room for many hours on $20 bucks each tip to the bartender at the closest register to the entry door.
John decided he could leap over a car in the driveway as we were leaving, with that God Gifted Irish leaping ability. He ran full speed towards the car, leaped, and impaled his thigh on the door handle.
Still has the dent and scar to this day.
SMH at guys that think having a good arm is no big thing. I could throw pretty hard in my day (I was my large town’s Babe Ruth athlete of the year ... played SS, LF, 1B, and P) and in over 10 years of coaching Little league I threw 10’s of thousands of batting practice pitches (keep in mind little league distance and speed 😉). But compared to some guys my arm was just OK.
I remember my Soph year at RU coming back from class during a good snowstorm. A kid I didn’t know was a good 75’ away across the quad and I threw a snowball at him (we had epic snowball fights between the quad and river dorms). My throw landed at his feet, he smirked, made a snowball and drilled me in the chest... it was humbling. Turns out he was one of Frank Burn’s boys. HE had a good arm 🙂
I remember my Soph year at RU coming back from class during a good snowstorm. A kid I didn’t know was a good 75’ away across the quad and I threw a snowball at him (we had epic snowball fights between the quad and river dorms). My throw landed at his feet, he smirked, made a snowball and drilled me in the chest... it was humbling. Turns out he was one of Frank Burn’s boys. HE had a good arm 🙂
Umm
You don’t see little or big unathletic looking guys all of a sudden rear back and throw a rocket at you.
Never a problem for me. I probably have the weakest throwing arm in the history of athletics. I had good hands though and could hit so I played almost exclusively at 1B and just prayed no one bunted in my direction.
Runner on first I always got the out at first before trying to throw to second. I just couldn't throw at all. Don't know if it was physical or mental but all the way back to LL it was like that.
Andre The Giant. The eighth wonder of the world. He drank 110 beers in one sitting. Daly's a piker
Not sure I would believe every one of these about Andre...supposedly, this was in just 45 minutes. Story told by Hulk Hogan...
When they made the movie Secretariat, that was the one race where they settled on showing footage of the actual race. As great as Secretariat's Derby and Belmont were, it was said that Big Red's move on the first turn in the Preakness was the one they would never be able to realistically recreate.
Would love to know if they ever measured his exit velocity. 😃
Is that where they he is coming from behind on the outside and watching it, it literally looked like he was going twice as fast as every other horse on the track. The difference in speed almost looked fake.
Nobody mentioned Bob Mathias.
At 17,he won the Gold Medal in the Olympic Decathlon at London in 1948 by over 900 points,similar to Babe Ruth's outhomering entire teams.Then,he enrolled at Stanford,playing fullback.He returned a kickoff vs USC for a TD,then played in the Rose Bowl.
He returned to the Olympics in 1952 at Helsinki,after first stopping off at Bloomfield's Foley Field to qualify for the team.After winning his second gold,he retired from the sport.To this day,he is the youngest Gold Medal Winner in Track and Field.
There's a story that floated around in those days that he broke par the first time he hit the links.If true,the question of being the world's greatest athlete should stop right here.
At 17,he won the Gold Medal in the Olympic Decathlon at London in 1948 by over 900 points,similar to Babe Ruth's outhomering entire teams.Then,he enrolled at Stanford,playing fullback.He returned a kickoff vs USC for a TD,then played in the Rose Bowl.
He returned to the Olympics in 1952 at Helsinki,after first stopping off at Bloomfield's Foley Field to qualify for the team.After winning his second gold,he retired from the sport.To this day,he is the youngest Gold Medal Winner in Track and Field.
There's a story that floated around in those days that he broke par the first time he hit the links.If true,the question of being the world's greatest athlete should stop right here.
Not saying he’s the best ever, just a fun story.
Aubrey Lewis while at Montclair played outfield on the baseball team, and between innings would run the 100 yard dash, 220, and 440 in his baseball uniform and spikes, and broke all the state records.
Aubrey Lewis while at Montclair played outfield on the baseball team, and between innings would run the 100 yard dash, 220, and 440 in his baseball uniform and spikes, and broke all the state records.
I ran track in high school, and saw him run in the state meet. He was well known, so you made it a point to watch him run his race. He was a couple of years ahead of me. Another baseball player who ran track was Dick Meade out of South River another name out of the past.
No kidding! Played with a guy[pitcher] in HS named Mert Oles, looked like Li'L Abner. Huge torso., short, big & strong legs. He'd get the side out & would run the 200 & 400 in his spikes & uniform on the cinder track that ran across part of the outfield & throw the shot behind 1st base bench. Later we played together on a real good semi pro club. He shut out the Schenectady All-Stars & was offered a contract with the Bucs right then & there. And signed after they talked with his folks. Was some unbelievable back in HS. Man child. Don't know how he wasn't offered a college scholarship in Football. Wasn't brilliant but no dummy, then again he wasn't in the town click. Oh yeah was the center on the basketball team. Could rebound & score.
Different world back then.
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My dad worked with a gentleman named Dick Meade.He was a multiple sport athlete at Cornell in the mid 50’s. I wonder if was the same person
Just called my dad. It was the same guy. He was Cornell’s best athlete of 50 years. My dad said he was a great man even beyond sports.
I think I played against his son, not 1 on 1, but team. There was a Ritchie Meade who played for UNC when I played in a tourney down there in '75.
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