Greatest athlete of all time???

[Melissa l]

If you had to pick in your opinion, who would the greatest athlete of all time be? It can be male or female, or human or animal. If I had to pick I would say that Secretariat was the greatest......

[Saguaro]

It is much too hard to pick one out of all the sports

[Melissa l]

Well my Viki loves Mike Schmidt.....Lou Gehrig IMO was the greatest man to ever wear a pair of cleats, and Wilma Rudolph.....my god, have you ever read what that lady overcame to win olympic gold?

[Kurtz]

Wilma Rudolph, for real. :yep

[Saguaro]

What about Jim Thorpe ?

[Kurtz]

What about Jim Thorpe ?

Oh yeah, no lie, great athlete. :theman

[patriotsblade]

I'm not a round ball fan, but I think Michael Jordan belongs up there somewhere.

[Saguaro]

Full Name: James Francis Thorpe
Nickname(s): Wa-tho-huck, Bright Path, Jim

Date of Birth: May 28, 1887
Place of Birth: Prague, Oklahoma
Date of Death: March 28, 1953
Place of Death: Lomita, California
Burial Location: Private mausoleum in Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania

Height: 6'1"
Weight: 190 lbs.
Hair Color: Black
Eye Color: Brown

Occupation: Football Player, Track and Field Athlete, Baseball Player
School: Haskell Indian School (Lawrence, Kansas) Carlisle Indian School (Carlisle, Pennsylvania)
Athletic Position: Halfback
Athletic Teams/Organizations: Cleveland Indians, Oorang Indiana, Rock Island Independents, New York Giants, Canton Bulldogs and Chicago Cardinals

Parents: Hiram P. Thorpe and Mary James
Spouse(s): Iva Miller (1913), Freeda Kirkpatrick (1926) and Patricia Gladys Askew (1945A)
Children: Gale, Charlotte, Frances, James Francis Jr., Phillip, William, Richard and John


Did You Know?

• Thorpe’s family wanted to bury him in Oklahoma and build a memorial for him there. Unfortunately, state officials refused permission. Thorpe’s widow Patricia heard about a small town in Pennsylvania called Mauch Chunk that was seeking a different name to increase town tourism. She struck a deal with the town and brought Thorpe’s remains to the tactfully renamed Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania. There, a monument has been erected in his honor with the sentence, “Sir, you are the greatest athlete in the world,” etched in the stone.

• The town of Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania holds an annual birthday celebration for Thorpe every May 21 and 22.

• Believe it or not, Thorpe once hit 3 home runs into 3 different states in the same game. During a semi-pro baseball game in a ballpark on the Texas-Oklahoma-Arkansas border, he hit his first homer over the leftfield wall with the ball landing in Oklahoma, his second homer over the rightfield wall into Arkansas and his third homer of the game was an inside-the-park home run in centerfield, which was in Texas!

• Thorpe is one of two men in history who played for the New York Giants in two different sports. In football, he was the New York Giants' running back and in baseball he was the New York Giants' outfielder.

• Thorpe played football professionally well past his prime, retiring in 1928 at age 41.

• Jim Thorpe played major and minor league baseball for 20 years, starting with the New York Giants in 1913 and later playing a number of other teams, including the Boston Braves and the Cincinnati Reds.

• Thorpe was the first president of what is now the National Football League.

• Thorpe was .252 in his six seasons (1913-15, 1917-19) as an outfielder with the Giants, Cincinnati Reds and Boston Braves.

• Thorpe's best baseball season was his last, when he batted .327 in 60 games for Boston.

• At and auction in October 2003, an early 1900s football jersey worn by Jim Thorpe fetched a winning bid of $210,000.

• Thorpe was a twin; his brother Charlie died at age nine.

• He won the gold medals in the decathlon and pentathlon during the 1912 Olympic Games.

[Kurtz]

Can ya believe his HOME state refused to have him buried
there, fuckin' ignorance passed off as authority back then. :mad

[patriotsblade]

Certainly a mark of shame on my home state.

[Kurtz]

Certainly a mark of shame on my home state.


Is that your home state?

I remember years ago that little town of Bethany (outside OKC) didn't sell cigarettes coz they were all Christians there. I mean decades ago. I've been in that biggest church there in Del City, won't say any more about it, we all have skeletons in our closet, ya know. :lmao

[April15]

The indian Knute Rockney

[Saguaro]

Isn't Oral Roberts from Okla ?

[Kurtz]

Isn't Oral Roberts from Okla ?

:yep

Tulsa, home of Oral Roberts University

[Saguaro]

Explains a lot

[bluedog]

How about a whole society of Athletic supermen....."GO TELL THE SPARTANS" that there was before or has been sense...any better conditioned men that walked the face of the earth. BD

[patriotsblade]

Yep, ORU, another scar on the landscape, and then we have a wonderful Sen. Inhoffe who said on the Senate floor that global warming is a hoax and that he was "outraged over the outrage" about the Abu Ghraib case.

[patriotsblade]

I was raised in Oklahoma, buckle of the bible belt, by semi-conservative democrat parents, then went into the military for 8 years where there is a strong leaning conservative culture and still turned out to be a liberal. There's hope for anybody.

[Trueblue]

Some who really impress me:

Michael Jordan
Lance Armstrong
Satchel Paige

and Ed Viesturs-he may not be the greatest of all time, but I just read a book about him and he sure is something. Climbed the fourteen highest peaks in the world, without supplemental oxygen, and without suffering a major injury.

[Partyless]

I'm a former competitive swimmer so I'm a wee bit biased:

Mark Spitz - no one has duplicated his 7 gold medals in one Games yet so that says a lot.

Tracy Caulkins - undoubtedly one of the best all around women swimmers of my lifetime - had we not boycotted the 1980 Olympics, more people would have seen her talents. She did win several golds in 1984.

Pablo Morales - comeback kid of 1992. Missed qualifying in 1988, lost his mother then came back to win a gold in butterfly in Barcelona.

Deon Saunders - amazing to watch on the football field, did his stint in baseball, too! And marginally entertaining as a commentator :)

Venus and Serena Williams - strong, assertive, they amaze me!

I could probably name one per sport but overall, those are top of mind.

[Saguaro]

I'm a former competitive swimmer so I'm a wee bit biased:

Mark Spitz - no one has duplicated his 7 gold medals in one Games yet so that says a lot.

Tracy Caulkins - undoubtedly one of the best all around women swimmers of my lifetime - had we not boycotted the 1980 Olympics, more people would have seen her talents. She did win several golds in 1984.

Pablo Morales - comeback kid of 1992. Missed qualifying in 1988, lost his mother then came back to win a gold in butterfly in Barcelona.

Deon Saunders - amazing to watch on the football field, did his stint in baseball, too! And marginally entertaining as a commentator :)

Venus and Serena Williams - strong, assertive, they amaze me!

I could probably name one per sport but overall, those are top of mind.


No thanks, I will take Bo Jackson

[VRWC]

And no one mentions the greatest of all. Casius Clay A.K.A Muhamad Ali!

[Melissa l]

Babe Ruth, Gale Sayers, Billie Jean King, Nadia, Ty Cobb