Which sport has the Michael Jordan equivalent competing currently meaning someone who is generally regarded as the best to ever do it or someone who even transcends the sport itself?
Is there a sport where the GOAT is active right now?
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Which sport has the Michael Jordan equivalent competing currently meaning someone who is generally regarded as the best to ever do it or someone who even transcends the sport itself?
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Not playing at anything like the top level any more but Lionel Messi
Novak Djokovic in tennis
Mountain climbing
Magnus Carlsen in chess
McDavid in the NHL might be the most individually talented player that ever played – at the very least the greatest skater.
Ohtani might be the greatest two-way baseball player of all time.
I think Tadej Pogacar will later be recognized as the goat.
Shohei Ohtani in baseball
Lewis Hamilton/Max Verstappen in Formula 1
Marc Marquez in motogp
David Clifford in Gaelic Football. Does things like this https://m.youtube.com/shorts/_lpUMIN0JCM
Janja Garnbret in women’s bouldering and lead climbing. She’s winning everything since years
Basketball literally has a guy better than Michael Jordan playing right now.
Simone Biles in gymnastics
Saenchai in Muay Thai
He’s 45 years old and a long-time 8-limb cart-wheel machine
still a bit early in his career, but Pogacar might be the one who manages to compete with Merckx for that title at cycling
Ronnie O’Sullivan in snooker.
Yiheng Wang in speed solving of Rubic’s cube and he’s just 11 now.
Ronnie O’Sullivan snooker
Levan in Armwrestling
Gordon Ryan BJJ
Mondo Duplantis in pole vaulting
Efren Reyes still plays pool.
Messi football
Caitlin Clark
Chess.
Sydney McLaughlin – Track & Field
For pole vault, Armand “Mondo” Duplantis has broken the men’s world record 13 consecutive times since 2020, the latest being 6.29m/20ft 7.5in on August 12th. Before that, the world record was 6.16m/20ft 2.5in set in 2014 by Renaud Lavillenie. Before that, the standing world record of 6.14m/20ft 1.25in was set by Sergey Bubka in 1994–his 17th world record, the last 14 consecutively. Bubka’s streak was over the course of 10 years. In pretty much every metric except the consecutive world record streak, Mondo is the greatest of all time, and it’s not a matter of if, but when he gets his 14th and 15th consecutive world records. Personally, I give it a year, tops, until he surpasses Bubka in that regard, but his track (or rather, field) record and consistency has already earned him GOAT status.
Mondo’s father, Greg, was also an accomplished pole vaulter. He had a pole vault runway and pit in his backyard, and started vaulting when he was 4 years old.
He is simply in a league of his own. Sure, genetics do play a role in some ways, but pole vault is an incredibly unforgiving sport, and good genetics don’t mean jack shit if your technique isn’t good enough to capitalize on that. It takes an insane amount of practice and dedication to refine your pole vault technique, and as someone who did pole vault in HS (though I wasn’t very good at it), it is a very physically demanding and grueling sport. We were always the first ones to get to practice and the last ones to leave, sometimes up to 2hrs after the sprinters, long-distance, and other field event athletes had left.
The only question left is how much higher can he go? It really seems to me like the sky’s literally the limit, because we are in completely uncharted waters at this point. He can’t keep getting away with this, but he just keeps doing it again and again.
Moto GP – Marc Marques
Plenty.
It’s still very early in his career, but Luke Littler is doing amazing in darts.
Yiheng Wang for speedcubing 🙃
Arguably Alex Palou in IndyCar
He’s not at his best anymore but Novak Djokovic is still playing at the top level.
Women’s alpine ski racing.
Mikaela Shiffrin is still only 30 and has won a record 101 World Cup races. She has won all 6 World Cup disciplines. Ingemar Stenmark has the male record with 86 wins. He was a slalom specialist and almost all his wins were in that discipline.
I’d say Kayla Harrison is the women’s MMA goat. That title will be cemented 100% if she beats Amanda Nunes.
Lionel Messi is still playing, albeit at a lesser standard now he’s at the end of his career.
LeBron?
Nigel Richards in Scrabble.
Not yet, but Scottie Scheffler is on a trajectory. He’s 29!! (I know, i know)
Victor Axelsen in Badminton probably.
Shohei Ohtani (Baseball)
Adolfo Cambiasso in polo?
Portia Woodman in womens rugby.
Lewis Hamilton- Formula 1
Joey Chestnut in competitive eating, more specifically hot dogs 🌭
Antoine Dupont – Rugby
Crosby Or Ovechkin.
Me in professional afternoon napping.
Tiger
Missy Franklin retired 7 years ago, but it’s wild she’s still only 30
Killian Jornet – trailrunning. I would be surprised to learn of any trailrunner that believed otherwise.
If you want to watch the up and coming goat, lamine yamal just turned 18 and has already won the euros with Spain (the day after his 17th birthday. He’s the youngest to ever play in the euros). And he has won la liga. He’s got a lot of hype around his career. And also famously had a picture of Messi holding him when he was a baby.
Additionally, the Messi-Ronaldo thing is back with yamal at Barca and mbappe at Real Madrid.
Marc Marquez – Motogp
Jett Lawrence in motocross isn’t there yet, but seems to be well on his way and many expect him to be.
Manuel Neuer, soccer/football goalkeeper
He might not be now but in 5 years Gannon Buhr will be the goat of disc golf. The current goat is Paul McBeth and he’s still active and very competitive
Shohei Ohtani in baseball could very well be the GOAT
Lewis Hamilton in F1 – having a tough time ATM but a multi record breaking driver still at it
Yeah, I’d say soccer with Messi is a solid pick. He’s still active and widely considered the GOAT by many. You could also argue tennis with Djokovic or Serena not too long ago.
Gannon Buhr in disc golf. Other players are often just competing for 2nd because he’ll build a lead and extend it throughout the final round.
Novak Djokovic is still active, albeit not at his best considering his age, but he is absolutely good enough to beat most of the top players except two who are dominating the sport right now.
Novak Djokovic in tennis obviously
Depends how you define active, but some of the original Z Boys are still skateboarding. Tony Alba for sure and I think Jay Adams.
Hawk and Mullen are still doing it too.
Messi
For women’s climbing Janja Garnbret is the best of all time and it’s not even close.
Katie Ledecky in women’s swimming. She is literally entire pool lengths ahead of the rest of her competition. The top 20 times in the 1500m freestyle are ALL her.
Katy Ledici.
Novak Djokovic
Jett Lawrence in motocross & Supercross
Messi
Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton in F1
Alex Ovechkin is the greatest goal scorer hockey has ever seen. It’s probably his final year though.
Faker.
Novak Djokovich is arguably the greatest and is still playing
Same with Patrick Mahomes lol
Messi is still playing in the MSL
Katie Ledecky
Kelly Slater is still surfing the odd competition as a wild card in his 50s
Simone Biles said she’s coming to the 2028 Olympics.
Connor McDavid.
I know Gretzky is considered “The Great One,” but I really think McDavid is better.
Uh, Lionel messi in football. You know, the most popular sport in the world currently playing in your country and only 1 yank in this comment section has said it. Incredible
Tia-Clair Toomey CrossFit
Connor McDavid – NHL/Ice Hockey
Arguably Chess with Magnus Carlsen.
How come no one mentions MMA, where Topuria or Makhachev can be considered goats
Brian Shaw & Hafthor Björnsson (yes, the controversies and nay sayers are out there, but he’s putting in the work)
Was Paul McBeth in disc golf but Gannon Buhr is 20 and looks to be on pace to be the best.
Ben Johns in Pickleball. Was ranked 1st in singles, men’s doubles and mixed doubles. He seems to have stopped caring about singles and either doesn’t play or has little effort. But is still top in the other two. He’s only 25.
Lewis Hamilton F1
Rachel Homan in curling is on a years-long run of dominance like the sport has never seen, not the undisputed GOAT yet but at age 36 she’s still young by curling standards and if she keeps playing at even 75% of her recent success for another Olympic cycle she’s got a case for GOAT.
Motorcycle racing. The Moto GP. Valentino Rossi.
Gannon Buhr is close to it in disc golf, but there are a few others who can compete at his level. But when his game is clicking, he’ll easily beat the field by a handful of strokes over the course of a tournament weekend.
Serral for StarCraft 2.
Tadej Pogacar in road cycling
Serral in starcraft 2
This will probably get a lot of hate and downvoted to hell, but Tia-Clair Toomey in the sport of Crossfit/fitness. She has won every Crossfit games title since 2017, except 2023 due to pregnancy. And yes, its debatable if Crossfit/fitness is even a sport in the classic sense, but I am going to play devil’s advocate here.
Faker in League of Legends
Caitlin Clark in the WNBA
It’s a game rather than sport but chess – Magnus Carlson
Faith Kipyegon in the women’s 1500 track. 3 x olympic champ, multiple world champ, multiple world records, simply the best ever.
Football – Messi & CR7
Ronaldo
Lewis Hamilton in F1 won 7 world championships. Now he’s with Ferrari and have won since 21? I think. He was the greatest for a second.
Messi
Baseball? I am (pretty) sure Shohei Ohtani is the GOAT.
Ohtani
Its way too premature, and the statistics of the game have changed so much that he will never have some of the records that players from previous eras have just by virtue of how the game is played and managed, but Paul Skeens is doing some pretty remarkable things very early in his career, things that haven’t been done before.
Jon Jones is not my MMA goat, but he is for a lot of MMA fans, and he’s recently unretired.
Lewis Hamilton in F1
Okay ya’ll, now do sports.
Paul McBeth in disc golf
connor mcdavid in hockey might not be as smart as gretzky but no one has ever been able to do what does. and what’s crazy is there’s a couple guys right there with him in terms of skill and speed, like mckinnon.
Ohtani in baseball is close.
Lewis Hamilton in F1
F1
Lewis Hamilton and max verstapon
Anna Leigh Waters – Pickleball.
It’s the fastest growing sport on the planet, and she’s so incredibly dominant that she gets pitted up against men in MLP singles dreambreakers.
She has over 155 gold medals, with the second being Catherine Parenteau who has only 1/3rd as many (50), however 38 of them are in Women’s doubles because she was ALWs partner for all of them (and hasn’t won one without her since they split).
The second highest outside of Catherine is Anna Bright with 30 or so.
ALWs career record is 274W and 28L, playing exclusively against the top players in the world.
Oh, and she’s only 18 years old. She did a lot of that while being only 15, 16, 17 years old. Imagine a 15 year old coming into a pro-level sport and not only somehow competing, but DOMINATING the game.
And for anyone who thinks “oh Pickleball, it’s not that hard”, go watch some pro footage – it’s one of the most insanely athletic games (at the top level) of any sport.
ALW singles highlight:
https://www.tiktok.com/@thekitchenpickleball/video/7481470192682356010