Check out the blog post on The hardest sport at http://www.empoweredathletes.com He talks about fighting as the hardest, but not really the most athletic even though you need to be a great athlete. Boxing is an amazing sport that people dont understand. The world cares about soccer, so Pele is the king. Boxing does not have the importance of soccer/futebol to the world.
using "ifs" can be very tricky. sure ronaldo could have won then in 1998, but Pele could have also won if he was not injured in 1966, being at the height of his abilities, younger and even better than in 1970. That seizure, happening of all times just before the final of the most important game of Ronaldos career up to that point, shows that perhaps ronaldo didnt have the mental strength -or call it whatever, to endure the pressure of a world cup final. still, I think France had an advantage as they were the home team and were playing well too. Pele, on the other hand, was magnificent in his first WC final being just 17. Ronaldo was extremely fast in his early career, but looking overall, what he had in his first years he lost it after he was 26-27, whereas Pele was still very fast and agile during his early 30s. Another fact that shows that Pele was a phenomenal athlete, is that although he had his share of injuries in his career, he would recover very quickly. as he has said himself, for many years his longest consecutive absent period due to injury was just three weeks!!
Yes and Schumacher way over Senna. Or are Europeans not allowed? Btw I can't find Nevers or Montanta on Wikipedia, who are these guys?
Decathlon, boxing, car-racing, tennis, baseball - too different sports to be compared. This thread is getting astray! ... If we stick to the OP proposition 'Pelé vs Michael Pordan' we'll fare better. Both practiced a ball sport which without the interference of sticks, rackets or bats directly 'manipulated' a big round ball either with feet or hands & tried to fit it into a net. In that sense they are much more basic ball sports than cricket or hockey, for example. And, still, those are quite distinct activities. In both Jordan & Pelé were gods but soccer penetration in the world is much bigger. And I don't know if Jordan's domination was as big as Pelé's. Yes, there were among others Magic, Jabbar, the Big 'O', Walt Frazier, John Havlicek, Jerry West, Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain - the ONLY guy yet to score 100 points in a game (vs the Knicks!) & pick up 55 rebounds in another one - all that in an epoch in which players were not so big (although Wilt was 7 ft 1) & there weren't 3-point baskets yet (adopted by NBA in 1979).
[Ernie Nevers was a brilliant all-round American athlete: his playing peak was during most of the '20s. Nevers played collegiate gridiron for Stanford, he played pro gridiron for various clubs of the day & he was a starting pitcher for the St. Louis Browns. He was inducted into the Collegiate Gridiron (Football) HoF in '61 & the Pro Gridiron (Football) HoF in '63. Nevers as an athlete was rather like if Wayne Rooney was also a fantastic outside centre in rugby union (the 15-a-side code).]
First it's always difficult to compare and then rank players of different sports, however I try my best ... 2cents 1- Pele: King of the most popular sport game of the world: Football (not NFL in America). Here I only listed his most impressive achievements with (almost) unbreakable record (in red): - 3xWC + 1Goldenball, 1Silverball , 1Silverboot - 10xchampions Paulista + 11xtopscorers - 2xCopalibertadore + 1xtopscorer+ 1MVP - 2xIntercontinentalCup + 1xtopscorer+1MVP - >1000goals (worldwidely accepted at professional level) - 3xseasons of ~100goals scored (100, 110 & 97) - Career 0.97GPG (highest of forward) 2- Jordan: He was regarded as the best player in Basketball with typical phenomenal record: - 6xNBA championships + 5xMVP - 10x All stars FirstTeam NBA + 3x MVP allstars - 2x Goldmedalists Olympic - 30.1 PPG career tied highest points per game with Wilt Chamberlain - rated points 33.4 (highest ever NBA overall) ================================================== For me, eventhough Jordan got some greatest achievement (in Basket ball) Pele EXCELLED himself in Football with many "unbreakable" records as highlighted. Jordan's record were great but he was not the "ABOSOLUTE" best (ever) in any particular attributes (in Basketball) PELE (edged out)
- 6 x NBA Finals MVP - Remember what happend to Jordan's team three times champions in a row after he left and what happened when he returned again?
What ya meant by that? in response, Pele got 92x hat tricks career (another "unbreakable record" ) I agreed with Muhamed Ali saying in regard of who is the "best athlete" of the century: "I have to stay with Pele, no doubt," he replied. "When someone has played for his country at 16, won a World Cup at 17 and scores more than 1000 goals, they deserve it. Until you find someone else who has done that then it must be me."
Joe Montana was a great QB assisted by an offensive coordinator who called plays for him, and teammates who are Hall of Famers or near Hall of Famers just like most every other multiple champ team. He is most definitely not the greatest QB of all time, having never once called a play on his own. That's the line of demarcation and on the good side of that line are Bradshaw, Fouts, Unitas, Starr, Tarkenton, Kilmer, Jurgensen, Namath and quite a few others. Montana ranks with some of those guys, but one has as many Super Bowl rings as Montana and got them first, two when DBs could hit WRs all the damn way down the field and the other two in the Nanny Era. Staubach didn't call his own plays, but I'd start him before Montana uness I had a "system" that kept Montana alive. And all this talk of no INTs because Lewis Billups can't catch a ball thrown straight to him... pish. Jerry Rice turning 12-yard dinks into 60, 70 and 80-yard TDs... Peyton Manning is the only QB since that era who could have played successfully in that era other than Jim Kelly and maybe Ben Roethlisberger (who is no Peyton, but is a big enough guy that he's held up under pressure and hits that would have crippled Montana)
The media want you to focus on what's happening now. That's why Tom Brady gets more ink than Montana or Terry Bradshaw (whose name never seems to come up in these discussions)
I thought Jordan's impact on the global scare is greater than Pele. Yes, soccer is a much bigger sport than basketball. But Jordan lived in an era where television is truely globalized. We can live and breath MJ 24/7. Very few people got to watch Pele live in person or TV during the prime of his career. His crowning moment was the 1970 WC Finals, but that WC Finals was the only beginning of global television. A lot of people during the peaks of Pele's career only could read about him. Because of live television in 1990's, Michael Jordan's actions were shown live around the world.... even in some Third World countries. The successes of Jordan has also helped by Nike(or Jordan helped Nike). They marketed him correctly. He was on TV around the world all the time. Even if you hate sport, you cannot escape Jordan in most countries around the world. Don't forget Jordan turned Nike into a global cultural icon liked Coca-Cola. Even if you can escape from Jordan, you cannot ignore Nike. sport wear is not just spprt wear because of Jordan and /or Nike.... I am not saying that Jordan is greater than Pele, but Pele simply did not have it in his era.
While Jordan helped turning Nike to global marketing stuffs, Pele with his football game STOPPED the war (in Africa) and he was the main image that support Football (Soccer) remained as the ULTIMATE sport worldwide!
That maybe true, but Michael Jordan has saved the loony tunes characters from the prospect of permanent slavery by a bunch of aliens!!!!!
Why irrelevant? It seems you do not even have a clue how (professionals) to compare players of different sports!
You can't. Apples and Oranges. It's hard enough to compare two players that played their whole career in the same league at the same time (take a look at the ongoing Del Piero vs. Totti or Gerrard vs. Lampard discussion) Now try it with two athletes who didn't even played the same SPORT. Pretty lame to call me clueless for preferring MJ. It's irrelevant because there is not really anything in Basketball that would compare to scoring a Hattrick thus it's impossible to compare this feat in a Basketball context. You might give it a try at looking how many years each of them was considered the best player in the game. While doing so you might look beyond regular season MVP awards as they indicate the most valuable and not best player and don't take the playoffs into account.
Pele and MJ are a rare type of player. If the game they played were a river, they changed where the river went.