GREATEST SPORTSMEN OF ALL TIME

Its no longer news, that American boxer, Floyd Mayweather has been voted the greatest boxer of all time. It comes as no surprise to many considering the 43 year old never tasted defeat in his 21 year career. Winning all of his 50 fights.

 

However there are other sportsmen who did exceptionally well and can be considered the greatest in their various fields.

Are you excited to meet these legends?

 

American football - Jerry rice

Jerry Rice is a three-time Super Bowl champion and holds the NFL records in all-purpose touchdowns (208), total receptions (1,549), total receiving yards (23,546) and touchdown receptions (197).

He's the only player in NFL history with more than 20,000 receiving yards.leads the NFL in consecutive games with at least one reception (274) and holds 36 total NFL records.

Rugby- Richie McCaw

McCaw won the 2011 and 2015 world cups as the captain of the all Blacks. He also played in 148 tests for them in a 14-year long career. McCaw was known for his leadership abilities also and remained a player his teammates looked up to. He also managed to score 27 tries in his international career and had a wonderful club career with the Canterbury Crusaders with whom he won 6 Super rugby titles. He also won 10 Tri-nations titles with the All Blacks and was twice selected as the World Player of the year. 

Baseball - Babe Ruth

Babe Ruth was nicknamed ‘The Sultan of Swat’ and ‘The Bambino’ for his charismatic skills at the time of Roaring Twenties. He started as an outfielder and pitcher for Boston Red Sox in 1914 and later joined the New York Yankees in 1920 where he played 15 seasons. Babe established huge numbers of records with his 714 career home runs, .690 slugging percentage, 2,213 RBIs and 1.164 on-base plus slugging.

He won World Series championship seven times and AL home run championship record twelve times and also made it to the All-Star team twice. New York Yankees honored him by retiring his jersey no.3. Babe was one of the five inaugural members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1936.

Table tennis - Ma Long

Living up to his name, Ma Long is the longest reigning male world number 1 table tennis player of all-time. As of June 2017, he has held the International Table Tennis Federation ( ITTF ) number one ranking for a record total of 58 months. He is the first male player to win every singles title in table tennis and the fifth to accomplish the grand slam ( Olympics, World Championships and World Cup ) . He has won five ITTF World Tour Tournaments in a row, including an unbeaten streak of 35 sets. Ma has been world number one since March 2015 and his current streak of 27 months is tied for the longest single reign.

Ma was the Asian and World Junior Champion in 2004. He won the Olympic gold medal in the Rio Olympics and the World Championships in 2015 and 2017. He is also a two time World Cup winner, 24 time ITTF World Tour winner and 5 time ITTF World Tour Grand Finals winner. Ma Long was also the 2010 Asian Games gold medalist.

Volleyball - Charles Frederick “Karch” Kiraly

Known for his ability to play both indoor and outdoor Volleyball  with equal masterful control, Charles Kiraly is a three time olympics gold medalist and a World Championship winner. After retirement Kiraly coached the US Women’s National Team where he led them to win the FIVB World Championship by defeating China in the finals.

Table tennis - Roger Federer

Born in Basel, Switzerland, Roger Federer has won 103 career titles including 20 Grand Slam singles titles—the most in history for a male player. He held the world No. 1 spot in the ATP rankings for a record total of 310 weeks (including a record 237 consecutive weeks) and was the year-end No. 1 five times, including four consecutive.

Federer has won a record eight Wimbledon men's singles titles, six Australian Open titles, five US Open titles (all consecutive, a record), and one French Open title. He is one of eight men to have achieved a Career Grand Slam. Federer has reached a record 31 men's singles Grand Slam finals, including 10 consecutively from the 2005 Wimbledon Championships to the 2007 US Open. Federer has also won a record six ATP Finals titles, 28 ATP Tour Masters 1000 titles, and a record 24 ATP Tour 500 titles. Federer was a member of Switzerland's winning Davis Cup team in 2014. He is also the only player after Jimmy Connors to have won 100 or more career singles titles, as well as to amass 1,200 wins in the Open Era.

Hockey - Wayne Gretzky

Gretzky set records in both regular season and post-season play, holding the record for most career regular season goals (894), assists (1,963), points (2,857) and hat-tricks (50). The next closest player in total points for the regular season is Jaromir Jagr at 1,921,[1] thus Gretzky had more career assists than any other player has total points. Gretzky scored his first 1,000 points faster (424 games) than any other player in NHL history, and scored a second 1,000 points (point number 1,001 through 2,000) faster (433 games) than any player other than himself. Gretzky's point total including regular season and playoffs stands at an imposing 3,239 (1,016 goals, 2,223 assists).

His 47 playoff points in 1985 and 31 assists in 1988 are still records for a single post-season round, and he holds the record for career playoff goals (122), assists (260), points (382), hat-tricks (10) and game-winning goals (24).

Basketball - Michael Jordan

Nicknamed MJ, Michael Jordan's individual accolades and accomplishments include six NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) Awards, ten scoring titles (both all-time records), five MVP Awards, ten All-NBA First Team designations, nine All-Defensive First Team honors, fourteen NBA All-Star Game selections, three All-Star Game MVP Awards, three steals titles, and the 1988 NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award. He holds the NBA records for highest career regular season scoring average (30.12 points per game) and highest career playoff scoring average (33.45 points per game). In 1999, he was named the greatest North American athlete of the 20th century by ESPN, and was second to Babe Ruth on the Associated Press' list of athletes of the century. Jordan is a two-time inductee into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, having been enshrined in 2009 for his individual career and again in 2010 as part of the group induction of the 1992 United States men's Olympic basketball team ("The Dream Team"). He became a member of the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2015.

 Cricket - Donald Bradman

Bradman nicknamed "The Don", scored 6996 runs in 52 Test matches (80 innings). He scored 29 Test centuries, which was a world record at one time.

 

He also scored 13 half-centuries and 12 double hundreds (the most by any batsman). Bradman’s ratio of hundreds to fifties was a staggering 2.23. He scored a hundred every two tests.

 

Bradman’s stats are even more remarkable because of the eight years he lost due to the World War 2. In the 15, Tests he played after the war, he averaged more than 105, and scored eight hundreds.

 

He holds the record for the highest rated test batsman in the history of cricket with 961 points. Bradman’s record of 974 runs in a series is the most by any player in test history.

Football - Cristiano Ronaldo

Apart from winning five Ballons d'Or and four European Golden Shoes, both of which are records for a European player, the Juventus forward holds the records for the most goals scored in the UEFA Champions League (128), most hat-tricks in recorded history (56), joint-most hat-tricks in the UEFA Champions League (8), shared with Lionel Messi, most international goals by an active player (99) and the joint-most goals scored in the UEFA European Championship (9). He is the only player to score more than 60 goals in all competitions in 4 consecutive seasons. He is one of the few recorded players to have made over 1,000 professional career appearances and has scored over 700 senior career goals for club and country.