You need a dictionary to look up the term athlete. You don't have to be good at all sports. Just like a great American footballer does not need great endurance etc
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/athlete
A lot of sports like American Football are more niche than t&F as carried out only in very selective countries
Grant is a world class athlete. Just because T&F isn't as popular as football doesn't take away from what he can do. As fans of the sport, we know this & should defend this. This kid is a clown with 20 followers who said Daniel Jones is fast. He might be football qb fast but people outside our sport have no clue how big the gap would be if someone like that sprinted 1v1 against someone like Holloway.
Brooks Sucks wrote:
To me a world class athlete would be someone like LeBron James. You could take Lebron James and move him to other sports, such as football or baseball, and he probably could learn to be good or even great at them.
Baseball? He’d be worse than Jordan.
Football? His career would’ve ended a decade ago from injury.
In neither sport would LeBron become great. If he were good enough to play in the biggest league (the NFL) or a league without a salary cap (the MLB), he would. Instead, he plays in the comparatively second-tier NBA.
Brooks Sucks wrote:
Being an athlete requires some hand eye coordination along with a great mind to be able to analyze sports that require decision making.
Certain sports require hand-eye coordination to certain extents. Its importance in soccer/football, for instance, is negligible compared to its presence in baseball.
As for the “great mind” part, no. There’s a reason people use the term ‘basketball IQ’; you don’t need a ‘great mind’ to be a great athlete. LeBron James isn’t good at basketball because of his brain, he’s good because he’s fast, strong, and tall.
Brooks Sucks wrote:
Running doesn't require any decision making, knowledge of the game, or hand eye coordination.
The only one that’s true is hand-eye coordination. Runners have to pace themselves (“decision-making”) and know the rules/length of the race (“knowledge of the game”). Those elements might be more prevalent in other sports, in your opinion, but that’s all.
Brooks Sucks wrote:
Running also doesn't present the opportunity to be a leader and lead a team to a victory when all adversity and a crowd is against them.
Team sports don’t present the opportunity to be totally responsible for your own success. You don’t “lead a team to a victory”, you’re carried to a victory by your teammates.
Muhammad Ali, Usain Bolt, and Michael Phelps didn’t have subs waiting on the bench or teammates to pass off to. It was all on them.
No one would ever choose track & field as their main sport if they had the chance to be world class in a major sport.
1500MeterLoser wrote:
Grant was not even close to as good as football as lebron. Lebron owns recruited by ND, Ohio State, etc. they stopped recruiting him because his coach told them he was going straight to the NBA and it was a waste of time. Also grant can only run fast in straight line. Also, tell me how jumping far helps you in any athletic competition? That is such a worthless skill in sports.
False, Grant was better. Grant is faster, has a higher vertical, and was better at football.
Only sport lebron could beat grant in is basketball— and that’s because of skill — not athleticism.
Side note: Patrick Mahomes is not a good athlete. He’s a good QB — just like Tom brady. But that doesn’t make them good athletes anymore than Arnold Palmer being a good at golf does. They have skill. Not athleticism.
There are many NFL and college players who made the decision to walk away from football. Some names were provided such as Pat Tillman. It us disgusting that you would lump him into your accusation. He walked away from $3M 15 years ago to earn $50k and was killed to keep you free.
I wish there was in particular sport that was the raw measure of athletic ability... If there every was I bet it would be called athletics and the people who competed in it your be athletes... Oh wait! That's exactly what track and field is in literally every other place in the world out side the US of A!
Grant is best at running and jumping than any other "athlete" in another sport (Goodwin would probably be the 2nd). He just doesn't have the throwing down though lol
I would go with the decathlon as the event that determines the best athlete. Grant woukd be very competitive in it after a year of training. LeBron would not be good. Tom Brady couldn't beat an average high schooler.
Sounds like you mean something like "best all-around athlete with particular weight given to popular American ball sports".
This is not what most people mean when they say "world class athlete".
Was Jesse Owens a world class athlete? How about Carl Lewis?
Of everyone in track and field, he is the BEST example of a world class athlete.
Sprint, hurdle, jump
Most athletic combo going.
Not good at all of them like a decathlete but world class at all of them.
Ask a footballer to hurdle. That will settle it right there.
I hope Wojo comments soon to give us his thoughts. But once again, I don't think being able to run fast in a straight direction and jump far with a long build up makes you a "world class athlete". It makes you world class at your discipline. But once again, put him on a football field, he would get burned by many players because of the pads and starting and stopping and cutting. As for pacing yourself as another poster wrote as decision making, to that I say there is no decision making or strategy in sprinting, its called run as hard as you can for 20 seconds max lol. To the person saying Patrick M isn't an all around athlete. He is so far ahead of Grant in this it is crazy. Kid was drafted in the MLB in high school, he was an all-state Divison 1 offered basketball player, and might go down as the greatest QB ever. He is extremely intelligent with his knowledge of the game and his leadership is amazing.
Lets put it this way, all the sports in the world are put into a hat and one is picked at random. You have Grant versus Lebron, I think LeBron would be better at most sports. He would be better at: basketball, football (listen grant is skinny and not built like an NFL player, he wouldn't last like LeBron), baseball, wrestling, probably boxing, probably volleyball. Grant would do well in track, soccer (endurance based sport, although grant might get tired after a couple mins but we will give it to him), other than that idk.
Brooks Sucks wrote:
Lets put it this way, all the sports in the world are put into a hat and one is picked at random. You have Grant versus Lebron, I think LeBron would be better at most sports. He would be better at: basketball, football (listen grant is skinny and not built like an NFL player, he wouldn't last like LeBron), baseball, wrestling, probably boxing, probably volleyball. Grant would do well in track, soccer (endurance based sport, although grant might get tired after a couple mins but we will give it to him), other than that idk.
I am glad 'all the sports in the world' largely consists of ball sport popular in America
NERunner53 wrote:
Grant is a world class athlete. Just because T&F isn't as popular as football doesn't take away from what he can do. .
This is only true in the US. The US make up less than 5% of the global population. The remaining 95% are generally all pretty confused by the US version of football and have no interest in playing it. The top 10 for each position in the NFL would look very very different if the Oceanic countries played American Football rather than Aussie rules, Rugby League or Rugby Union
It’s been fun reading the opinions of home schooled kids arguing that people like Kipchoge, Benoit-Samuelson, Blankers-Koen, Latsikene, Bubka, Lyles, Rodman are not athletes. Keep studying. College is gonna be fun.
“Runners can’t be world class athletes”
That’s all it takes for anyone to realize you’re position is flawed.
How is Lebron James a world class athlete? He can’t even run a 5 minute mile. Endurance is a fundamental aspect of athleticism, and if you’re a “world class athlete” then you better be better than a random JV freshman...
In all seriousness, the idea that you have to be a multi sport athlete to be world class is dumb. Halloway a world class hurdler. Lebron is a world class basketball player. Are they world class “athletes?” Who the F cares
Athletics! That is what the rest of world (outside the US) calls Track and Field. Athletic traits are measurable. How fast? How far? How high? How long? Obviously every World Class Athletics competitor is a World Class Athlete. Major sports stars might be World Class Athletes if they can excell in some event in Athletics.
I miss the days when elite athleticism was determined by whether you survived and the hunt or not and brought meat home to the village or not.