Bill Rodgers or Pat Porter

still correcting you wrote:Wrong. Boston is a significant net drop. Big difference from Chicago or London. What Rodgers ran in NYC is irrelevant to this point.

Way wrong. Boston has a net drop on paper, but is significantly more difficult than the flatlandthons.

Actually, I agree with you about Shorter - to a large extent,a nyway. Olympic titles are definitive, but, in Rodgers' case, because of the boycott, they are not as significant as they might otherwise be. Doing well in the Olympics is to some extent the result of being lucky. Viren has two golds from Montreal, but would he still if not for the African boycott? Would Rodgers have a gold, if not for our boycott of Moscow? Heck, would Montreal have been different if not for Rodgers injury? On the other hand, Rodgers had his chance, and, Shorter was probably also injured at Montreal. That said, I believe that, while the argument that Shorter is the more accomplished runner - or better runner - than Rodgers has a lot of merit, Rodgers and Shorter deserve to be mentioned in the same breath. Rodgers and Porter do not.

I think that's about as well as it can be put regarding Shorter and Rodgers.

I don't see any African beating Viren in Montreal. Unless someone came out of the woodwork which, based on what happened around that time, there didn't seem to be anyone. Yifter was hurt that year I believe and Rono was not yet Henry Rono and was supposed to run the steeple only I think. John Ngeno was not going to beat Viren although he may have medaled in the 10000.

[quote]Sagarin wrote:

Here's the point I'm making. If Alberto Salazar had been around just five years earlier, he alone would have beaten Rodgers at both New York and Boston. Heck, Dick Beardsley would have beaten Rodgers at Boston.

Or the increased competition would have pushed Rodgers to be a sub 2:09 man. He came pretty close while stopping a few times.

You can't have it both ways: Rodgers would not run faster today... but today's runners would have been just as good 20 years ago.

It's been almost a month since I posted on this particular thread. And you made a completely redundant point made by so many others, that it really doesn't bear repeating. Why revive it? Did I piss you off on the Hillary CLinton thread or something?

For what it's worth, Pat Porter's 10,000 PR was set at the Mt. SAC Meet in April of 1988 (27:46.xx).

Rodgers marathoning superiority over Porter wasn't even a comparison. Porter's cross country superiority (9 TA-USA XC titles) was a landslide. Porter had the edge on the track. However Rodgers was so thoroughly dominant in the best marathons I'd have to give him the nod as the more notable runner.

The 'things might have been different if' game, i.e., if Rodgers took more shots at the track, or if Porter took more shots at the marathon, is moot I suppose.

Absolutely no question that Rodgers was a more notable runner.

This topic is just silly. I suspect that someone from the Porter family started this thread.

Without question, Porter was a very good runner. To name just a small number, Bjorklund, Centrowitz, Chapa, Durden, Eyestone, Kardong, Hunt, Kempainen, Lindsay, Macdonald, Sandoval, Nenow, Wells and Meyer were also very good runners.

Rodgers is a legend. Only Shorter and Salazar are in his class.

Ryun, Mills and Virgin (who won 2 World X-C Championships and was much faster than Porter at 10K.) would be the next level of American runners.