Popularity of WR vs Olympic titles: debate closed

OldNECoach wrote:

Not fair to use Maree in this comparison because he wasn't allowed to run in the Olympics during his peak because South Africans were not allowed to compete. He didn't gain US citizenship until later in his career. For his early career, the NCAA's were his biggest meet.

His NCAA 1500 mark was incredible, and was actually a solo effort in the semi's of the IC4A's at Franklin Field. He then won 2 events the next day, leading a 1-4 sweep by Villanova in the 1500.

Almost everything in your post is wrong. Maree's peak running came after he gained US citizenship. His collegiate record was in the 1981 NCAA final, not the IC4A.

Records are broken, medals last forever. Olympic Gold over WR any day.

Dan Marino or Jim MacMahon?

dadsfadsfdasfdsafdas wrote:

Would you have rathered Steve Scotts career or Peter Rono?

Rono and it's not even close.

What about Ron Clarke and Billy Mills? Clarke set some phenomenal WR's. When he ran 27:39, the next fastest time, not including his previous WR, was 28:18 and his 13:16 took an 8 second chunk off of Kip Keino's record. It's not fair, but when I think of Clarke, it's mostly of him getting outkicked by Mills and that horrible picture of him receiving oxygen after the Mexico City 10000.

Runner10287 wrote:

Dan Marino or Jim MacMahon?

The first problem with this is comparing a team sport to an individual sport.

The second problem with this argument is that Marino's greatness is based off longevity and consistency of excellence during that longevity - it has nothing to do with the records he set. If Marino's 1984 season (48 TD's 5084 yards) was a total outlier and then nothing else even approaching it then the answer is McMahon.

But the answer is of course Marino but only because he was able to basically play at that level for basically 12 seasons.

The reason why we even get into this conversation in running is because setting the WR in track and field is so hard that you almost have to be at the level where you are dominant in your event to the point you would be for multiple seasons. So yeah when you want to compare Kipketer to Rodahl, the reason why you take Kipketer is because in order to break that WR he had to be so good that the by-product was that he also won 3 world titles and dominated his event.

I'll give the best example of this in a running sense. I use these guys because neither are really legends of the sport or guys that many of us would put in the context of all-time greats and who basically had the same resume of good/great races. Would you rather be Dennis Kimetto (WR holder who basically ran 2 good and 1 great race in his life) or Stephen Kiprotich (OC who basically ran 2 good and 1 great race in his life)?

Nobody now gives a f$$k about either of these guys but one sits at home with an Olympic gold medal and the other is just the guy before the GOAT came along and dominated the event like no other.

Easy one.

FWIW, John Walker said he got much more attention from breaking the mile world record. He was getting telephone calls from all over the world once back in his hotel room.

My kid has multiple Oly gold. My kid also holds WRs, both individually and on relays. Speaking from what they have experienced, the golds are completely life changing from the standpoint of how people outside the sport treat him/her. Also helps quite a bit from the endorsement side. Within the environment of his/her sport, the WRs are really cool and get them a lot of recognition and respect. Golds>WRs