Great response! Do you think time and history will tell a different story? Or maybe the greats grow larger in our mind over time to the point that it's nearly impossible for an athlete to be thought of as the greatest after their predecessors?
I mentioned Tom Brady as being the GOAT, in the NFL, but I know people who refuse to let go of Joe Montana as the greatest. Montana won less championships than Tom Brady, but he also never lost a Superbowl, in an era where quarterbacks didn't have rules to overly protect them.
Babe Ruth may be the greatest to ever play baseball, but he played before black integration. How would he have compared to Jackie Robinson in equal territory?
This is just my opinion, but I think Michael Jordan is one who should still be considered the greatest. He played in an era with very few rules when it came to fouls... the NBA was extremely physical back then and fouls werent called for minor things like they are today (in fact the players were pretty brutal, sneaky punches and knees to private areas to name just a few... ). The stars are so protected now that the refs call fouls for the current "greatest" getting his beard touched and acting Ike Tyson punched him *coughlebroncough*
What are your thoughts on "the greatest"?
With regards to hockey, it's really hard to say, honestly. The game is getting better and producing a lot more quality players and stars, so there will always remain the possibility that somebody shines brightly like nobody who's played the game before, but the flip side of it is that since the quality of players is so much better than the past eras, it's harder to stand out and thus have somebody enter that conversation as the GOAT. Plus, with the injuries and wear and tear of sports in general being much greater now than in the past, seeing players play and be dominant long enough to have enough of a resume for their career is becoming increasingly rare.
Like, part of what makes Gretzky the greatest isn't just his numbers, but the fact he was
that much better than his peers when he played. Just to throw an example out there, in his third NHL season he finished with 212 points, second best all-time. That was 65 points more than second in the league. The next season he finished with fewer points (196), but was still well ahead of the rest of the league (+72). It was basically that way for 7 straight seasons until Lemieux came along, and the fact he was able to do that for so long and was named league MVP 8 years in a row really does speak to his dominance even in an era of high scoring games, which did contribute to all his records.
That said, when I look at today's game, the one player who could possibly break into that top 3 is Connor McDavid. I've watched enough of him to know he is that skilled, that talented, that special, since he plays and thinks the game at a much higher speed than anybody before or after him, and his dominance has shown throughout his career. He's hit 100+ points in all but two of his NHL seasons, with a collarbone injury in his rookie year and the pandemic cancelling the end of the 19-20 regular season preventing him from reaching the mark in those seasons. He became only the fifth player ever to reach 150+ points a couple of seasons ago, first in 27 years. He broke Gretzky's record for assists in one playoffs last season when he won the Conn Smythe (playoff MVP) in a losing effort. He's been hitting all these career milestones, like 1000 points, as one of the fastest in NHL history, just behind guys like Gretzky and Lemieux. Gretzky's points record is very likely out of reach, but even just becoming the second player to reach 2000+ points, which he is on pace for, would be a massive accomplishment. I know some people hold the fact he hasn't won the Stanley Cup against him, but in fairness he hasn't had a great team built around him for most of his career, and eventually he will finally win the Cup before his career is over. I honestly don't know if he will enter the conversation of being in the top 3 of greatest hockey players ever, and I can't see him dethroning Gretzky even if he does, but I do think he'll finish top 5 for sure by the end of his career.
Just to briefly touch on the other sports, I'm not well-versed enough on the other top NA sports leagues these days to have a strong opinion on the GOATs for them, though I definitely understand the argument for guys like Tom Brady, Babe Ruth, and Michael Jordan in their respective leagues. I do have an interest in soccer, though I'm mainly interested in the international side of things rather than the club side, and I know Lionel Messi's now considered the GOAT (or, at worst, one of the GOATs) after winning the World Cup for Argentina on top of all his other individual achievements and accolades, which also serves as a good highlight for this discussion.
Anyways, that rambly mess aside, I do think it's possible for who's considered the greatest to change for any sport, but it really would require a once in a generational talent to come along and have the durability/longevity to play for a long enough time to enter those conversations. After all, the saying is "records are meant to be broken", but even if some records aren't, sometimes it just comes down to how we view those players when compared against the era they played in, the players they played against, how much they were able to achieve in their careers, etc., or even something as simple as "this player played for my team I like them the most". It does also make sports more fun to always hope for the next superstar to come along and dethrone the consensus greatest!
