Roger Federer: The best ATHLETE ever?

GANDALF

GANDALF

Active member
i think so

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best athlete ever? perhaps you've never heard of this small-time basketball player named Michael Jordan. Federer is a good tennis player, but he doesn't have ANYTHING on Jordan.

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Nope......not even close.

Wayne Gretzky

MJ

Mohamed Ali

Micheal Schumacker

Babe Ruth

Tiger Woods

ALL these guys are better athletes then this dude. They all DOMINATED their sports ( most points in a season....wayne, Most Wins in a season Schumacker, most PGA grand slams Tiger ( i think im not a golf guy), I could go on). Federer is the greatest at his sport, but he does not DOMINATE everything, and he just does not have the heart that the other guys i just name have.

 
if i'm not mistaken, Federer isn't even the top-ranked tennis player in the world anymore... how is he the best athlete ever if he isn't even the best at his sport?
 
Not the best player. Not nearly. Is he a great player? he sure is.

I still like watching Roddick more. He breaks things like no other.
 
I love to watch Roddick, I wish he would win more. I really want to give him a piece of my mind right now though - GRRRR! I'm a racket smasher too, so I really shouldn't be talking.

I would say that Tiger Woods is THE MAN.
 
a tennis player will never be the best all around ATHLETE ever. Think rugby players and football players. in no other sports do you have to have the quickest forward/backward movement as well as lateral movement, and still be putting pounds and pounds of muscle on. these are the biggest, strongest, fastest, most agile people in the world for their given size.
 
Federer is better at tennis than Tiger Woods is at golf... consequently, he's better at tennis than anyone has ever been at any sport, including Gretz or MJ. This was true before he lost the #1 ranking... if he can get back to where he was, win 3 of 4 next year, there will simply be no debate. No one has ever dominated a sport like he has for the last 5 years.
 
Fuck yea, don't I know it. I play with the same raquet as Andy and it's $200 a raquet. I had to have an aditude adjustment because I was smashing them.
 
pele wasn't even that great. Sure he was good, but mostly in the world cup. And he'd get his ass kicked these days if he played in europe
 
I used to when I was 15 playing varsity tennis, but now I'm my own player with a better attitude and better game than ole Roddick.
 
almost as impressive as my friend, who won the state championships in Class A his freshman year!

aspendukes, you're making yourself sound like an air-headed ho. stop typing. in case you didn't know it, you just said you have better game than Roddick...
 
It is very hard to to compare athletes in individual and team sports. That said, Roger Federer is the best athlete in an individual sport. It is hard to really debate anything else if you view his results fromt the last five years.

The way he dominated tennis until just recently is without comparison. Even though Nadal temporarily has passed him he is still up there.

Comparing Roger Federer with a team athlete like MJ is harder. MJ was one of a kind, no doubt about that. But to determine whether or not he is better than Federer is neither easy nor interesting. It is much better to compare him with someone like Christiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi. Both young guys who are both dominating in their teams and leagues in a sport that is played all over the world. Give those guys a couple of years and we will see.
 
I would have to agree. Armstrong is easily up there among the best athletes the world has ever seen. Endurance cycling like that has got to arguably be one of the most physically taxing sports.

As for federer, I would say he is still way up there. He is better than Woods at his sport, he absolutely dominated for 5 years straight. In an individual sport like tennis that's pretty stunning.
 
You're so unbelievably stupid you ought to be put in a glass box as a promotional symbol for abortion. "Cum-filled ass"? Is that supposed to be funny? Are you sixteen, or have you just sniffed so much glue since you were that you've just lost all the years in between? Get over yourself. People are allowed to have opinions on things without having to contend with some asshole with repressed anger issues because daddy abused him earlier in life.

Jordan did not "dominate" from the time he was a freshman until 1998. You're an idiot. There were better players in the world for most of that time, and even when he was clearly the best, there was always some question as to who would win the NBA championship, and who would win the MVP, in every year. What I mean by domination is that in a sport where you're out if you have one bad day, from 2004 to late 2007, there was simply no question who was winning Wimbledon, the US open and the Australian open. CBS could talk up whoever they wanted as being a "threat", but if you went to a major during that time and you weren't Roger Federer, you were playing for 2nd place.

By the way, that doesn't make him the greatest athlete. Neither MJ nor Feds could hold a candle to triathletes in that department. Those guys torture themselves. But in terms of being the best at their sports, it goes Federer, Tiger, then everyone else.

 
he would barley make a top 100 athlete list for me. He is nothing special, he is dominant because its fucking tennis. NO ONE extremely athletic plays tennis anymore.
 
Herman Maier.. dominated downhill skiing and super G, broke his leg hospital wanted to amputate and he said no and was only allowed to keep his leg because of who he was, was told he would never ski again and has since returned to World Cup and Won races.

Herman Maier is the greatest athlete of all time

or Lance Armstrong
 
the most physically taxing game of chess you'll ever play. it takes a flawless physique and mind and there is no arguing- Armstrong DOMINATED cycling like no one has ever dominated any other sport. he also dominated cancer, so suck on that, Federer.
 
You could make a pretty solid case for Lance. 7 in a row is pretty absurd.
 
^I would agree with you guys. Lance is king. Then every decathlete to win a gold medal in history should be a close second.
 
15's not a big deal, at least where I'm from. I started part time Varsity in high school in 9th grade. Full time in 10th. So, 14 for me? lol.

Either way, tennis rules.
 
My personal list of the world's best athletes:

1.Michael "Air" Jordan, a.k.a. The Black Cat

2.Roman Sebrle

3.Lance Armstrong

4.Richie McCaw

5.Muhammad Ali

6.Usain Bolt

7.Brain Lopes

8.Jonah Lomu

9.Cedric Gracia

10. Tanner Hall

 
the best athletes in the world are the triathletes and it isnt discutable. Those guy are the most complete athletes on the planet, body wise. Ever heard of the ironman triathlons? pretty fuckin redicoulus if you ask me.
 
I'm pretty sure that any tailback in the NFL could knock his shit apart. They are on another level in the NFL
 
discutable? i'm surprised anyone knows how to use that word on here.

bear in mind, Lance was a triathlete first and is still to this day a very strong runner and swimmer. his uni-ball and it's magic powers, though, help him climb mountains faster than anyone in the history of road cycling, though, so that was the obvious pursuit.
 
I forgot rebecca romero only athlete to win an olympic medal in two entirely different sports

But herman maier is the man
 
Just to help fight my case.. Lance Armstrong does the forward for Herman Maier's autobiography and says that Herman beats him for sheer determination hands down
 
you all are completely forgetting the fact that tennis is one of the most mentally tough sports out there. and federer is mentally the best player there is. have you ever seen him lose his temper? i havent. he is so calm on the court i cant even believe it. this guy is also hitting shots the NO ONE ELSE can hit. if he doesnt haven an angle, he makes one. go on youtube and watch videos of him. its ridiculous.

AND although ferderer is now number 2 in the world, he is still the best tennis player in the world. no one will ever be as good as he is. sure, nadal beat him at wimbledon to take over the number one spot, but thats all numbers. each player gets points based on which rounds they make it to in tournaments.

and crazyfuck, your an asshole.
 
lance armstrong dominated his sport for over 7 years...

tinker juarez has been on top of endurance mountain bike racing for over twenty years with 100+ major race wins and still continues to WIN...

roger is hardly the best athlete that ever lived.
 
I hate when people do shit like this. The people who compare athletes or teams like this and brand them as "the greatest ever" typically have absolutely no perspective.

While Federer's achievements are very impressive and he could very well pass Pete Sampras as the all time number one, you can't make any kind of objective analysis until someone's career is finished and look at the overall historical implications.

Do you ever notice when people do the "greatest athlete ever" its almost all people from the lest 15 or so years? You'll see guys like Shaq make the list while better athletes like Jim Thorpe, Pete Maravich, and Cy Young get thrown under the bus.

Anyone remember in the early part of the decade when people we're wondering if the LA Lakers where the best NBA team ever? This is while completely disregarding the achievements of the Bulls ten years earlier or the Celtics who completely dominated the sport in the 50's and 60's.

Lets look at Tiger Woods. He is a fantastic golfer and has made some stunning achievements, but lets keep in mind that some of the other greatest golfers of all time, among them Sam Snead, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Byron Nelson, and Ben Hogan, were all striving for similar numbers while also competing against each other at some point. The current state of the PGA is not nearly as competitive at the top end as it has been in the past, it comes and goes.

People have no perspective at all.
 
as soon as i saw this thread, this is what i thought.

im pretty sure its just about fact at this point that the answer will always been jordan.
 
I completely disagree. Complete athletes? No. Very respectable? definitely. They are endurance athletes. They probably have lung capacities three times mines and I am a competitive track and field athlete. But complete? No. If you really want complete, look at decathletes. Sure triathletes can run, bike, and swim, but all three are endurance based sports. Decathletes lean more on anaerobic strengths, but still are more complete. There is sprinting, distance (kind of, 1500m), jumping, throwing, basically every muscle group on the body.
 
the fact that he gets pwned by nadal in recent history proves that he is not the BEST athlete EVER. hes damn good but the best is an overstatement.
 
im pretty sure you are a dumb ass, throw a professional foot ball player into professional rugby and they wont be able to keep up. only people who could keep up would be people like jerry rice or other recievers/corners but they would just get smashed.

football players are so ignorant in thinking that they are so tough and are such great athletes. football players play for 30 seconds at a time, tops. rugby players play for 40 minutes straight, then they have a few minutes for half time then another 40 minutes. in rugby you can only have 3 substitutions unless there is injury. football the line up is changed every time there is a turn over. rugby players play offense and defense, football players only play one side of the ball with very few exceptions.
 
in my opinion, street skaters are the most finely attuned athletes on the planet. go watch what daewon song does and then go watch federer play and i feel like what daewon does is far more difficult. and if we're going by mental toughness I would have to say big wave surfers can take the cake. to elaborate on that, i would say mavericks surfers.
 
best athlete no. best tennis player ever, in my book yes, and if he wins a few more everyones book.

federer is amazing mentally tough, shotmaking abilities of a god, amazing at making adjustments, and almost never picks the wrong shot in any situation. if the wimbledon grass was not so slow now, there is no way that he would have lost this year(nadal probably wouldnt have even made it to the final)

IF he wins a french, ill start talking about him being the best athlete at their respective sport ever.

bc it would be unbelievable considering he has to go through nadal, who, if his career continues on its way, will become the bar none best clay cort player of all time and one of the greatest ever.
 
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