Why Michael Jordan is the Greatest Athlete Ever

Many athletes have and current do dominate their sports. Who can forget Babe Ruth in baseball or the way Barry Sanders dominated the NFL a few years back? In Golf right now there is Tiger Woods. In baseball currently Barry Bonds still seems to dominate despite being plagued with the steroids scandal. But no one athlete dominated his sport at such a high degree for such a long period of time as Michael Jordan.

Jordan holds a huge number of NBA Records and has won numerous awards including but not limited to the following:

Rookie of the Year:1985
All NBA First Defensive Team Selections: 9 (NBA Record)
All NBA First Team Selections: 10
Defensive Player of the Year: 1998
NBA Scoring Titles: 10 (7 Consecutively)
NBA Finals MVP: 6
NBA Regular Season MVP: 5
Number of NBA Championships Won: 6
Career Points Per Game Average: 30.1 (1st in NBA History)

Of course Jordan isn’t just the best athlete ever simply because of how impressive his stats were…it was how impressive his stats were for how long. Michael Jordan came into the league in 1984 and aside from two retirement games did not leave the game until 2003. Over the course of that time Jordan started in over one thousand NBA games and averaged 30.1 points per game, 6.2 rebounds, and 5.3 assists per game.

Now any very gifted basketball player can win a scoring title but how many can hold it ten times and for seven consecutive seasons? As of right now no one but Jordan. He also did it on both sides of the ball finishing his career second in NBA history in steals. Longevity is the key. Jordan may have retired twice but he was able to play into his forties at an all star level. And unlike a sport like baseball, in basketball it is very difficult to play if you have bad knees (i.e. Bonds in baseball).

What is also indicative of his athletic ability is the fact that he was able to have a minor league baseball career after retiring from basketball for the first time. Many people criticize Jordan for this and say that this shows that he isn’t as good of an athlete. They say that if he was so good he’d would have been playing in the majors for the Chicago White Sox instead of in the minors for the Birmingham Barons. I would offer a different opinion. Yes he only batted around .200 in minor league ball but take any established athlete from any sport in their thirties who have played no organized professional baseball and put a glove on them and see how they do. The bottom line is that they won’t do very well at all. If Jordan wanted to play baseball or any other sport in his life professionally and got the chance to do it then I respect him for trying to follow his dream.

Is there any athlete right now who can challenge Michael Jordan as the greatest athlete of all time? Its doubtful. Currently, Tiger Woods would seem to be seem to be the closest. But what must be remembered about him is that his competition is much less than what Jordan faced. Is there any serious rivals for Tiger like Bird or Magic were for Jordan? Not really anymore. Most of Tiger’s competition are much older and in not nearly the greatest of physical shape. Golf involves some physical attributes but not nearly as much as basketball. It is much harder in basketball to be a great player at forty than it is in golf. In the here and now Michael Jordan is the greatest athlete of all time