Who coulda been the best decathlete ever?

[parkerrclay]

History has given us some great decathletes...Jim Thorpe, Rafer Johnson, Dan O'Brien, Daley Thompson, Bob Mathias, Heino Lipp etc. Several great athletes excelled in the decathlon before trying other sports/events...Valery Brumel, Bo Jackson, Jim Brown, etc. Others never even tried it...Sergey Bubka, Michael Vick, Wilt Chamberlain, to name a few.

Assuming every great athlete would have trained and competed in the decathlon, who would be the greatest ever at this event?

[Per Andersen]

Injury free? It's always Rafer Johnson!

[CookyMonzta]

Re: Who coulda been the best decathlete ever?

History has given us some great decathletes...Jim Thorpe, Rafer Johnson, Dan O'Brien, Daley Thompson, Bob Mathias, Heino Lipp etc. Several great athletes excelled in the decathlon before trying other sports/events...Valery Brumel, Bo Jackson, Jim Brown, etc. Others never even tried it...Sergey Bubka, Michael Vick, Wilt Chamberlain, to name a few.

Assuming every great athlete would have trained and competed in the decathlon, who would be the greatest ever at this event?

Roger Kingdom! They say he did everything under the sun (including a 7-foot HJ and 25-foot LJ), except the pole vault and javelin.

[bambam]

Per Andersen may be right with Rafer Johnson. I would say its either him or Jim Thorpe. I don't think any of the non-decathlete pretenders (Jim Brown, Bo Jackson, etc.) could have beaten either of them in the decathlon, even if they concentrated on it. They were both athletic freaks.

[tafnut]

Junior Seau!!

[bekeselassie]

If he wanted to be - Jesus!

[skyin' brian]

ABE LINCOLN!!

[paulthefan]

Ill rate them:

1) J. Thorpe
2) R. Johnson

as good as the numbers are on some of these later guys I just dont see them measuring up to these two in head to head competition.

[bekeselassie]

ABE LINCOLN!!

Could he even lift the shot?

[paulthefan]

Abe was a physically impressive speciment... I think Skyn Brian is on to something..

[eldrick]

i know this is slightly off-topic , but how on earth anyone can look elsewhere than dan-the-man ?!

the man used to score 8800 points after jogging the 1500 !

[paulthefan]

one word Eldrick... one word .. Thorpe!

[Double R Bar]

I always wondered about Wilt Chamberlain, but I guess he was too tall for the vault and I'm sure his 1,500 wouldn't be fast enough. He was a good prospect though.

[jhc68]

It's pretty tough to imagine that anyone could have been better than the guys who actually dominated the event over the past half-century: Mathias, Campbell, Rafer J., O'Brien, Thompson.

Other great athletes might be great in our imaginations. IMHO Jim Brown and Wilt are often over-rated in terms of their potentials... too much mythology associated with their exploits. Truly world class track specialists are more interesting: Kingdom and Brumel have been mentioned. Seems like these guys had the physical attributes to have done it all.

[eldrick]

one word Eldrick... one word .. Thorpe!

no disrespect paulie, but that was in an archaelogical era !

i give dues to modern age & if in my expected lifetime of ( hopefully ) another few decades, if another decathalete comes along better than dan-the-man, i will be shocked !

at his peak, he coud score just about any score he needed to, to win - if he was up against an 8900 point guy, he wouda gone 8950, if he'd been up against a 9000 guy, he wouda gone 9050 & if he'd been up against a 9100 guy, he wouda gone 9150

can anyone seriously put their hand on their heart & say they saw a "better" decathlete than the man in their lives ?