G.O.A.T.s in miscellaneous sports

[Peter_Spaeth]

Here are a few. some of these are easy some very debatable.
Wrestling (the real kind): Karelin.
Swimming: Phelps.
Women's swimming: Ledecky.
Track and Field: Lewis.
Women's Track and Field: Joyner-Kersee.
Skiing: Bode Miller.
Women's Skiing: Vonn.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Figure Skating: Scott Hamilton
Women's Figure Skating: Yamaguchi
F1: Lewis Hamlton
Nascar: Petty

[Michael B]

Peter,

You will need to look for new cards in figure skating. Hamilton and Yamaguchi cannot hold an ice cube to some of the greatest figure skaters of all time:

Males

All time

Gillis Graström of Sweden - 3 gold and one silver in the Olympics, 3 golds World Championships (1920-1932). He is technically the first person to win a gold medal in the Winter and Summer Olympics. Figure skating was held during the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp. The first Winter Olympics were 4 years later in Chamonix, France.

Modern

Yevgeny Plyushchenko - 2 golds and 2 silvers in the Olympics. One of the golds was Team Mixed skating in 2014. At the World Championships - 3 gold 1 silver, one bronze.

Females

Sonja Henie - 3 Olympic gold World Championships - 10 golds 1 silver

Irina Rodnina (pairs skater) - 3 Olympic gold World Championships - 10 gold
She won her first Olympic gold and 4 World golds with Aleksey Ulanov. He became romantically involved with another skater. Rodnina switched partners to Aleksandr Zaytsev, whom she married in 1975. Together they never lost a competition - 2 Olympic golds, 6 World Championships and 7 European Championships.

Grafström is in the Zeenut UV light set and Idrottsbladets Bildgalleri (Swedish set sort of like the Reemstma set). Also on some postage stamps.

Henie is in the 'Greatest Olympians" set, Sportscaster, SI for Kids, 3M Innovators, Reemstma (aka Sammelwerk, aka Olympia) and others.

Plyushchenko (Plushenko) is in the 2020 Euroset year in sport set card #16.

Rodnina is in Sportscaster, Brooke Bond, Soviet World of Sport, Zeenut UV light. I believe she is on one of the Soviet Heroes of Sport postcards issued after the Olympics. She is also on a few postage stamps.

For the greatest female Olympian there are a number of cards of Larisa Latynina - Brooke Bond among others. In tennis there are a number of Margaret Court cards. More grand slam singles titles and total titles than Serena Williams.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Latynina and Court rookie cards.

[D. Bergin]

Sonja Henie has a lot of contemporary cards out there that can be had for a song.

Just like the bigger sports, I like to separate the modern greats from the earlier or pioneer greats and break them up into distinct era's, simply because it's unfair to me to compare athletes from different era's.

2 of my favorites in the tennis world are Helen Wills Moody and Bill Tilden. Both were absolutely dominant for a decent length of time.

Compared to the modern great tennis players, and considering they were the benchmarks of their era, their cards/photos/memorabilia can be had pretty inexpensively.

[steve B]

Eddy Merckx would fit a collection like that, Sportscaster card, plus some European issues.

Most of the greats before him have the occasional card.

Sadly, I don't think the greatest female cyclists have any cards, let alone ones done during their careers.

Art Arfons or Craig Breedlove - both have a few cards.
Malcolm Campbell or Henry Seagrave- Same, but fewer I think.

Steve McKinney(Speed Skiing) - Not sure there are any cards at all. There may be a handful for the entire sport, but I haven't checked all that much.


The lack of cards for some sports makes me wonder if the might not be a market for a set or sets of cards from those sports.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Michael B

Peter,

You will need to look for new cards in figure skating. Hamilton and Yamaguchi cannot hold an ice cube to some of the greatest figure skaters of all time:

Males

All time

Gillis Graström of Sweden - 3 gold and one silver in the Olympics, 3 golds World Championships (1920-1932). He is technically the first person to win a gold medal in the Winter and Summer Olympics. Figure skating was held during the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp. The first Winter Olympics were 4 years later in Chamonix, France.
.

I picked up this one (with Karl Schafer, also a great champion in the day).

[steve B]

I almost think you'd have to split the figure skating into pre and post compulsory figures.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by steve B

I almost think you'd have to split the figure skating into pre and post compulsory figures.

I believe it wasn't until 1990 they were eliminated from competition, so even skaters you would think of as fairly modern like Witt had to do them.

[blankcheque1914]

Perhaps not the greatest single jockey of all time but certainly the GOAT female jockey.