Is Michael Jordan the Greatest Team Sports Athlete of All Time?

[Impuniti]

I don't disagree that Gretzy has a significant gap over his peers, but I'm reluctant to give the nod to a hockey player simply because the global talent pool for the sport is much smaller than that of soccer, basketball, and event baseball to a certain extent. How different would the NHL be if hockey was accessible/affordable to people in all climates and economic backgrounds in the same way other sports are?

I mean, the broad-scale hypothetical NBA talent pool is pretty small because hardly anybody is tall enough. Should we just say it's Pele?

Babe Ruth was a much better pound for pound athlete than Michael Jordan. Also more competitive.

Let's hear your argument for "more competitive than Michael Jordan"...

It's Jordan, 5-6 soccer players, and a few others like Schumi, Federer etc. Absolutely none of these guys are in the radar worldwide regardless of iconic they were in America/Canada.

This topic reminds me of My Big Fat Greek Wedding movie where the Greek chick meets up with her hubby's intelligent parents, and they're dumb as bricks when it comes to anything outside of America.

[AdagioPace]

Lance Armstrong isn't the best cyclist ever, but he definitely wins on fame and cultural impact. Relative to other cyclists Lance is far more famous and impactful than the 2nd most popular cyclist ever, than any other team sport athlete is to the 2nd most popular player in their sport.

just because US media (mainly) talks a lot about a scandal it doesn't mean you had a big cultural impact. Firstly, Armstrong is not talked about anymore outside maybe of the US (it's almost taboo). Cyclists like Merckx, Coppi, Bartali, Anquetil, Hinault, Kelly have had way bigger impact on global cycling that they still get mentioned very often by commentators. Several others like Indurain, Pantani, and of course Contador's/Froome's/Nibali's/Valverde's achievements, are still quite fresh in people's mind. GT climbs and one-day "classic races", are bound to all those names historically.

[In SVG We Trust]

LeBron, Messi or CR7 played in the strongest eras of their sports and all of them get the maximum individual and collective achievements.

[twyzted]

LeBron, Messi or CR7 played in the strongest eras of their sports and all of them get the maximum individual and collective achievements.

Messi and Ronaldo have achived so much more than lebron that its almost insulting to compare him against those two.

[Tomjas]

It’s Bradman and it’s not close

The guy is 30% better than anyone to have played a game played by more than a billion people for 140 years

To put things into context, he would have averaged 60ppg in the NBA for 20 years and won 19 titles

He lifted spirits around the world in the depression

He lifted spirits around the world after WW2

15000 people traveled for hours to watch him practice against scrubs

Seriously?

[In SVG We Trust]

LeBron, Messi or CR7 played in the strongest eras of their sports and all of them get the maximum individual and collective achievements.

Messi and Ronaldo have achived so much more than lebron that its almost insulting to compare him against those two.

Salary Cap

[BigtimeNBAfan]

It’s Bradman and it’s not close

The guy is 30% better than anyone to have played a game played by more than a billion people for 140 years

To put things into context, he would have averaged 60ppg in the NBA for 20 years and won 19 titles

He lifted spirits around the world in the depression

He lifted spirits around the world after WW2

15000 people traveled for hours to watch him practice against scrubs

Seriously?

Yeah maybe we should differentiate between American and international. There are a lot of star athletes elsewhere in the world that nobody in America cares about and vise versa.

[Johnny Bball]

Not even close.

Wayne Gretzky is the greatest. He’s even nicknamed the Great ONe. There is nobody that had a career like that in a team sport and stood out more clearly and holds more unbreakable records than Gretzky.

[jimmy keys]

The gap between Gretzky and every other hockey player is greater than any other GOAT in any other team sport.

Hasek is every bit as great a goalie as Gretzky is a forward and his 98 Olympics is greater than any single Gretzky accomplishment

Roy > Hasek.

[twyzted]

LeBron, Messi or CR7 played in the strongest eras of their sports and all of them get the maximum individual and collective achievements.

Messi and Ronaldo have achived so much more than lebron that its almost insulting to compare him against those two.

Salary Cap

And how is that relevant? He hasent even got any awards for 4 years now? He isint even the most successful of his era. Others have played with salary cap and been more successful than him.
In the last 12 years 1 player other than messi or cr7 has won ballon dor.
They have won 16 domestic league titles.
9 champions league titles.
Broken many records.
Hes not even close to them.

[Rust_Cohle]

Messi doesn't belong in that group.

BS, considering how many of his peers say he is the GOAT he is absolutely in the conversation

[Rust_Cohle]

We talking "athlete" or having the most team success? How on earth is Babe Ruth included?

Federer is the greatest tennis player in history and is still top 3 at the age of 36. He's the most graceful athlete I've ever seen. His has elite level hand eye coordination, lateral movement, anticipation, clutch performance, stamina...and yes some hops. I would put him up there with Gretzky, LeBron, Jordan and over guys like Vince Carter who have incredible vertical games but, but not the soft hands, dribbling etc.

Djokovic and nadal can both make arguments against federer. Strong chance both overtake his GS totals as well.

[Rust_Cohle]

cristiano ronaldo has dominated all 3 different major leagues in europe and has won 2 national trophies with sub-par teammates comparatively to the competition (internationally speaking, not domestically)

along with getting robbed of one ballon d'or

most of those guys on the list i assume played in one system in one league on one team their entire careers

His sub par teammates won a euro final without him, won a nations league final when he played like crap and have gone their last 12 matches that didn’t feature Ronaldo without a loss. Hell, Pepe even in Ronaldo’s eyes was the best euro player in 2016. And you could argue Ronaldo stole a ballon d’or in 2013.

He’s a phenomenal player but he went to Juventus who had won the league 7 years in a row. Madrid only won 2 la ligas in 9 years but their CL campaigns were amazing.

And most people (most of his peers and managers) tend to rate Messi higher overall although Ronaldo’s resume is nothing to scoff at.

[Drakeem]

Except Fed is definitely not the consensus #1 like some of these other players. He has a losing record against his two biggest competitors (Djokovic and Nadal), dominated early in a fairly weak era of Tennis, and doesn't have the supplementary achievements like some of his peers (Golden Masters and season peaks like Novak for example).

His only claim to fame is his Grand Slam wins at the moment, and if it wasn't for COVID, Nadal probably goes to tie him since he's at 19, and Novak is close behind at 17 (Federer has 20). While you can make the argument, it's far from fact, and will probably lean more AWAY from him being the Tennis GOAT than towards it.

But popularity? Probably.

Nadal is the greatest clay court player of all time. 12 of his 19 are the French Open, where's he's basically unbeatable. He can't really be argued as the GOAT. His claim to fame honestly is the 19 Grand Slams and the H2H winning percentage against Federer which isn't really that impressive anymore since Federer has seemingly figured him out and has been beating him more times than not lately (he's won 6 of their last 7 matches).

GOAT is between Federer and Djokovic imo. They're the two most well-rounded players I've ever seen. Djokovic has been more dominant in the last decade, but at the same time, he's younger and came up as Federer aged. I think I would take a peak Federer over a peak Djokovic, but it's splitting hairs.

and yet Federer has only won 1 French open. How is such a well-rounded player who is the GOAT right now only a 1 time French Open Champion?
Winning 7 outside the clay shows that Nadal is well rounded too. Young Nadal beat peak Federer at Wimbledon. I can bet you that Federer will never do that to Nadal at French Open.

Fed may have a French Open title, but he has never beat Nadal in that tournament. He lucked out on Nadal being beaten and took his opportunity. He was so close to never getting that career Grand Slam. Nadal has beaten Fed on his best court, so I think that throws the argument out the window.

Plus, Fed was actively ducking Nadal in tournaments to not have the record even worse, picking and choosing which courts to play on.

[Air Apparent]

cristiano ronaldo has dominated all 3 different major leagues in europe and has won 2 national trophies with sub-par teammates comparatively to the competition (internationally speaking, not domestically)

along with getting robbed of one ballon d'or

most of those guys on the list i assume played in one system in one league on one team their entire careers

His sub par teammates won a euro final without him, won a nations league final when he played like crap and have gone their last 12 matches that didn’t feature Ronaldo without a loss. Hell, Pepe even in Ronaldo’s eyes was the best euro player in 2016. And you could argue Ronaldo stole a ballon d’or in 2013.

He’s a phenomenal player but he went to Juventus who had won the league 7 years in a row. Madrid only won 2 la ligas in 9 years but their CL campaigns were amazing.

And most people (most of his peers and managers) tend to rate Messi higher overall although Ronaldo’s resume is nothing to scoff at.

aite so boom...

they didnt win a euro without him, he carried that team, his teammates willed that final win as underdogs with nothing to lose, that doesn't make them superior teammates lmao, anything can happen in a single game like that with that sort of pressure, its like a game 7, anything can happen (it was a 1-0 scoreline they barely won), of course as a team they were good as a unit, but he was still playing with a bunch of misfits and young players who had no business winning the whole thing, especially against competition like france

the 2nd best player was more likely quaresma (a flop in every major league in europe) or the young kid renato sanches, his team was clearly sub-par

you seriously gonna argue pepe was the best player for portugal in 2016? pepe hasnt been the best player for any team at any stage of his career in his life, ronaldo probably said that in a leadership role or something in the locker room, or being a defensive anchor, since he was the only top tier defender they had

sure you could argue that ronaldo stole one, but i could also argue that messi stole 2-3 in total, 2010 being one of the most blatant of all robberies, he had no business getting that award, and the fact that all 3 top vote-getters were barca players lol, how can u have 3 players in the top3 votes for balon dor on the same team?

thats like jordan playing with the 2nd and 3rd mvp vote-getters in the same season as his own mvp season, that makes no sense and means he probably isn't as goat as everyone props him up to be, messi is a legend but at the end of the day he has always been a system player who benefitted from an offense that produced goal-scoring opportunities at an extremely high rate, david villa his striking partner for those dominant barca teams could've been replaced by antonio di nitale who was, at that same time scoring 28-29 goals a season in serie A for udinese with no help, he would score 40 as well in barca/la liga in that situation if he gets 30 more shots a game inside the box

whereas ronaldo scoring at that high of a clip is more impressive after playing scoring and dominating as a winger most of his career then having to play a different position because of madrids style of play and personnel in comparison. he has played on 4 different teams in different roles and dominated, messi has never been the barca messi outside of barca, aside from the youth argentina team

most Argentinians don't even respect messi higher than maradona, you wanna talk about pepe carrying ronaldo lol, what about di maria actually carrying messi to the wc final, but everyone conveniently falls back to the argument "oh he was creating for others, he was assisting" bla bla

fam, if you score 40-50 goals a season we don't want you to assist, your job is to score hattricks, but manz can't do **** in copa year after year and world cup, in a different situation with some really talented teammates, you probably not THAT legendary then.

everyone acts like he was playing with scrubs while saying ronaldos teammates were good? lool, those teams were good, so messi single-handedly can beat an entire team and lead them to finals but cant do it in the final? messi shouldve been the piece to take them over the top, but there is more than enough evidence by now that he just doesn't know how to function outside of a barca type system, he has horrible positioning and looks completely clueless out there, man literally had to retire temporarily from embarrassment

lol im a serie a fan, juve has won the league mostly because the other teams have been completely depleted and mismanaged, but the past 2 seasons competition is back up with inter and napoli and roma, juve is actually facing threats now, that's the situation ronaldo moved into and joined, he didnt join the same juve as those prior seasons where they were winning easily by like 30 pt leads in the standings

he is literally single-handedly saving many of their games half the time these days, and is still among the top of the league in scoring at his age

you dont have to agree with him being the goat, but people discredit him wayyyyy too much and make excuses for messi's shortcomings like its a joke - and i dont even like hating on messi because he is a legend but sometimes the ronaldo slander gotta make you put things in perspective and play dirty too

it probably stings a little more for messi fans that ronaldo has 2 national trophies at the end of the day with **** teams than Argentina has had with messi with wayyy more opportunities in copa and world cup

ironically the one loss that you could argue for is that all-time great portugal team (led by figo) that lost to greece in the final though he was as just a teenager, but he shouldve won that, he otherwise had a great tournament

though people would discredit that as well for him, you dont wanna give him credit when his team is **** and they win, and you wouldnt have probably given him credit for a possible greece victory too since his team was stacked - as if players like pele didnt have stacked teams winning those world cups, or messi's accolades based on the fact that his teams in barca was stacked with a generational spanish team that won without messi as well



/rant

[lobosloboslobos]

The Oilers won the Stanley Cup 2 years after trading Gretzky, with the same exact core that they had in 88.

yes that is because the Oilers were a team full of all-time greats. but you know what else? the year before that in '87 when Gretzy was traded from that GOAT championship squad to the Los Angeles Kings, a team that finished 18th of 21 teams in the league the year before, he led those Kings to the playoffs where they met his old team the champion Edmonton Oilers, and knocked them out of the playoffs in the first round.

do you have any idea how insane an achievement that was?

[ScotlandRed]

cristiano ronaldo has dominated all 3 different major leagues in europe and has won 2 national trophies with sub-par teammates comparatively to the competition (internationally speaking, not domestically)

along with getting robbed of one ballon d'or

most of those guys on the list i assume played in one system in one league on one team their entire careers

His sub par teammates won a euro final without him, won a nations league final when he played like crap and have gone their last 12 matches that didn’t feature Ronaldo without a loss. Hell, Pepe even in Ronaldo’s eyes was the best euro player in 2016. And you could argue Ronaldo stole a ballon d’or in 2013.

He’s a phenomenal player but he went to Juventus who had won the league 7 years in a row. Madrid only won 2 la ligas in 9 years but their CL campaigns were amazing.

And most people (most of his peers and managers) tend to rate Messi higher overall although Ronaldo’s resume is nothing to scoff at.

Yep. Not sure who the 2 sub par teams are considering a Man Utd were the dominant team in England at the time along with Chelsea. Peak Vidic and Ferdinand, peak Rooney. Scholes and Carrick. Tevez, Berbatov.

[twyzted]

cristiano ronaldo has dominated all 3 different major leagues in europe and has won 2 national trophies with sub-par teammates comparatively to the competition (internationally speaking, not domestically)

along with getting robbed of one ballon d'or

most of those guys on the list i assume played in one system in one league on one team their entire careers

His sub par teammates won a euro final without him, won a nations league final when he played like crap and have gone their last 12 matches that didn’t feature Ronaldo without a loss. Hell, Pepe even in Ronaldo’s eyes was the best euro player in 2016. And you could argue Ronaldo stole a ballon d’or in 2013.

He’s a phenomenal player but he went to Juventus who had won the league 7 years in a row. Madrid only won 2 la ligas in 9 years but their CL campaigns were amazing.

And most people (most of his peers and managers) tend to rate Messi higher overall although Ronaldo’s resume is nothing to scoff at.

aite so boom...

they didnt win a euro without him, he carried that team, his teammates willed that final win as underdogs with nothing to lose, that doesn't make them superior teammates lmao, anything can happen in a single game like that with that sort of pressure, its like a game 7, anything can happen (it was a 1-0 scoreline they barely won), of course as a team they were good as a unit, but he was still playing with a bunch of misfits and young players who had no business winning the whole thing, especially against competition like france

the 2nd best player was more likely quaresma (a flop in every major league in europe) or the young kid renato sanches, his team was clearly sub-par

you seriously gonna argue pepe was the best player for portugal in 2016? pepe hasnt been the best player for any team at any stage of his career in his life, ronaldo probably said that in a leadership role or something in the locker room, or being a defensive anchor, since he was the only top tier defender they had

sure you could argue that ronaldo stole one, but i could also argue that messi stole 2-3 in total, 2010 being one of the most blatant of all robberies, he had no business getting that award, and the fact that all 3 top vote-getters were barca players lol, how can u have 3 players in the top3 votes for balon dor on the same team?

thats like jordan playing with the 2nd and 3rd mvp vote-getters in the same season as his own mvp season, that makes no sense and means he probably isn't as goat as everyone props him up to be, messi is a legend but at the end of the day he has always been a system player who benefitted from an offense that produced goal-scoring opportunities at an extremely high rate, david villa his striking partner for those dominant barca teams could've been replaced by antonio di nitale who was, at that same time scoring 28-29 goals a season in serie A for udinese with no help, he would score 40 as well in barca/la liga in that situation if he gets 30 more shots a game inside the box

whereas ronaldo scoring at that high of a clip is more impressive after playing scoring and dominating as a winger most of his career then having to play a different position because of madrids style of play and personnel in comparison. he has played on 4 different teams in different roles and dominated, messi has never been the barca messi outside of barca, aside from the youth argentina team

most Argentinians don't even respect messi higher than maradona, you wanna talk about pepe carrying ronaldo lol, what about di maria actually carrying messi to the wc final, but everyone conveniently falls back to the argument "oh he was creating for others, he was assisting" bla bla

fam, if you score 40-50 goals a season we don't want you to assist, your job is to score hattricks, but manz can't do **** in copa year after year and world cup, in a different situation with some really talented teammates, you probably not THAT legendary then.

everyone acts like he was playing with scrubs while saying ronaldos teammates were good? lool, those teams were good, so messi single-handedly can beat an entire team and lead them to finals but cant do it in the final? messi shouldve been the piece to take them over the top, but there is more than enough evidence by now that he just doesn't know how to function outside of a barca type system, he has horrible positioning and looks completely clueless out there, man literally had to retire temporarily from embarrassment

lol im a serie a fan, juve has won the league mostly because the other teams have been completely depleted and mismanaged, but the past 2 seasons competition is back up with inter and napoli and roma, juve is actually facing threats now, that's the situation ronaldo moved into and joined, he didnt join the same juve as those prior seasons where they were winning easily by like 30 pt leads in the standings

he is literally single-handedly saving many of their games half the time these days, and is still among the top of the league in scoring at his age

you dont have to agree with him being the goat, but people discredit him wayyyyy too much and make excuses for messi's shortcomings like its a joke - and i dont even like hating on messi because he is a legend but sometimes the ronaldo slander gotta make you put things in perspective and play dirty too

it probably stings a little more for messi fans that ronaldo has 2 national trophies at the end of the day with **** teams than Argentina has had with messi with wayyy more opportunities in copa and world cup

ironically the one loss that you could argue for is that all-time great portugal team (led by figo) that lost to greece in the final though he was as just a teenager, but he shouldve won that, he otherwise had a great tournament

though people would discredit that as well for him, you dont wanna give him credit when his team is **** and they win, and you wouldnt have probably given him credit for a possible greece victory too since his team was stacked - as if players like pele didnt have stacked teams winning those world cups, or messi's accolades based on the fact that his teams in barca was stacked with a generational spanish team that won without messi as well



/rant

Great post!
Now im as much of a messi stan as i am a jordan stan. Im not a man utd or real fan.
But i cant disagree with anything you said. Portugal played my country in the first game of the euros and the match ended in a draw 1-1, we then beat england in last 16 and played france in the next game and they destroyed us 5-2.
And when i saw that they would meet portugal in the finals ez win for france i thought and when ronaldo had to leave the game it was over no chance but somehow they made it to extra time and then when that eder dude scored my jaw dropped it wasent pretty but they won and ronaldo was head and shoulder over the other portugal players.
And what ronaldo did to atletico in last years cl was EPIC, where i again thought that ronaldo was beaten and my team did not have to meat him again in the cl. Like in the finals the year before.
As a messi stan i cant say that ronaldo is better but at the same time i cant put messi over ronaldo. Im just grateful that those two where playing at the same time that does not happen often
Sorry for rant

[ScotlandRed]

cristiano ronaldo has dominated all 3 different major leagues in europe and has won 2 national trophies with sub-par teammates comparatively to the competition (internationally speaking, not domestically)

along with getting robbed of one ballon d'or

most of those guys on the list i assume played in one system in one league on one team their entire careers

His sub par teammates won a euro final without him, won a nations league final when he played like crap and have gone their last 12 matches that didn’t feature Ronaldo without a loss. Hell, Pepe even in Ronaldo’s eyes was the best euro player in 2016. And you could argue Ronaldo stole a ballon d’or in 2013.

He’s a phenomenal player but he went to Juventus who had won the league 7 years in a row. Madrid only won 2 la ligas in 9 years but their CL campaigns were amazing.

And most people (most of his peers and managers) tend to rate Messi higher overall although Ronaldo’s resume is nothing to scoff at.

aite so boom...

they didnt win a euro without him, he carried that team, his teammates willed that final win as underdogs with nothing to lose, that doesn't make them superior teammates lmao, anything can happen in a single game like that with that sort of pressure, its like a game 7, anything can happen (it was a 1-0 scoreline they barely won), of course as a team they were good as a unit, but he was still playing with a bunch of misfits and young players who had no business winning the whole thing, especially against competition like france

the 2nd best player was more likely quaresma (a flop in every major league in europe) or the young kid renato sanches, his team was clearly sub-par

you seriously gonna argue pepe was the best player for portugal in 2016? pepe hasnt been the best player for any team at any stage of his career in his life, ronaldo probably said that in a leadership role or something in the locker room, or being a defensive anchor, since he was the only top tier defender they had

sure you could argue that ronaldo stole one, but i could also argue that messi stole 2-3 in total, 2010 being one of the most blatant of all robberies, he had no business getting that award, and the fact that all 3 top vote-getters were barca players lol, how can u have 3 players in the top3 votes for balon dor on the same team?

thats like jordan playing with the 2nd and 3rd mvp vote-getters in the same season as his own mvp season, that makes no sense and means he probably isn't as goat as everyone props him up to be, messi is a legend but at the end of the day he has always been a system player who benefitted from an offense that produced goal-scoring opportunities at an extremely high rate, david villa his striking partner for those dominant barca teams could've been replaced by antonio di nitale who was, at that same time scoring 28-29 goals a season in serie A for udinese with no help, he would score 40 as well in barca/la liga in that situation if he gets 30 more shots a game inside the box

whereas ronaldo scoring at that high of a clip is more impressive after playing scoring and dominating as a winger most of his career then having to play a different position because of madrids style of play and personnel in comparison. he has played on 4 different teams in different roles and dominated, messi has never been the barca messi outside of barca, aside from the youth argentina team

most Argentinians don't even respect messi higher than maradona, you wanna talk about pepe carrying ronaldo lol, what about di maria actually carrying messi to the wc final, but everyone conveniently falls back to the argument "oh he was creating for others, he was assisting" bla bla

fam, if you score 40-50 goals a season we don't want you to assist, your job is to score hattricks, but manz can't do **** in copa year after year and world cup, in a different situation with some really talented teammates, you probably not THAT legendary then.

everyone acts like he was playing with scrubs while saying ronaldos teammates were good? lool, those teams were good, so messi single-handedly can beat an entire team and lead them to finals but cant do it in the final? messi shouldve been the piece to take them over the top, but there is more than enough evidence by now that he just doesn't know how to function outside of a barca type system, he has horrible positioning and looks completely clueless out there, man literally had to retire temporarily from embarrassment

lol im a serie a fan, juve has won the league mostly because the other teams have been completely depleted and mismanaged, but the past 2 seasons competition is back up with inter and napoli and roma, juve is actually facing threats now, that's the situation ronaldo moved into and joined, he didnt join the same juve as those prior seasons where they were winning easily by like 30 pt leads in the standings

he is literally single-handedly saving many of their games half the time these days, and is still among the top of the league in scoring at his age

you dont have to agree with him being the goat, but people discredit him wayyyyy too much and make excuses for messi's shortcomings like its a joke - and i dont even like hating on messi because he is a legend but sometimes the ronaldo slander gotta make you put things in perspective and play dirty too

it probably stings a little more for messi fans that ronaldo has 2 national trophies at the end of the day with **** teams than Argentina has had with messi with wayyy more opportunities in copa and world cup

ironically the one loss that you could argue for is that all-time great portugal team (led by figo) that lost to greece in the final though he was as just a teenager, but he shouldve won that, he otherwise had a great tournament

though people would discredit that as well for him, you dont wanna give him credit when his team is **** and they win, and you wouldnt have probably given him credit for a possible greece victory too since his team was stacked - as if players like pele didnt have stacked teams winning those world cups, or messi's accolades based on the fact that his teams in barca was stacked with a generational spanish team that won without messi as well



/rant

The whole of this argument is just so stupid I don’t know where to start. Saying Messi is a systematic player is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Messi has scored and incredible amount of goals as a winger, a false 9, a CAM and even played a general CM role as shown by heat maps. Still top scorer in Europe.

For the past 5/6 years Ronaldo goal scoring has maintained but all round game has decreased. He’s not as quick and isn’t as gifted as messi in terms of footwork balance and body movement to continue to dribble past players. He’s been morphed into a winger/striker who stands about a lot.

Strange how Di Maria carried Messi to WC final yet Messi won player of the tournament. Not sure how your argument holds up there.

[BladeDaywalker]

The two athletes who should be at the top unquestionably are:

1. Don Bradman- Cricket

2. Wayne Gretzky- Hockey

Who care if Messi, Ronaldo, Jordan, etc. might have been more famous or had a greater cultural impact?

Bradman and Gretzky's dominance in their respective sports in unparalleled.