Originally posted by tomdavis80
There is one problem with this perception, one is the insistence to stay with the past greats as the greatest of all time, rather than recognizing that different eras change and as cycling opens up as a sport, there will be more talent and more possibility of very powerful potential cyclists much in the mold of Lance but perhaps better than he is.
Other sports have had this issue with greatest player of all time, one sport that has this issue is comparing Babe Ruth with the powerful hitters we have today. To be honest, in comparing the two, the powerful hitters we have today are going to be much more refined and much more talented in terms of eye-hand coordination, power, speed, and such due to an expanding talent pool. This sort of talent pool didn't exist so much in the 1920s and 1930s in baseball because of the exclusion of minority and international talent. If you can see my point with how this relates to cycling, as the talent pool of cycling increases so will the ferocity of the competition and the strength of the cyclists that once every 20 years or so, there definitely will come along a champion much in the mold of Lance and Eddy Merckx. The defining line of champ and chump in cycling is very thin when comparing talent but has much more to do with the mental makeup of the person: the desire to dominate.
If you look at every great champion in any sport in the past 50 years, there is that consistent appearance of the mental aspect. Basketball? Michael Jordan. Baseball? Ted Williams and Barry Bonds. Track? Carl Lewis. Wrestling? Dan Gable (Legend at Iowa State, only one to have won 3 national champs in weight class and be undefeated) All of them had that mental aspect, that uncanny ability to focus on the one thing that they wanted most, to dominate.
Thomas Davis
Your debate has many faults. First off, mentioning a known drug user like Carl Lewis.
Second Ruth can not be compared to hitters now. One season he had more HRs that most teams. The pitchers were weaker. Ballparks not as big, etc.. He was well ahead of his time. Lance is not. Lance has not done anything that was not already accomplished.
Lance is a good TDF rider and that is about it....
Memph