We can argue about the greatest athlete ever, but unless you said Jim Thorpe, you’d be wrong.
Jim Thorpe was simply the best. Whatever he saw you do, he could do better. And he did. In 1912 he went to the Olympics in Sweden and won. The King of Sweden handed him his gold medals and told him that he was the greatest athlete ever. Humble Jim Thorpe said, “Thanks, King.”
Before one day of racing he reached into his bag and his shoes were missing. Depending on the source, it may have been just one, maybe both. Someone found one (or two) shoes in the trash can. The shoes he wore didn’t match. One was too big so he wore an extra sock. He won. With mismatched, incorrectly sized shoes. Jim Thorpe didn’t just beat the competition (no one ran faster than him until 1948—we had to fight 2 world wars before anyone could do it faster), he beat the competition in someone else’s shoes.
Then, in 1913, it came out that Jim had played semi-professional baseball. Semi. Not full on, semi. In a sport that was not an Olympic sport at the time. Jim had played for the sake of playing not the money, but the Olympic committee striped his medals because he was not an amateur but a semi-professional.
This error was not corrected until nearly 30 years after Jim’s death.
Thirty years. Semi-pro baseball. Greatest Athlete Ever.
Fast forward. US Olympic basketball team in 2024 has made $4.7 Billion. And “won” a gold medal in the sport that pays them so well.
I hope every one of them chipped a tooth when they posed for the picture on the medal stand.