Myself and several of the guys were discussing this at work tonight and some pretty interesting names came up...

Who do you think are some of the most overrated athletes of all time? All major sports count (football, basketball, baseball, hockey, etc. etc.)

*Note: OUR discussion was limited to how good people perceive a pro player to be vs what his stats actually are; NOT how good a player was SUPPOSED to be coming out of college/high school and then tanked. That would be more overhyped than anything.

The two names that suprised me that came up from about 4 different people at my job were Brett Favre and "Broadway" Joe Namath. Favre because of several seasons of leading the league in INT's and several less than stellar seasons. He is widely considered by experts to be one of the "better" QB's of all-time, but there are many many QB's who have overall better stats who will never sniff the HOF, while Favre is a virtual lock for the HOF.
Namath suprised me, but seemed logical after I listened because I didn't know that he actually had more career INT's than TD's in the NFL. Basically everyone remembers him so fondly, and his career was built on his "guarantee" that the Jets would beat the Baltimore Colts in superbowl...which they did, and Namath played well in that GAME. But his overall career was VERY average and he is already in the HOF.

Lets here some more, from other sports. Discuss!

And before anyone says anything, i put this on this forum and not the pro sports forum because this forum gets way more discussion.

I tend to agree with the Namath pick, everyone just remembers him for the one game, a game in which he played extremely average. Didn't do much the rest of his career either.

A lot of guys could probably fit in here, including many big names, but you have to realize that they get hyped up for other reasons than just stats. An example, Allen Iverson. When you look at the numbers, he probably wasn't as good as many made him out to be--but he got huge props for toughness and the do or die attitude. So you have to remember WHY some of these guys are hyped up as well.

As far as Favre, I think he's a good example of what I'm talking about. The INT's don't do a thing to my thinking of the man, because it isn't perceived that he's not going to throw them. But the man has had incredible success even while turning the ball over--he was good enough to make plays that make the majority of his mistakes forgivable.

Namath is an excellent pick. I've never found a way to intelligently rank him in the top-25 listing of QBs all-time.

Archie Manning is the only guy who's ever gotten a pass for "Oh, if only he'd played on good teams". Tobin Rote was five times the QB that Manning was and actually did something on good teams (like being the best playoff QB in history).

Bob Griese is another. In two Super Bowls he threw a combined 13 passes and somehow ends up in Canton. (That's not the only strike on him, but he has a very small body of work).

Troy Aikman is still another. I've been saying for years that if you flip Steve Young and Troy Aikman, the Cowboys could have gone five or six years without losing a game.

Doesn't mean Aikman wasn't still good, though I agree Young was better. I absolutely don't think Aikman is overrated, I think he pretty much gets the right amount of credit.

Only thing that comes to mind is Allen Iverson. Dude, straight up blows.

I think that pound for pound, Iverson is one of the premier basketball players around. I just don't think that having him in the club house is a positive thing for the other players or the team in general.

I think the biggest knock on Iverson is that he is a career 42.5% FG shooter and a lot of people call him a great scorer. He certainly was a good scorer in his time, but I'm not sure that number qualifies you as great. But people have to remember, he gets a lot of his hype because he's 6'0. So is he really overrated when a good part of his hype isn't stat based?

Swamp Fox wrote: I think that pound for pound, Iverson is one of the premier basketball players around. I just don't think that having him in the club house is a positive thing for the other players or the team in general.

Career 42.5% FG. That's below league average by a lot, he's junk. I don't care how tall he is, he's one of the most garbage athletes of all time. His me first, team second, attitude doesn't help either.

There is only ONE pro athlete able to carry this title... Ryan Leaf.

sleeper wrote:

Swamp Fox wrote: I think that pound for pound, Iverson is one of the premier basketball players around. I just don't think that having him in the club house is a positive thing for the other players or the team in general.

Career 42.5% FG. That's below league average by a lot, he's junk. I don't care how tall he is, he's one of the most garbage athletes of all time. His me first, team second, attitude doesn't help either.

His me first, team second attitude this is the only reason you're saying that. Just like his size and toughness is the only reason they blow up the hype about him.

I agree AI is overrated by quite a bit of people, but he was still a very good player.

Dirk Nowitzki is another guy who is vastly overrated by a lot of people.. I remember hearing people say he could be/was better than Larry Bird...

Yeah.... NO!

LTrain23 wrote:

Dirk Nowitzki is another guy who is vastly overrated by a lot of people.. I remember hearing people say he could be/was better than Larry Bird...

Yeah.... NO!

I'd take Dirk over Bird. What is Dirk, like four inches taller then Bird?


Over rated= Karl Malone.

I still stand by my feelings on Jim Brown being overrated, although that's not a popular opinion in these parts.

said_aouita wrote:
I'd take Dirk over Bird. What is Dirk, like four inches taller then Bird?

WOW...any credibility you may have had is now gone. Dirk over BIRD??!!

Larry Legend is one of the top 5-10 players of all time. Even the best of the best will tell you that.

Scottie Pippen. Take Jordan away from him and he is average at best. Didn't he make the top 50 of all time list? Does he do that without Jordan?

Emmitt Smith

Before someone can be considered overrated we have to know what they were rated.

What were Joe Nameth and Allen Iverson rated?

What was Jim brown rated?

Con_Alma wrote: Before someone can be considered overrated we have to know what they were rated.

What were Joe Nameth and Allen Iverson rated?

What was Jim brown rated?

He said in the original post that it's based on how they're perceived. All of the above are certainly "rated".

Got to define how they're perceived. That's kind of subjective and based on opinion. Can it be wrong if it's not factual?

Joe Willy "called his shot". That can be perceived as a great part of his resume'. Jim Brown put up huge numbers...but he was also quite a bit bigger than your average back in the day.

Perception is a huge part of the discussion, and there's no wrong answer.

Con_Alma wrote: Got to define how they're perceived. That's kind of subjective and based on opinion. Can it be wrong if it's not factual?

It's not a science, just use common sense--aka use your brain. A lot of people consider Jim Brown the GOAT.

I mean, there are a lot of variables, that's why it's a hard discussion. MANY discussions in sports are pretty subjective because they all include too many variables to provide a real, concrete answer.

To the question of where Namath is rated:

The Sporting News Top 100 Football Players of all-time ranks Namath in the top 100 and has him slotted as #17 among quarterbacks.

The Sporting News Top 50 Quarterbacks has him 25th.

NFL Films has him 19th among quarterbacks.

Someone named Lazenby wrote a book on the top 100 quarterbacks, with Namath being 20th.

Riddell had a book written on quarterbacks, which included Namath ranked 17th.

I'll throw another name out there: George Blanda. He was a below-average starter with Chicago and lasted basically two years in that position. He got another shot with the AFL and put up his best numbers during the first two years of the league (when the caliber of play was below the CFL). When the AFL improved, he threw an unbelievable number of interceptions and produced much less offense. Basically, he was a more turnover-prone version of Drew Bledsoe. During the 1962 season, he threw 42 interceptions in a 14-game season, then followed that with 5 more in the title game, which Houston lost 20-17 in overtime.

Anything that puts him in the top-50 is being overly generous, but he's in the Hall of Fame and is usually ranked in the top-25 quarterbacks.

Terry Bradshaw

His interception to TD ratio was 1:1 and his completion % was 51%.

He was a winner, but his stats didn't show it.