What Is The Greatest Sporting Feat or Moment?
 

so what is the greatest sporting Feat or Moment?

it could be anything and not necesarily a world record. just an astonishing event that stands out in your mind. it could be a world record, it could be a knockout, it could be a moment, a team sport win, or a streak.

For me it would have to be Bob Beamons long jump in mexico city. it changed the sport and stood for 23 years.

share your greatest moments.

well the moment that I will always remember for the rest of my life is watching Boston win the title in '04. All the pain of previous years gone..

Gretzky beats Howe's record of 1,850 career points
 

This is going to vary depending on our favourite sports, of course, and I think that's great.

Growing up in Canada in the '80s, it was hard for a kid not to be awed by NHL hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, who would become known as the Great One. I even had a Wayne Gretzky lunch pail.

Anyway, he played a game where, in one season, scoring 20 to 30 goals makes you a "goal scorer," 50 goals makes you a "sharpshooter," and 100 points makes you a top player in the league. Gretzky, in his best years, scored 92 goals in one season and 215 points (52 goals, 163 assists) in another. Yet, even after such record-breaking feats, he still had one milestone ahead of him: legend (and Gretzky's idol) Gordie Howe's long-standing record of 1,850 total career points.

Well, it didn't take him long. He managed to break Howe's record in about 1/3 of the time (and against his former team, the Edmonton Oilers), and would go on to score more than 1,000 more in his career. It will be a long time before many of Gretzky's records are broken...if they ever will be--they are that astounding.

Wayne Gretzky's Record-breaking 1,851st Career Point
Los Angeles Kings vs. Edmonton Oilers
October 15, 1990

That ski jumper crashing off the ramp at the intro to "Wide World of Sport" - you know, "the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat ... CRASH!".

That guy is a god.

i think its great that we're getting different sports here.

gucci - for the dummies like me..the only boston team i know is the celtics..and i know the celtics didnt win the NBA in '04.

care to elaborate mate?

i am not a particularly avid sports fan generally, but there are three moments i remember:

france beating brazil 3-0 in the 1998 world cup finals.

the red sox world series win in 04.

but for some reason, the new england patriots winning their first super bowl is a particularly strong memory. i remember watching the game in a shitty sports bar in philadelphia on a wall of monitors and thinking i never thought i would see this, that it was the most implausible thing i had experienced sports-wise. for years, in us football, there was bad, there was really bad and there was the patriots. the only football game i have been to featured the patriots against the houston oilers during the babe parelli period, and even though i was at the time a little kid, i knew i was watching a game that was almost unimaginably bad that day.

now that i think about it, the red sox had more impact on me, even though i remember it less well---after they won a world series, it seemed like the map of sports i had carried around in my head the whole of my life had been messed up. the red sox existed to break your heart. that is what they did. you learned certain things from this--like nothing that happened before the all star break meant anything because afterward, the red sox would start to implode. and even if the sox made it into the playoffs, you knew--you just knew--that something was going to go horribly wrong and that the sox would loose. nothing sums all this up better than buckner's ground ball.

after the sox actually won, i didn't watch sports at all for a couple years. nothing made sense any more.

I'm going to have to narrow it down from a few choices.

They are:

1) Richard Petty's 200 NASCAR wins.
2) Wilt Chamberlain scoring 100 points in an NBA game.
3) Tom Brady throwing 50 touchdown passes in 2007.
4) Cal Ripken's "iron man" streak of playing 2632 consecutive games.

Baseball, our Aussie friend :)

The Red Sox winning their first championship in 86 years.

That's not my memory, though :lol:

I didn't see it when it happened, but I watch it a lot and still get teared up-Dale Earnhart, Sr.'s first and only win of the Daytona 500 in 1998.
Even the announcer choked up as he stated that every man from every team came out to congratulate Dale on his victory.
Three years later he would die at the same track.

I wouldn't call it the greatest, but there is one memory that definitely sticks out as a contender: South Africa beating Australia in the greatest one-day cricket game ever.

Australia scored a mammoth 434 for the loss of only 4 wickets. At the end of their innings I was stunned - I couldn't believe so many runs could be scored in only 50 overs. I was sure it'd be a case of SA coming out blazing but fizzling out with a middle order collapse. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Come out blazing they did, but with a determination that gave me hope. I knew it was a longshot, but just the thought that they might actually get there kept me glued to the screen.

Long story short, we won in amazing fashion. Herschelle Gibbs scored an amazing 175 and Mark Boucher hit the winning runs off Brett Lee to the roar of the crowds (as well as those at my house).

438 for 9...in a one-day. I still can't believe it.

I don't know much about cricket. How many runs are normally scored by a team in the typical game?

Phelps winning all 8 medals was pretty big.

i remember that match quite clearly. if you can chase a huge total like that, you deserve to win. it would have been an honour just being a part of that game.

the average number of runs ranges from about 180 up to 300 runs.

remembering that 1 over is 6 balls. times that by 50 overs=300 balls per match.

which meant that they were scoring on average more than a run per ball which is crazy. i still cant believe it..438... people dont score that in a test match over 5 days.

dj - thanks mate. i know next to nothing about baseball. i can tell you a bit about cricket though :D

Well, in the context of the Australia vs SA game...

The Aussies first innings score was a massive world record, the previous being 398 by Sri Lanka against Kenya (a non test playing nation)

So basically the Australian batsman decimated the previous world record and scored almost 40 more runs than any other team had done in a ODI, and then the South Africans came out and scored even more. Not a great day to be a bowler! I remember the bbc report at the time describing the crowd as "delirious" by the end!

___

For me its hard to choose, but because its so fresh in the memory I think I'll have to say Usain Bolt's 3 Golds and 3 WR's.

The 100 was just phenomonal, and the relay was incredible and a fantastic moment for Safa as well, but the 200 was the best for me - especially as the American legend Johnson has been saying all over the TV that Bolt couldnt beat his record this time at least... I can still remember at the end the commentator just gibbering about the fact that he had broken the WR into a headwind, and then remembering he was supposed to actually be calling the places but didnt know, and saying "I'm sorry, I have no idea who finished second or third..."

The time i set a track record in the 400m hurdles at a small college in Wisconsin. I can't remember if it was St. Norbert's or Ripon. Somewhere around there.

Whitewater HS's game-winning TD drive with 1:45 on the clock in the 1980 state playoffs. Maybe it was 1981. It was the best football game i've ever seen.

I don't want to encourage what is a theatre of cruelty, but the Tour de France deserves mention. The riders need drugs to just to get through a stage, and just to finish is really quite remarkable.

And wile it may not involve any sporting skill, for pure class - you wont see much classier than Mo Cheeks helping out the young girl who forget the words to the national anthem. Im not even American and it gives me goosebumps.

You can find it in Youtube easily enough if you search "mo cheeks anthem" but I probably cant post it on here because the singer is just a kid.

Just the opposite here :p

Interesting, considering that the two sports come from the same lineage.

+1

Wow, this one is kinda tough.

I guess I don't really have a single moment but a few.

Watching Joe Carter's walk off HR in the World Series.

Terrell Owens dropping all those balls against GB in the playoffs then making that grab at the end between all those defenders and getting sammiched and nor dropping the ball.

Young to Rice in the Superbowl, third play of the game TD. Rice had 3 that day and SF rolled SD.

I could probably sit here and think of a ton, but those have to be my three most vivid that I actually watched happen.

I'll stick to things I actually saw:

Secretariat beating the field by 31 lengths at the Belmont to win the Triple Crown. It's my first sporting memory and I remember laughing like a drain watching Big Red whip everyone else.

Liverpool coming back from 3 goals down to AC Milan in the 2005 Champions League final to win in extra time. Maybe the best football/soccer comeback ever.

Jack Nicklaus winning his 6th Masters in 1986 at the age of 46 and well past his prime. You got chills listening to the roar of the crowd.

Tiger winning the US Open last year on a busted leg.

Tiger beating the field by 15 strokes at Pebble to win the US Open a few years ago. Maybe the most complete sporting performance ever.

Usain Bolt at this summer's Olympics setting 3 world records and winning 3 golds in spectacular fashion.

The US beating the USSR in the Miracle in Ice at the 1980 Winter Olympics.

The USSR beating Canada 8-1 at the Montreal Forum in the 1981 Canada Cup Final. I was at the that game - we had Gretzky, Lafleur, Bossy, a team full of Hall of Famers and got utterly and completely smoked.

The Montreal Canadiens vs Red Army New Year's Eve 1975. Maybe the best hockey game ever. 3-3 was the final score and if you're new to hockey and want to see a great game, look this one up. Fantastic stuff.

Oh, and for dlish - the 2003 Rugby World Cup Final and the drop goal winner by Johnny Wilkinson. You gotta love that one.

:)

couldnt help yourself could ya....

i dont remember it..at all. its too painful to remember!

golf - tiger woods winning his first masters with a massive 18 under, at the age of 21.

boxing (best)- ali vs foreman - rumble in the jungle
boxing (worst) - tyson vs holyfield - ear biting incident

swimming - US medley? relay team pipping the french at the post to keep phelps dreams alive of winning 8 gold in a single olympics

basketball - chicago bulls three-peat

rugby league - benny elias hitting the crossbar with the fieldgoal that would have won the Balmain Tigers the premiership

australian football - tony lockett kicking a goal after the buzzer to get the sydney swans into the grand final

rugby union - jonah lomu trampling over his opponent going in for a try

Watching Chelski get drummed by United 3-0 earlier today :p

I remember in '04 when Dave Roberts stole second base in the ALCS against the yankees.. that moment is the one single moment that started the greatest comeback in baseball history.

There are tons of great ones.. I just am not in the right mind set atm to write them down.

Nobody for the Henderson goal in 1972 in Moscow? When an entire country stood still and held its collective breath?

Boxing: Corrales vs. Castillo #1, for me, was the most exciting thing I have seen, sports-wise. Corrales getting up and winning was quite a feat.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d1...ngknockout.gif

what about soccer anyone?

c'mon gucci - surely you watch soccer

for me it would be the 'hand of god' goal by maradonna

that's post 22

;)

as if you couldn't tell by my avatar..

and it's football..not soccer :lol:

How about Solskjaer coming off the bench and scoring 4 goals in 12 minutes against Forest? Or his game winning goal to win the '99 UEFA Champions League and securing the Treble?

This is one of my pet peeves. Why in the hell would you agree to sing the national anthem in front of thousands of people and show up without knowing the lyrics? She clearly didn't know half of the lyrics. Nerves can screw up a word or two but she forgot half the song. Who would agree to such a performance and come so unprepared?
-----Added 12/1/2009 at 04 : 17 : 52-----


This is it for me. Being Appalachian State alumni and witnessing this was simply amazing. The 3 consecutive championship wins on top of it are close in 2nd.

As I understood it she had the flu, and was very nervous, and just froze.

And while everyone just stood there watching, Mo Cheeks had the guts and heart to go and help her.

Michael Jordan dropping 55 against the Knicks when he came out of retirement.

David Tyree's helmet catch in Super Bowl XLII

Vince Carter jumping over Frederic Weis in the 2000 Olympics

Travis Pastrana's double backflip at the Summer X games in 2006

I know the end of post 20 got you all riled up, but the second item in that post is what you Aussies call "soccer"!

:thumbsup:

Evander Holyfield's 11th round TKO victory over Mike Tyson. I just wish that the ref had let Evander continue to hit Tyson until Tyson fell down.



A very exciting fight!!

There was some controversey over Corrales twice intentionally spitting out his mouthpiece. Many people, myself included, felt that the fight should've been stopped when he did it the second time, with a TKO victory going to Castillo.

what do people think of the carl lewis vs leroy burrell see-sawing long jump competition at the world championship in tokya '92?

although i regard carl as a cheat these days, back then as a kid i was in awe of the spectacle along with his 9.86 in the 100m sprint.

Carl Lewis was a cheat? How so?

just the first article that came up when i googled it...

Carl Lewis's positive test covered up - smh.com.au

take everything with a grain of salt.. or a tablet.

excuse my pessimistic attitude. this thread is about finding the best of athletes.

I think that 7 of the 8 finalists in Seoul 1988 has since tested positive for some drug or another.

huh. and we really took it on the chin for Ben Johnson. Is there any statute of limitations?

Or, the original results should be reinstated, as it appears that there was in fact a level playing ground.

I will never forget this. This was Mika Hakkinnen passing Michael Schumaker in one of the most awesome passing moves I have ever seen in my life.

I'm with Highthief on this one.

The 2005 Champions League Final, or The European Cup as I still like to call it.

That night will forever be in my memories. It had everything, the low point of going down 3-0 at half time. The possibility of getting back in the game when we scored our first (Captain Fantastic, you're a legend!)
And then the drama of equalising goal and the final piece of heart-busting nonsense, the penalty shoot out!
We were all in our garden screaming at the tops of our voices.
Wow! What a night! :) :)

as much as I hate to agree with dirty scousers, this was a fantastic game.

The greatest goal ever? (especially if youre a Liverpool fan)


For US Football fans, just think, people miss field goals from that range...