re: The GOAT - Michael Jordan or Tom Brady? Who is the greatest athlete of all-time?

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Its a good argument but I find it hard to believe hockey has the same concentration of talent a sport like basketball does. Basketball is REALLY popular and a lot of great talents aren't even good enough to get to the NBA. I'm not saying hockey is easy, but you don't have near the talent pool and it would make sense a guy like Gretzky could stand out so far in a small talent pool. Soccer in the US is a great analogy. Why does US soccer suck? Because our best athletes typically play other sports growing up while in other countries soccer is the only sport kids grow up playing.

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That’s true when it comes to the south, but almost all Yankees pick up a hockey stick at some point in their life and give it a shot. Europe has world class players as well and at one point hockey was the #2 most played sport in the world.

One simple stat for Gretzky that is mind blowing is that he has more assists than any other person in the history of the game has total points(assists+goals)

He has almost 1000 more points than jagr(current #2) and he has been playing since around 1992. Gretzky played from 79-99 and 5 less seasons than jagr and is still that much ahead. Also played when hockey was a low scoring sport compared to today’s game