Sports Stars: Unquestionably Odd

Bryan Joiner writes the Unobstructed View column for The Inquirer.

Professional athletes are, unquestionably, human oddities. Unlike like the rest of us, they are big dudes and dudettes. The typical NFL running back polishes a porterhouse faster than he can run the forty-yard-dash. Meanwhile, his linemen carve the whole cow.

America’s athletes are Bunyanesque big. Some are born that way, like Babe Ruth, who measured 6’2” and weighed in at 215 lbs. Others aren’t, like Barry Bonds who, at 6’2”, weighed 185 lbs. in 1986, and tips the scales at 230 lbs. today.

The average Joe in three of the major North American major sports is 6’1”—four inches taller than Average American Male, who is, himself, a shade shorter than comparatively diminutive Doug Flutie (5’10”, 180 lbs.). The average NBA player is 6'7" and has every reason to fear overzealous ceiling fans.

Most of us didn’t have a shot at “the show” from the get-go simply because we’d only grow to fit into a go-kart. Shaquille O’Neal (7’1”, 325 lbs.) bangs elbows with the Mavericks, but not Maverick himself, Tom Cruise (who stands a measly 5’7”).

It’s not just that most athletes are big—it’s that the bigger they are, the better they are. Up the yardstick go Alex Rodriguez at 6’3”, Roger Clemens and Tom Brady are both 6’4”, Peyton Manning is 6’5”, and Michael Jordan, 6’6”. When a smaller athlete takes down the warriors, it’s a story of Davidian proportions, yet Pedro Martinez (5’11”, 170 lbs.) and Allen Iverson (6’0”, 165 lbs.) could look down on li’l ol’ me at a hair over 5’9”. The late Mickey Mantle (5’11”, 198 lbs.) already does.

I am almost precisely the national male average height, and it is nice knowing USA soccer wunderkind Freddy Adu (5’8”, 145 lbs.) couldn’t walk in my shoes. He could borrow those of Pele, who at 5’7” and 150 lbs., is the rarest player on the field: the shortest, yet indisputably the best.

Golf is supposed to be the great equalizer with its emphasis on nerves and brains. Arnold Palmer (5’10”, 185 lbs.) and Jack Nicklaus (5’10”, 180 lbs.) saw eye-to-eye on this; then Tiger Woods (6’1”, 185 lbs.) came along. Phil Mickelson is the new favorite of the everyman, but—at 6’2”—is a full five inches taller.

No different: the bigger are better at women’s sports. The average American woman is 5'4”, but every star female athlete soars above her. Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf, Monica Seles, and Venus and Serena Williams all are at least 5’8” from head to toe. Golf wizard Annika Sorenstam is 5’6”, and it’s from there long way down to Danica Patrick, whose 5’2”, 100-lb.frame lightens the load of her racecar.

Some of the rarest physical specimens haminty ever produced have been officiated. 7'6" Gheorge Muresan played in the NBA and starred in a Billy Crystal movie; 43" Eddie Gaedel had one at-bat for the St. Louis Browns baseball team in 1951 before the commissioner voided his contract on account of clownishness. Baseball spawned the term “Ruthian.” It’ll stick with the big guys.

Yet baseball has the smallest average North American professional athlete (6’1”, 192 lbs.). They’re just behind hockey, at 6’1”, 200 lbs. While NBA players have a full six inches on their six-foot-one NFL counterparts, they are 21 lbs. lighter.

Hockey may be the average man’s best chance to get back into the game. Wayne Gretzky stood a mere 6', as did Bobby Orr. Martin St. Louis, a 5’7” center for the Tampa Bay Lightning, was the MVP of the NHL in 2004. Yet, all these men are another type of human oddity: they’re Canadian.

(Navratilova photo from flickr.)

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Comments

[joe namath]

Big? I'll show you big ----

[Andre Lopez]

By definition the entire enterprise of professional sports revolves around the athletes turning into unrequieted she-men.

It doesn't take long for that to require sticking a needle in your butt to pump up your arms and shrink your...i'll leave that up to you to figure out.