I'm pretty sure that Cey won a World Series. Is Thompson the first to win an NBA title for a Coug?
Rypien won a Super Bowl
- Thread starter LoneStarsGhost
- Start date
Yes, Baynes won a championship last year with the Spurs. Conley won three NBA championships with Celtics and won a baseball World Series championship as a pitcher with the Milwaukee
Braves.
In response to Ainge I would rank him , Hendrickson, and Conley as follows:
1) Conely. 3 championships as a role player for Celtics ( also played for the Knicks) and 6 years and once championship as a starting pitcher in MLB.
2) Aigne because he won championships in the NBA was no great success in 2 years with Toronto in MLB 2.20 career batting average.
3) Hendrickson. He had 5 years in the NBA ( not a bad paycheck) and 11 years in MLB but he has no championships.
All of these guys were great athletes, but I would take Conley over he other two.
I would also take Gene Conley, though this is a pretty impressive trio of athletes. Conley did it when there were not nearly as many NBA teams, and IMO the effort to make it through the minors to MLB was proportionately more difficult than today. There were fewer MLB teams but more minor league teams, and a higher percentage of the great athletes were focused on baseball from childhood.
Anybody who makes either league is a freak athlete, and that was true then just as it is true today. To play in both leagues is almost a statistical anomaly. I am too lazy to research this (probably someone already has done so), but I'd be personally surprised if there was an active player every year for the past 70 that ended up in both leagues at some point. Seems unlikely. To have three at WSU seems to me to be unusual, but then again, I have done no research and don't claim to have done so.
Anybody who makes either league is a freak athlete, and that was true then just as it is true today. To play in both leagues is almost a statistical anomaly. I am too lazy to research this (probably someone already has done so), but I'd be personally surprised if there was an active player every year for the past 70 that ended up in both leagues at some point. Seems unlikely. To have three at WSU seems to me to be unusual, but then again, I have done no research and don't claim to have done so.
Does Michael Jordan count?
Greatest basketball player of all time. Owned a baseball glove for a while. Still better than the other 3 listed combined.
Dave Winfield wouldn't qualify because he didn't play basketball, but the fact that he was drafted by 4 professional sports teams in 3 different sports is incredible.
Winfield was a fantastic athlete. Another tidbit about Hendrickson is that I believe he also won a doubles tennis championship when he was in high school. This is incredible when you think about that he was only a part time player, as tennis and baseball are at the same time.
Indeed I may have wrote two early. WSU does have 17% of all players who played both in the ML and the NBA or it's predecessor the BAA. In addition to Ainge here are the 9 others:
Frank Baumholtz (45 games in one season of the Basketball Association of America, 2nd team all league; 10 years in MLB, 1019 games)
Chuck Connors (49 games in BAA over two years, 45 in first year, also played NBL and won a title; 2 season in MLB, 67 games, 1 game in first year)
Dave DeBusschere (36 games over 2 seasons in MLB, HOF in NBA)
Dick Groat (1 season in NBA, 26 games; Over 2000 MLB hits, 1960 NL MVP and Batting Champ)
Steve Hamilton (12 years in MLB, 663 ip, mostly in relief; 82 games over 2 seasons in NBA, played in both a World Series and an NBA final series)
Cotton Nash (13 games over 3 MLB seasons; 84 games over 3 NBA and 1 ABA season)
Ron Reed (119 games over 2 NBA seasons; 19 MLB seasons, One of five pitchers to have over 100 wins, 100 saves, and 50 complete games, 1968 All Star, World Series champ 1980)
Dick Ricketts (212 NBA games over 3 seasons; 1 MLB season 12 games pitched)
Howard Schultz (173 games over 3 NBA seasons plus 3 season in NBL for 165 games; 6 MLB seasons, 1699 games played)
Who would have ever imagined ten years ago that WSU would have not one, but two different players playing in the NBA finals in consecutive seasons? It's absolutely remarkable, and one is even a starter and an all-star.
Thank you Dick and Tony Bennett!
Love, thank you for the research that I was too lazy to do myself. 17% is amazing!
How, not only do you raise a good point, but it is yet more proof that the stars rating system is not all it is cracked up to be.
How, not only do you raise a good point, but it is yet more proof that the stars rating system is not all it is cracked up to be.
Similar threads
