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Seb Coe says no
While President Barack Obama was sending a congratulatory message to Michael Phelps for making America proud with his record 19th career medal Tuesday night, Locog chairman Sebastian Coe took a different approach.
"I think you can say it is self-evident that he is the most successful. I am not sure he is the greatest,” Coe told reporters while winking, nodding, and reminding everyone that his two 1500m golds were pretty impressive, too, if you think about it in context. "[Phelps won] a pretty good haul, but who is the greatest? In my opinion he is probably not."
Coe didn't say who the greatest Olympian was, but he's previously opined that friend Daley Thompson, a back-to-back decathlon champ, is the greatest British athlete, so we'd guess he gets the vote.
We'll agree it's easier to rack up medals in a sport where you can swim eight events in a single Games, as opposed to one or two, but it's also pretty tough to swim in prelims, semis, and finals for all those events... and then to do that in three straight Olympics... and then win 15 of those events. What we're essentially saying is maybe Coe should stop talking for a while.
While President Barack Obama was sending a congratulatory message to Michael Phelps for making America proud with his record 19th career medal Tuesday night, Locog chairman Sebastian Coe took a different approach.
"I think you can say it is self-evident that he is the most successful. I am not sure he is the greatest,” Coe told reporters while winking, nodding, and reminding everyone that his two 1500m golds were pretty impressive, too, if you think about it in context. "[Phelps won] a pretty good haul, but who is the greatest? In my opinion he is probably not."
Coe didn't say who the greatest Olympian was, but he's previously opined that friend Daley Thompson, a back-to-back decathlon champ, is the greatest British athlete, so we'd guess he gets the vote.
We'll agree it's easier to rack up medals in a sport where you can swim eight events in a single Games, as opposed to one or two, but it's also pretty tough to swim in prelims, semis, and finals for all those events... and then to do that in three straight Olympics... and then win 15 of those events. What we're essentially saying is maybe Coe should stop talking for a while.
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