Who is the GOAT?
No, not those cute animals with the horns and the beards. The Greatest of All Time.
Tom Brady. Serena Williams. LeBron James. Lionel Messi. Muhammad Ali. Roger Federer. What about Novak Djokovic, who just won his 24th Grand Slam? Or is it impossible, even foolish, to say?
In his essay “GOATs Are Everywhere in Sports. So What Really Defines Greatness?” published in July at the start of Wimbledon, Kurt Streeter considers how sports heroes become transcendent and why we have become so obsessed with the question of who is the greatest:
If you are reading this column, I have great news: You’re the GOAT!
That’s right: Among those who have happened upon this space, I deem you the Greatest Reader of All Time.
Then again, if you’re LeBron James, or Serena Williams, or Nikola Jokic — with that sparkling N.B.A. championship ring — well, you already know you’re the GOAT. Everyone has been saying so.
“Bahhh, bahhh, bahhh,” goes the bleating of a goat. It’s also the sound made by James’s Los Angeles Lakers teammates when he walks into the locker room. GOAT hosannas are practically the soundtrack of his life.
Driven by its pervasive usage around sports, five years ago the wordsmiths at Merriam-Webster entered the term GOAT in the dictionary as an acronym and a noun.
LeBron James is considered by many to be the GOAT in men’s basketball.
Defining the term as “the most accomplished or successful individual in the history of a particular sport or category of performance or activity,” a Merriam-Webster editor nodded to the pervasive use of Tom Brady’s name along with GOAT in a popular search engine as an example of why the acronym had become dictionary official.
Yeah, I know — this GOAT thing, it’s a little confusing. To be the greatest implies singularity, no? But now there are GOATs everywhere we turn.
Even worse than the acronym’s overuse is its doltish simplicity. There’s not enough nuance. Too much emphasis on outright winning, not enough on overcoming.
What are our options here? Maybe we should ban the use of the term outright in sports, following the lead of Lake Superior State University, which cheekily ranked the hazy, lazy acronym No. 1 on its 2023 list of banished words.
Mr. Streeter reflects on the origins of the term GOAT, and on the “craziness” of trying to identify the GOAT in a particular sport — but also on “the foolishness and the fun of it.” Then, after all of that ruminating, he goes on to name his list of GOATS:
Who’s the GOAT?
Well, to be honest, I’ve got four. Willie Mays. Joe Montana. Williams. Federer.
I can remember each for their sublime victories, of course. But also their stumbles. A 42-year-old Mays lost in the outfield. A fragile Montana in his twilight, playing not for San Francisco but Kansas City.
I was on hand to see Williams struggle and come up short as she chased that elusive last Slam. I sat feet from Federer as he held two match points against Djokovic in the Wimbledon final of 2019. Then the Swiss crumbled in defeat.
“For now it hurts, and it should — every loss hurts at Wimbledon,” Federer said at the post-match news conference. But, he added, he would persevere. “I don’t want to be depressed about actually an amazing tennis match.”
No one escapes disappointment and frailty. But if we do it right, we soldier on.
You know what that means? It means all of us can be GOATs!
Bleat on, my friends. Bleat on!
Students, read the entire article and then tell us:
Who’s the GOAT? Make your case for the best player of an individual sport — like basketball, tennis or hockey — or for the single greatest athlete of all time.
What’s your criteria for greatness? Is the greatest player the one you want to be batting in the seventh game of the World Series, with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning? The athlete with the most rings — victories, championships or titles? The most impressive longevity? The biggest effect on sports, and the world beyond?
What do you think of Mr. Streeter’s nominees for GOAT — Mays, Montana, Williams and Federer? Would any make your Mount Rushmore of sports heroes? Why do you think his essay mentions seeing these four superstars in moments of “disappointment and frailty”? How do they figure in the intricate calculus of GOAT-dom?
Does the GOAT really matter? Should we care who is the best at something? Or should the acronym be banned from sports debates for being overused, “hazy” and “lazy”? Why do you think people love to argue about the GOAT?
If you’re not an avid sports fan, tell us who you think should be considered the greatest of all time in another field: The greatest rapper? Guitar player? Writer? Chef? Teacher?
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
Find more Student Opinion questions here. Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate these prompts into your classroom.
