Quote Originally Posted by CDu View Post
Apologies if I've missed it, but I would suggest that gymnasts need to be in the discussion if we're expanding beyond the "big 4" US sports. They are phenomenal athletes, albeit very short ones.
In the 80's and 90's, Albuquerque had a really big gymnastic scene. Gold Cup Gymnastic Club sent 5 or 6 male athletes to the Olympics and they won several medals including a gold medal buy Trent Dimas. Anyway, Lance Ringnald came to visit my school right before the 1992 Olympics. A bunch of my friends would play basketball everyday for lunch and I asked him if he wanted to join us. Surprisingly, he did. He was not good but I'm sure the guy spent every minute of his life training for gymnastics so he had an excuse. I remember asking him if he could touch the rim. He said, "dude, those gymnastics moves use a lot of momentum and there are springs in the floor". He could not touch the rim. Nonetheless, yes, gymnast are incredible athletes.

I guess as the person that started this thread I would use the following criteria:
Running fast
jumping
strength
endurance
catching and throwing
hand eye coordination
general coordination