Nolan Dalla

What’s the Toughest Sport for an Amateur to Compete In?

Nolan Dalla

 

 

What’s the toughest game and position to play in sports?

 

In the fall of 1963, a mostly unknown journalist, writer, literary critic, and wanna-be professional athlete named George Plimpton walked into training camp with the NFL’s Detroit Lions.

Plimpton didn’t fit the mold of an athlete.  He was slow.  He was clumsy.  He was the oldest player on the team.  He arrived in camp as an undrafted 36-year-old “rookie” quarterback (he’d graduated from Harvard, 14 years earlier).  Although his lofty sights were set on getting into shape, completing drills with the team, learning the playbook, and suiting up to play in a preseason game, the fact was — when he first stepped onto the football field he didn’t even know how to position his hands and take a snap from center.

Predictably, the results were disastrous.

Plimpton’s teammates weren’t told in advance about their new rookie quarterback, nor his incognito expose intended for a magazine.  That way, his experience as a pro athlete was certain to be authentic.  However, once the Lions players witnessed him on the field floundering around, utterly clueless as to how to run an offense, they couldn’t believe he was given a uniform.  Turned out, Plimpton was almost comically ungifted physically, and so mentally ill-prepared to call the signals for an NFL team, that within just a few hours it became obvious he wasn’t really a football player but a bad pretender.  Nonetheless, Plimpton somehow managed to talk head coach George Wilson into putting him into a game for a series of downs during an intra-squad team scrimmage.

Fittingly, he was given the number “0.”  That’s when bad turned to worse.

Playing in full pads and competing at game tempo, Plimpton’s professional football “career” lasted just five excruciating plays.  He lined up in the quarterback position.  He five snaps.  Plimpton lost yardage on every play.

Afterward, Plimpton’s exploits became the focus of a magazine essay published in Sports Illustrated, and later the basis for a best-selling book, titled “Paper Lion.”  Later, actor Alan Alda played Plimpton in the movie, which took some liberties with the story.  In the movie version, Alda gets inserted into a preseason game in the closing seconds and loses 25 yards when he runs the wrong way downfield, colliding head-first into his own goalpost.  In reality, though, Plimpton wasn’t permitted to play in a game, for fear of a serious injury.  Given how bad the Detroit Lions have been in the 50 years that have since passed, there’s probably a joke in there somewhere that Plimpton might not have been the worst pick for a quarterback, after all.

Football players are so much bigger and stronger now.  The same goes for basketball and hockey, too.  Baseball, which is the most consistent of all team sports when it comes to statistics, is probably the only game where the athletes of earlier eras bear similarities to others that come later.  Soccer is another team sport where the greatest athletes of years ago could probably be competitive in the modern game (yet even this is a matter of controversy).

Given the extraordinary advances in physicality and science, it seems almost impossible for a George Plimpton-like amateur to surface anywhere today or enjoy the slightest chance of even marginal success.  No amateur athlete is going to skate onto the NHL ice or walk out onto an NBA court, and not be both humiliated and very likely destroyed, probably within just a few minutes.

That said, what if we were forced to chose one competitive endeavor from the rest?  If so, which sport would be the toughest for an amateur to compete in?  Accordingly, if somehow we can answer this question, then we can probably rank the sports from top to bottom in terms of difficulty.  That means we should be able to determine which sport is the easiest for an amateur to compete in.

Still with me?  Okay, for the sake of argument, let’s consider the following sports:

That’s five team sports and four individual sports.

Let’s go back and use George Plimpton as our benchmark athlete.  Remember, Plimpton was 36 when he tried out with the Lions, considerably older than the league average, but still physically within the possible age range of a professional football player.  Plimpton was 6-feet, 4-inches in height, much taller than the average man, giving him roughly equal stature with other pro athletes (even in basketball).  He’ll be our test dummy for comparison’s sake.  Again — a healthy male, of playing age, of decent size, who is reasonably intelligent and can follow instructions.

My rankings — from the toughest sport to the easiest:

TRACK AND FIELD:  This might seem like a surprising top choice as the sport where amateurs stand absolutely no chance competing against highly-trained professionals (let’s use Olympic athletes, for comparison).  This is because the athletic endeavor of track and field is the purest.  It has no luck factor, no teammates, no weather, nor any extenuating circumstances.  Barring a serious injury, no vastly superior runner, long-jumper, javelin thrower, or pole-vaulter would ever lose to a must lesser-trained opponent who is considerably slower, weaker, and physically less gifted.  Using any metric whatsoever, at any distance, there’s no way an amateur could ever compete alongside an Olympic gold-medal winner, barring a serious injury to the superior athlete in the midst of the contest.

BOXING:  No amateur athlete of any kind, under any competitive circumstances, would be able to survive inside the boxing ring with a trained professional fighter in the same weight class.  End of story.  End of discussion.  Given the proper training, a very tough amateur boxer might be able to assume a fetal position, take several punches, and might even last a few rounds.  But the physical pounding would quickly take its toll, and could even prove deadly if the charade were permitted to last too long.  There’s no way an amateur athlete could win even a single round, much less win a prizefight against a ranked boxer.

TENNIS:  What if an amateur tennis player were to step onto the court against a top pro?  I suspect that if the tennis pro was determined to sweep the amateur player, he (or she) could do so easily.  Returning a 120-mph serve would be challenging enough for anyone who’s unaccustomed to match-like conditions.  Most of the opponent’s lightning-fast serves wouldn’t be returned.  The only way an amateur might win any points would be if the professional was having an off day, and missed a few shots.  Otherwise, the pro would likely win every single point and sweep each game, effortlessly winning the set and match.

ICE HOCKEY:  Aside from boxing, an amateur player is probably most likely to be injured in a hockey game.  Even assuming the amateur can skate reasonably well, he’d still be blown off the ice by the sheer speed and strength of opponents.  It’s highly unlikely an amateur could score a goal, unless by a deflection.  In a shootout scenario, an NHL goaltender would likely stop every shot made by an amateur.  If the amateur were to skate around the rink any link of time in-game conditions, he’d probably be injured within the period, checked into the boards, and left unconscious, even by a clean hit [I used to skate very well and even played one period of hockey when I was 22, and I was nearly killed).  The amateur would have little chance of even the slightest success in a full-strength hockey game.  Note:  An exception would be if the amateur were to play goaltender.  A poor shooting night by the opposing team could result in a game that could be semi-competitive.

FOOTBALL:  Let’s assume we’re talking about playing quarterback.  Other positions would probably be far too dangerous for any amateur athlete (and even the quarterback position would probably end in injury).  Even under ideal conditions — let’s say inserting our hero into the game as the quarterback of the New England Patriots playing versus a bad team — the inexperienced player is likely to fare miserably (recall Plimpton’s experience with the Lions, losing yardage on all five plays).  However, if the defense were unaware of the quarterback’s arm strength weakness and therefore was forced to properly defend against the (long) pass, our hero quarterback might be able to hand-off the ball on virtually every play to a runner and somehow manage to lead the offense to a touchdown (giving the amateur some credit for the repetition of doing hand-offs and being able to call plays).  This is very tricky, however, since success depends on how little we have to rely on the quarterback.  Given neutral circumstances (defenses adjusting to the novice QB and blitzing on every play, for instance), here are my projections on the chances of events happening if an amateur were to play quarterback in a typical NFL game (for sake of argument, we will assume no late-game prevent defenses):

BASEBALL:  Baseball is a complex sport to judge, given its skillset includes hitting, fielding, and throwing (and possibly pitching).  Let’s assume we’re discussing a right fielder inserted into the starting lineup of an average major league baseball team.  Much depends on how much coaching and hitting practice the amateur receives.  Even given months of spring training and several games of playing experience, the amateur is unlikely to get more than a few hits during the entire season.  The best course of action for any amateur would be to stand in the batter’s box, pretend to be interested in swinging, and take every pitch.  There’s a much better chance of getting on base via a walk.  The next best scenario would be to bunt every time, hoping the infielder commits a throwing error.  But if the amateur were to play the game normally:

BASKETBALL:  Given the nature and flow of basketball, a very good team could cover up the deficiencies of a far weaker player.  The superior players would simply overcompensate for the bad player who doesn’t shoot well, and can’t play defense.  They would also have to ensure that the amateur touches the ball as little as possible, since he’d be stripped from the ball often and would surrender an obscene number of steals.  However, given the Plimpton scenario (remember, he was 6′ 4″), there’s some argument that he might not have fared as badly as one might expect.  Lining up Plimpton repeatedly in the corner, perhaps along the 3-point line, would enable him to take some shots.  Given his height, he’d probably even make a few.  So long as the requirements were kept simple, a reasonably-sized amateur could score a few baskets.  However, he would not be able to do much more than that in terms of dribbling and passing.

GOLF:  Golf might be the toughest sport to handicap in terms of making a professional versus amateur comparison.  Most men in decent physical shape are able to perform the basic mechanics of driving, chipping, and putting.  Even someone who has never picked up a golf club before could conceivably take a driver and smack a gold ball perfectly down the middle of a fairway  On any given hole, even a terrible golfer could get extremely lucky on occasion and connect on a series of shots and end up parring the hole (I even got a par once).  Hence, as ridiculous as it sounds, if an amateur were to tee off on one hole against The Masters champion, on very rare occasions he could (and would) win the hole.  The frequency is open to debate.  However, given that golf is an individual sport, let’s take a typical par-4 on a PGA course and determine what chances the amateur has of being competitive:

SOCCER:  Soccer requires considerable skill and endurance.  However, the mechanics — consisting mainly of running, blocking, and kicking — are relatively simple enough for anyone to be able to take the field and have some chance of being competitive.  For instance, an amateur playing the forward position on a world-class team might even score a goal.  At the very least, an amateur wouldn’t necessarily look too bad running out on a pitch, getting a few touches, taking a corner kick or two, and blocking shots defensively.  This isn’t to say the far superior athletes wouldn’t badly outplay the amateur, just that the very nature of what’s very much a team game would mask some of the inequities.  Accordingly, here’s my projection based on playing the position of forward for an average team during a 10-game schedule of (UEFA) Champion League games:

A few final thoughts:  Last fall, a group of us were in Pittsburgh when we went out to a football stadium to kick field goals.  Trust me, even under perfect conditions (no pass rush, no pressure, perfect weather), kicking a field goal is not easy.  After several tries, I did manage to make one kick from 30 yards.  However, professional poker player Tom Schneider — who is considerably older and much heavier than me — not only made several kicks.  He even booted one from 40 yards.  So, from this assessment, I think we have to throw out field goal kickers as “athletes.”

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So, now it’s your turn.

What do you think of my rankings?

Which sports would be easiest and toughest for an amateur to play?

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