In which sport is it easiest for a single player to carry their team to a title?

[Thanatos 2,847]

Just thought this might be an interesting discussion.

 

I'm not sure what my answer is yet, so just throwing this out there.

[Dutch 874]

I don't really watch any other sport outside of football, so I can't add much to the discussion or should my opinion carry much stock. But I think basketball can be carried by a single dominant player the easiest and nothing will convince me that football isn't the ultimate team sport.

[Sarge+ 3,436]

Easiest is NBA, hardest is a tie between NFL and MLB.

[Bucman 891]

Easiest NBA. Hardest MLB.

NFL is slightly easier than MLB because if you have an elite QB like Tom Brady was he can make everyone look a lot better.

[Sarge+ 3,436]

Tom Brady hasn't won anything since the Pats lost their elite defense. Something to think about.

[BradyFan81 404]

NBA is the easiest by far.

 

NHL 2nd because if you have a red hot goalie you have a chance.

 

NFL 3rd because of the QB, but still you need way more than a great QB to win.

 

MLB it's just impossible for 1 player to have that big of an impact. I mean the "get on my back we're gonna win" type of impact for an entire playoffs.

Edited October 3, 2014 by BradyFan81

[Vin+ 3,121]

I'd like to say NBA for easiest, but when was the last time a team rode just one player to a championship?

 

You can ride a dominant pitcher to a title, and you can ride a dominant goalie to a title. I honestly think that both NBA and NFL require multiple pieces to win (You might be able to argue about a QB, but the NFL playoffs do weird things to teams)

[RazorStar 4,025]

Baseball has to be hard because only a pitcher can carry a team (the other positions are almost irrelevant), but a starting pitcher only plays 1/5th of the time at most. Even if that pitcher won every game, that wouldn't guarantee a World Series.

 

I voted NFL anyway because it's the ultimate team game for sho.

[blotsfan 2,112]

NBA without question. I'd say NHL is hardest unless you're talking about a non-qb in the NFL.

[Bay 2,003]

I'm bored so I'm going to list what I don't like about all sports.

 

Basketball- too many fouls, defensive efforts not there all the time

 

Football - flags mostly on the defensive side of the ball

 

Hockey - People mocking USA when the Canadian teams have American-born players on their teams. "USA sucks cock!"

 

Toronto - Phil Kessel (one of the best players in the league period)

Ottawa - Bobby Ryan (good for a while)

Calgary - Johnny Gaudreau Aka Johnny Hockey (future star)

Vancouver - Nick Bonino

Winnipeg - Blake Wheeler

Montreal - Max Pacioretty (one of the best goal scorers in the league)

Edmonton - Jeff Petry

 

Soccer - playing surface too big

 

Baseball - On offense you have batter vs. pitcher + baserunners not fluid like the other sports

[BradyFan81 404]

Good idea Bay.

 

Basketball- Wayyyyyyy too many timeouts make the last 2 minutes of games unenjoyable. I have shit to do, I don't want to spend 15 minutes watching the last minute and a half of a game. There's also wayyyy too many reviews by officials in final 5 minutes that slow the game down and make it unenjoyable, to the point where I'd rather them just get the fucking call wrong than reviewing every little damn thing in the final 5 minutes.

 

Also, there's no point in watching the East this year - regular season or playoffs - until the ECF... so there's that.

 

Football- PI rules, illegal contact, def holding, etc all thanks to the league's never ending quest to increase offense. Not just this year, has been a problem since 2004.

 

Hockey- There is literally nothing wrong with the sport of hockey. Maybe the regular season schedule and playoffs is a bit too strenuous? I'd like to see more time off between games personally. That's all I can think of though, the flow and structure of the game is the best IMO.

 

Baseball- time between pitches. Hitters do not need to adjust their gloves and step out of the box after EVERY pitch. Drives me crazy. This is easily fixable though which makes it even more annoying that they let it continue.

 

Soccer- diving

 

Also I'll say in general with every sport what's annoying to me is the need for fans to try to knock the best players every chance they get. Not saying I haven't done this too, but it's something I've made a concious effort not to do anymore. Like I used to try to shit on Peyton Manning every chance I get, but come on, he's fucking amazing, give the guy a break. Or I remember during the World Cup people were like "lolMessi" and "Messi is so overrated!!!111!!!" It's just like.. Messi is the best player on earth. Can't we give credit to the other team for defending him well and not letting him score? Or Jeter during these past few weeks. Sooo many people coming out trying to knock this guy down a few pegs and tell you how overrated he is and you're dumb if you think he's great.

 

I'm not saying I don't like when people root against players. Obviously I root against Peyton, LeBron, Kobe, PK Subban, etc, but I recognize their greatness and respect them. But if a great player has a bad game everyone jumps on them and they're now a choker or overrated or whatever. It's just annoying. It's one of the reasons I've really gotten into soccer the past few years. No one in this country really cares so I'm free to watch and enjoy the best players and teams without the haters.

 

Was reading an article a few weeks back and the writer said something that really hit home to me.

 

There are pluses and minuses to being a sports fan today, but one big minus is that people feel the need to use all these new tools to mock people for enjoying certain athletes. I do this all the time, obviously. I probably did it with Jeter up until this week. But still. It can suck the fun out of things sometimes.

 

There’s this smug attitude that infects the way we talk about sports, where you’re either clued in enough to know Derek Jeter was overrated, or you’re one of the pathetic people who actually thought he was great. There was no shortage of that perspective with Jeter this week, and it all started to blend together, and it was the worst.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/bestworst-jeter-the-curse-of-dan-snyder-and-more/

 

tl;dr: I don't like haters.

Edited October 4, 2014 by BradyFan81

[RazorStar 4,025]

I think people in general have taken overrated to mean not good. Which is really never the case. I say Peyton Manning is overrated, but he's still a top 10 QB in our game. He's just not the best anymore, like he was from 03-06 or so.

 

Baseball is about 100 games too long, if they turned all their 3-4 game series to 1 or 2 games over the same time span you'd have a less rampant drug abuse problem in the league because the players would actually be somewhat rested. The less games you have the more those games mean. Baseball also isn't a sport, but that's another story for another time.

 

Hockey and Basketball could function with 50 game seasons, hell the lockout shortened season was probably the most entertaining regular season I've ever seen. When every game makes a difference, it just means that much more. Playoff hockey is perfect, that doesn't need to change. Basketball... has to find a way to stop being a 4-6 team league where only 4-6 teams realistically have a shot (and they're usually the Eastern Conference Lebrons and the top 5 Seeds in the West. >_>)

 

Football: Give defenders a chance. Quit this diva acting for a penalty shit these WR's get away with. Also be consistent with your god damn fines and suspensions. Once you've suspended Ray Rice for two games, you end it there, no matter what he did to his fiancee. Being wishy-washy about it is just some PC garbage. Also stop trying to extend the season... you can never go back once you've made the season longer.

[ATL_Predator+ 1,196]

Obvious answer is obvious for easiest.

 

I wanted to say NHL for hardest...but then I remember the great goaltenders that have literally put their teams on their back during the finals just to keep them alive and then it's over simply after a loosy goosy shootout.

 

So for me, it's the MLB.

 

You can have a dominant ace or hitter, but it won't mean shit because of the size of teams and variety of roles needed to complete a championship team.

[Guest Phailadelphia]

NBA has to be the easiest. Teams without superstars unequivocally do NOT win rings. A single superstar may not be able to do it all on his own, but a team has virtually zero shot without one. Their impact on the game is crazy.

[SteVo+ 3,702]

The first answer is obviously the NBA, and it's not because basketball is an "easy" or less entertaining sport; there are only five starting players. Of course one superstar will make a huge difference.

 

And I voted as MLB the hardest for the reasons ATL mentioned.

Edited October 4, 2014 by SteVo

[Cherry 1,302]

Toughest has to be Soccer. Unless you're a god playing crap players, odds are you can't carry your team all by yourself.

[BJORN 679]

Toughest has to be Soccer. Unless you're a god playing crap players, odds are you can't carry your team all by yourself.

Seeing how its only the MLS mentioned, I'd have to disagree with you.

Edited October 5, 2014 by BJORN

[oochymp 2,393]

this is a really tough question because I don't think it's actually possible for a single player to carry a team to a title in any sport, a great team will beat a team that's carried by a single great player just about every time no matter what the sport

 

that said, I'm going to take what might be a somewhat controversial route and say the NFL, now please hear me out before you respond

 

The is the format of the playoffs stacks the deck against great individuals in the NBA, MLB, and NHL, who all use series in their playoffs, which makes it incredibly hard for a single player to beat a great team, the great team will have 2-3 games to figure out how to neutralize the great player and, as I said before, the great team will win almost every time anyway, so the odds are really stacked against the single player, no matter how great the player is

 

The MLS is really difficult because of the nature of the sport, 11 players, huge field, one person is not going to control a game, even if you have someone amazing a great team will figure out how to contain him, even the best goal scorers need people to get them the ball and if he's carrying the team he's gonna get tired over a 90 minute game

 

Now on to why a single player can carry a team to a championship, first of all nobody is going to disagree when I say that QB is the most important position in football, where I might russle some feathers is in saying that a QB can carry his team to a championship, I'd also like to remind you of the first paragraph of this post where I argue that a single player can't win a championship in any sport, but it's easiest for a QB

 

Now that that's out of the way, onto the actual points, I can make the case on theory, but I'm going to start with examples, first look at the playoff teams, more often then not the teams that make the playoffs are those with the best QBs, last year's playoff QBs: Wilson, Manning, Brady, Luck, Rodgers, Brees, Rivers, Newton, Foles, Kaepernick, Dalton, and Alex Smith, that's most of the components of a lot of top ten QB lists, and it's not coincidence, second look at the Colts, they set the record for consecutive ten win seasons with Manning at the helm, had one season without him and only won two games, the next year they got Luck and they're right back to ten win seasons, sure there's a lot of turnover in the NFL, but not that much, then you look at the teams that are regularly at the bottom of the league and you'll see teams that are struggling to find a QB, I could go into more depth, but suffice it to say there's a lot of evidence of a positive correlation between QB skill and team performance over the regular season

 

but the biggest factor working in a great QB's favor is that the single elimination format creates a lot of possibility for a great QB to carry his team through the playoffs, in a single elimination tournament it's a lot harder to adjust to a great player taking over the game, and we've all seen great QBs take over games, just look at Joe Flaaco in the Ravens' playoff run a couple years ago, sure he's not a great QB, but he had a great series of games

 

again, as I said before a great team will beat a great player with a good team nearly every time, but if you're looking for the best shot for a single player to carry a team to a championship, you're looking for a QB

[BwareDWare94 723]

NBA is easiest by far.

 

MLB is hardest by far. If you're an elite pitcher, you're not carrying the team if the other starters are good. If you're an elite offensive offensive player, you're not carrying the team with other good hitters on the squad. Any elite pitcher in the "carrying the team" mode can only do that for one out of 5 games. Any elite offensive player in the same position is fucked because he's surrounded by outs.

 

No single player can carry a baseball team. Impossible.

Edited October 10, 2014 by BwareDWare94

[seanbrock 1,684]

Honestly, I don't think 1 player can carry a team to a championship in any team sport. Even in the NBA if you have one guy who's the scorer, if his team is in the finals he has a lot of great or elite defenders. Vin said it, when's the last time 1 guy lead his NBA team to a championship? Not even the great Michael Jordan could do it. A lot of people forget that Bulls squad of his was damn close to winning a title without him and most people consider Jordan to be the greatest NBA player of all time. LeBron couldn't, the Cavs made it TO the finals but got swept by the Spurs.

 

Think about all these sports (besides soccer because it's a women's sport). Can you think of a case in any pro sport where 1 guy lead a team to a championship. Some people have been saying QB can make a huge difference in the NFL, but no QB has EVER won a championship by themselves even with these modern era rules.

Edited October 14, 2014 by seanbrock

[Thanatos 2,847]

The question, however, is which sport is it easiest, not is it possible for one single person to carry a team.

[blotsfan 2,112]

Honestly, I don't think 1 player can carry a team to a championship in any team sport. Even in the NBA if you have one guy who's the scorer, if his team is in the finals he has a lot of great or elite defenders. Vin said it, when's the last time 1 guy lead his NBA team to a championship? Not even the great Michael Jordan could do it.

 

Tim Duncan 03.

[seanbrock 1,684]

Tim Duncan 03.

Still don't buy that. Tony Parker was still good just not what he is today and the Spurs played excellent team defense. The Spurs had one great scorer but the rest of the team was still good. Having said that though it's probably the closest example you'd find.

[butta54 371]

Basketball and it's not really even a contest. One player makes all the difference because you only have five on the court at a time. While I don't know if one player could ever carry an entire team to a championship, but one player most def can flip a team from average to elite.

[Cherry 1,302]

Reason why I say carrying an MLS team is tougher than carrying an MLB team is that MLS is a constant game of moving. A player can only run so much. While a player in MLB is not subjected to the same kind of fatigue (Outside of a pitcher, with throwing).