Most Suspicious Performances: All sports edition

[The Hitch]

Same concept as other thread but not limited to cycling. Also not entirely limited to last 5 years. Let's compare the tennis hulks to the untested Jamaicans, to the 70 game a year soccer stars, to the cyclists etc.

What performances from any sport, did you think or suspect, were the most dodgy.
And how do they compare.

 

[BigMac]

Pheidippides.

Maradona.

 

[Irondan]

Major league baseball in the 1990's.

The performances were hilarious, much more fun than MLB of today.

 

[SeriousSam]

I'll set the bar high straight away:
.
Novak Djokovic v Rafael Nadal, Australian Open 2012. Sprinting, sliding and in Novak's case, stretching for every single ball for 5 hours 50 minutes. Maintaining focus throughout to produce very high quality shotmaking.

Djokovic had defeated Murray in an almost as gruelling 5 set match lasting 4 hours and 50 minutes 2 days before.

Djokovic, after he won, was visibly depleted:

 

[djpbaltimore]

The Oakland A's Bash Brothers come to mind. Mark McGwire's physique made bats look like toothpicks. Definitely on par with some of the worst abuses of the EPO era of cycling IMO.

Two single events that really looked too good to be true were Michael Johnson and Usain Bolt in their respective 200m World Record runs.

 

[GuyIncognito]

Surely nothing comes close to Flo Jo in 87?

 

[Nick C.]

Was Flo Jo's death ever linked to PED use or is that just speculation?

Adrian Peterson's post knee surgery season. LeBron James.

 

[wendybnt]

Re:

Was Flo Jo's death ever linked to PED use or is that just speculation?

Inherited pre-disposition to seizures. She'd had a few before the one that finished her off.

 

[the delgados]

Bolt, without a doubt.
Reason being is he absolutely smashed records made by runners who ate steroids for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
100 metres is 100 metres. There can be no talk about race distance, stage of the race, weather conditions, quality of bikes, roads, etc. etc.
Guy made Ben Johnson seem like he was running backwards.

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

Was Flo Jo's death ever linked to PED use or is that just speculation?

Adrian Peterson's post knee surgery season. LeBron James.

Yeah adp was obvious. I admire what he did though. Tough as nails.

Iirc he even denied he was on peds. That's the good thing about American sports. People aren't as afraid to say it. Even when he denied it everyone was like - lol it's the nfl.

Going back a bit (20 years) someone who reminds me a bit of ad and was rumoured to maybe have a go at the running back position - Jonah the whale. Kid was 20 years old and walking over 300 pound England players as as they were just a patch of grass

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

I'll set the bar high straight away:
.
Novak Djokovic v Rafael Nadal, Australian Open 2012. Sprinting, sliding and in Novak's case, stretching for every single ball for 5 hours 50 minutes. Maintaining focus throughout to produce very high quality shotmaking.

Djokovic had defeated Murray in an almost as gruelling 5 set match lasting 4 hours and 50 minutes 2 days before.

Djokovic, after he won, was visibly depleted:

Lol, did he throw his shirt so high it's only just landing?

 

[SeriousSam]

Flo Jo's 100m WR is 1.64% quicker than the second best time.
Flo Jo's 200m WR is 1.3% quicker than the second best time

Bolt's 100m is 1.1% quicker than the second best time
Bolt's 200m is 0.3% quicker than the second best time (because the Beast, mysteriously absent the last few years, once did 19.26)


Kimetto's marathon WR is 0.2% quicker than the second best time. The 10 quickest times are within 1 min 30s.

Paula The Clean's marathon WR is 2.3% quicker than the second best time. second to 10th quickest are within 1min 30s. Paula is more than 3 minutes quicker than the second quickest.

Paula's WR might actually be the most ridiculous in all of athletics.

 

[djpbaltimore]

Re:

Flo Jo's 100m WR is 1.64% quicker than the second best time.
Flo Jo's 200m WR is 1.3% quicker than the second best time

Bolt's 100m is 1.1% quicker than the second best time
Bolt's 200m is 0.3% quicker than the second best time (because the Beast, mysteriously absent the last few years, once did 19.26)


Kimetto's marathon WR is 0.2% quicker than the second best time. The 10 quickest times are within 1 min 30s.

Paula The Clean's marathon WR is 2.3% quicker than the second best time. second to 10th quickest are within 1min 30s. Paula is more than 3 minutes quicker than the second quickest.

Paula's WR might actually be the most ridiculous in all of athletics.

Sometimes it is not just the time that makes a long distance race seem dodgy. Although Sammy Wanjiru's (RIP) 2008 gold medal run in Beijing (2:06) was an Olympic record, it was the way a 21 year old runner just obliterated the field in terrible conditions that always stands out in my mind.

 

[Nick C.]

Re: Re:

Was Flo Jo's death ever linked to PED use or is that just speculation?

Inherited pre-disposition to seizures. She'd had a few before the one that finished her off.

Thanks.

 

[The Hitch]

Going more recent, I wonder if that left back who in his early 20's was famous for losing every single game he played, and then became the fastest player in the world, who just kicks the ball 10m forward and sprints past everyone, is maybe just a very good responder.

 

[mrhender]

Germany - Brazil 7-1 ?

Messi, Ronaldo and the Bayern Munich onslought on Barcelona.

And of course the general scope of doping in soccer, particularly the "never getting tired" syndrom as seen with some of the major clubs, and players.

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

Germany - Brazil 7-1 ?

Messi, Ronaldo and the Bayern Munich onslought on Barcelona.

And of course the general scope of doping in soccer, particularly the "never getting tired" syndrom as seen with some of the major clubs, and players.

Good shout. I thought Spain were ridiculous 2008-2012 but this takes the cake.

I'll remember Bloomberg, who's analysts are more there to analyze the economic aspect of world cups and not the sport, and so are oblivious to doping, marvelled after the game that Germany always had good players on the ball, but this was the first time Germany had a whole squad of ubermench that could run up and down the field all day.

 

[Catwhoorg]

Honorable nod the the "Turtle Soup" Chinese women contingent by that coach whose name escapes me.

 

[TomLPC]

Re:

Germany - Brazil 7-1 ?

Messi, Ronaldo and the Bayern Munich onslought on Barcelona.

And of course the general scope of doping in soccer, particularly the "never getting tired" syndrom as seen with some of the major clubs, and players.

Ronaldo never getting injured whilst being the most fouled player in the world and playing every game is beyond a joke. Ye Shiwen 2012 was the most recent name that sprung to mind, tanning the mens times on a diet of only steak and whiskey.

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2012/jul/31/london-2012-ye-shiwen-doping

The evergreen Giggsy legging it about against Europe's finest at the tender age of 59 deserves a mention, that must be one hell of a yoga programme.

 

[Lyon]

In skiing there is the Bavarian-Spanish miracle, but I more vividly remember Maurizio De Zolt running a 50k without his feet even touching the ground. Non-Norwegians might add Alsgaard in the 30k at Lillehammer.

 

[doperhopper]

Hard to beat weightlifting, essentially all the best performances of certain era are not just suspicious, but basically 100% certified PED-based (while in cycling we still have few riders enjoying benefit of doubt).

They even changed the categories TWICE in order to start New Clean Era, and erased all the records... imagine cycling dramatically changing bike specs to effectively erase The Hour record (rather than encourage breaking it).

http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/weightlifting/16552130

 

[The Hitch]

Oh yeah, forgot Bjorndalen.

 

[ray j willings]

Fred Perry's 1936 Wimbledon win

 

[the delgados]

Re:

Fred Perry's 1936 Wimbledon win

Totally roided up, no doubt. If not, he was definitely smoking the cigarette.

 

[May0maniac]

Alexander Karelin's reign of terror.
If you don't know him, he was a HW Greco-roman wrestler from Siberia who went undefeated from 1987 to 2000.

He just ragdolled other 130kg heavy wrestlers.