Wayne Gretzky on David Letterman at age 25 while with Edmonton Oilers

The most dominant team athlete ever?

From Bleacherreport.com:

Michael Jordan Or Wayne Gretzky? The 30 Most Dominant Athletes Of All Time

1. Wayne Gretzky There you have it, the most dominant athlete of all time—Wayne Gretzky.

The man owned hockey. When the day you're traded is considered one of the saddest days in the history of your city, you now you were pretty good.

And Gretzky was more than pretty good, he was unbelievable.

He was the greatest scorer in the history of hockey, and, by far, the best assist man in the history of the game.

He has 93 more goals than anybody in hockey history, he has the two highest goal scoring seasons in NHL history, he has over 700 more assists than anybody else in NHL history, he is the all-time NHL leader in assists per game and points per game, he had so many points in his career that had he not scored a single goal in his entire career he would still be the NHL all-time points leader.

Do you understand how great of an achievement that is? That means that he had more assists in his career than any other NHL player had assists plus goals.

He has 10 of the top 12 single seasons of all time in points scored, 11 of the top 12 seasons of all time in assists, and four of the top 10 seasons in goals scored.

He led the league in assists a remarkable 13 straight times, and points eight straight times.He is the only player in NHL history to top 200 points in a season, and he did it four times. His number has been retired by every team throughout hockey, not to mention he won nine Hart Trophies and four Stanley Cups.

There was never a player in the history of team sports like Gretzky. He could have scored 1,500 goals if he wanted, but he didn't want to, he wanted to get his whole team involved which shows with his ridiculous assist totals and his Stanley Cup total.

I'm Michael Jordan's biggest fan, but even I'll admit that Wayne Gretzky was much more dominant than him.

Gretzky was just a man among boys.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• Wayne
• Gretzky
• Letterman
• nhl
• hockey
• Edmonton
• Oilers
• Canada

[boundaryzero]

Great quality, was this on BETAMAX? ;p

[GregWn]

@boundaryzero No. recorded in SP on Mits. SVHS recorder using very high quality tape. Thx for noticing.

[MegaSpazztic]

this was very cool, what year would this have been ?

[GregWn]

@MegaSpazztic Wayne was born in January 1961, so probably 1986.

[schwalbstar]

Letterman was young?

[jlee222ballin]

Holy Smokes.... Gretzky souns sooooo similar to Crosby..... Just close your eyes and listen to him talk to letterman... its crazy.

[JJJMMM1]

@felled

There's nothing selfish about shooting or unselfish about passing. Forwards need to score goals in any way possible, that's their job. I wouldn't say Gretzky was a "pass first player", he didn't have a simple mentality like that. What made him great was the fact that he always made correct decisions and knew what was happening on the ice - not just around him but all over the ice. He did shoot the puck a lot too.

[WaltGekko]

@GregWn It was 1986. I remember this show because I happened to be watching "Live at Five," which was WNBC-TV's (Channel 4 in New York) local 5:00 PM newscast where Marv Albert was interview Gretzky when Dave come in with his crew to interrupt the interview (with Marv asking if his favorite program at 12:30 AM was the "CBS Late Movie?"). Saw that when it happened live and again when it aired on this particular Letterman show that night.

[hasablad69]

Two words - Bobby Orr.

[speerzy11]

greatest of all time.

[felled]

Most UNSELFISH, pass first player EVER...and YET....the GREATEST, MOST PROLIFIC goal scorer of all time.

Guess that's why they call him "The Great One," as in NUMBER 1 of ALL TIME.

[furiousgeorge4477]

greatest hockey player evar

[rsvpism]

at 1:39 Gretzky lies!!!!!

[coady28]

Pro Stars, WOW that brings back memories when I was a kid. That was byfar my fav. cereal.

[DirkDiggler1611]

Never knew he said those things about the Devils.