The 10 Most Unbreakable Individual Records in Sports

I'll begin by stating the obvious; Ichiro Suzuki is an anomaly in the MLB.

You would agree if you looked at the single season record for most hits: the previous record being set in 1920, the previous second place record being set in 1930 and the previous third place record being set in 1929.

The point I'm making is: nobody in the modern era has 250+ hit seasons—it just doesn't happen.

Take another look at the most hits in a single season, the Top 20 consistent of 14 players from before 1940.

Of the other six, four different players—Don Mattingly tied at No. 18; Darin Erstad tied at No. 13; Wade Boggs tied at No. 13 and Inchiro Suzuki at No.1, No. 10 and No. 18.

I'm done.

If you don't know anything about Greco Roman Wrestling, do not be worried, neither do I.

What I do understand is how dominant Alexander Karelin was.

He did not lose a single international competition from 1987 to 2000.

To clarify, he won the Gold Medal for Super Heavyweight class in 1988, 1992 and 1996, while also winning Gold at the World Championships from 1989 to 1999—that is nine Championships in a row.

There was none held in ‘92 and ‘96.

To compare to other Wrestling records, there is none.

Makharbek Khadartsev, won five freestyle Golds in a row in 90kg division and Alexander Medved won three Olympic gold medals in freestyle competition, but neither dominated in every international competition.

Karelin destroyed everybody in European Championships, Worlds and Olympics, until 2000—a 13-year span of pure unadulterated reign.

Due to the time we live in, I think this is impossible to break.

For one, a Championship fighter, of any of the four major titles now defends his crown maybe two or three times a year.

So, let's say the WBA Champion, to defend his title 25 times, he's have to keep it for about ten years and let's be honest what fighter would be so cautious as to only be content with his one title seeing as how there are four others?

It ain't happenin’!

On top of the fact the competition field is much deeper with boxing completely worldwide and if you're trying to point to boxing’s decline, that just reiterates my point.

Now, you have Champions fighting twice a year: how many fighters have a record of 25 KOs for God's sake?

(Not to mention most fighters have to attain a record of 25 win or more before they even get a title shot).

I doubt it's going to be broken for the sheer fact of timelines being so much shorter today than they ever have been.

It's a little biased to put an active streak as one of the most unbeatable records ever on this list, but consider average life span of a Tennis player, at the ATP level—if you enter at 18, you will probably expire by 28.

The timeline for a tennis player’s prime is no more than a decade as well, and that's for the legends only, for most players it's around five years.

Do you know how many Grand Slams are played in a single season?

It's four, on three different surfaces.

So, to get to at least the semifinal round of a Grand Slam tournament, you have to win five matches in a row and then do that on three different surfaces for nearly five-years.

The previous record for most consecutive appearances at a SLam semifinal was ten, held by Ivan Lendl.

Federer has nearly doubled the previous streak record.

Now, for any streak in any sport, could you imagine a doubling?

Reaching the Semifinal of a Grand Slam Tournament is not the same as winning it, or getting to the final and oh by the way Federer holds the record for most consecutive Slam Finals Appearances, as well.

The Slam Semifinal is difficult for any player to get to on every surface, factoring that in.

In comparison, this would be like a RB in the NFL consistently rushing for 100-yards a game.

To put that into perspective, if a RB gets 25 carries a game, he only needs to average four-yards a carry—not that easy—yet not extremely difficult.

Barry Sanders holds the record for most consecutive games with at least 100-yards, at 14, however, that is a season, and a player can have a hot season, can't he?

For five seasons this would be like a Quarertback throwing for more than 4,000 yards, to bring to light, Peyton Manning threw for more than 4,000 passing yards in six consecutive seasons and Emmitt Smith rushed for more than 1,000 yards in eleven consecutive seasons.

By this point, you may have figured out not only do you need to keep up a level of consistent greatness; you also have to stay injury free and getting back to surfaces.

It’s like a RB playing eight games in a dome with turf and then eight games away on real grass, outside, for five seasons.

Perhaps in time, we will see players playing till they are 60-years-old, but with the modern era and bigger payouts, it seems no player will have the desire to play every game, especially with a sore elbow or something else not entirely right.

This is why records for most consecutive games set by Cal Ripken is highly unlikely to be surpassed.

The MLB is not going to suddenly have 40 more regular season games, right?

Even then, what are the chances a player would not miss a game in 16-years?

I say, the chances a player comes along and plays in 4,000 games are slim to none.

Maybe by the year 2095 it could happen, but 2,632 consecutive starts?

Let's talk jobs people: how many people do you know that have gone 16-years without taking a single sick day?

I know, zero.

The longest streak I ever heard was a lawyer would didn't take a day off at his firm for eight-years, but not 16.

Unless a regular season NBA game is extended to 60-minutes, this record is unlikely to be touched.

For the record, when Wilt “The Stilt” retired in 1974, he owned the record for most points scored in a single game and held the top five points scored in a single game.

This was back when three-point shots were non-existent.

Now, I could have put Wilt owning the five most points scored in a single game at one time as the unbeatable record, but I'll parlay it to this: Wilt Chamberlain's PPG in a single season, an average of 50.4 in the 61-62 season.

Do you want to know the second most PPG in a single season?

It's Wilt's 44.8.

…And did I mention there were no three pointers during this time?

Not to say Chamberlain was a good three-point man, for he was not, but just adding how no current player could sniff the 50 PPG with the ability to shoot three-pointers, Kobe never will.

Everyone should know who Pele is.

Even if you have never watched a full game of European football, you better damn well know of Pele.

In 827 official matches, as in, no friendlies and not the games he played in the United States Soccer League, he scored 765 goals.

That's an average of 0.92 goals per game…

Now, let's look at this: how many soccer matches end at 1-0, 2-1, 3-1, etc?

A crap load.

So, how many times can one player of the eleven on the field, average close to a goal per game, in 827 games?

Nobody! That's who, except Pele, God of Football.

Although, there have been a few players who have averaged more than a goal per game, these would have been accomplished in sub par league play, such as Josef Bican, who was a great player, but played most of his career in Austria and Czechoslovakia, in the 30s and 40s.

In the Brazil league, Pele’s plays were much more revered and as proof, he was on three FIFA World Cup Teams.

In 1941, to clarify, if a player was walked in a game, he would have recorded zero hits, thus, the fact that for 56 consecutive games, a pitcher from the opposing team gave him at least one fair pitch is mind boggling in it.

How many times have we seen A-Rod have a game where he went up to the plate three or four times and was walked every turn?

Could you imagine 56 consecutive games where that didn't happen?

I couldn't.

Current formats and I'm sure unless intentional walks are made illegal, will keep Dimaggio's record alive, for possible thousands upon thousands of years.

In fairness, the human race has only got like 200-years left tops, right?

Moving on: Dimaggio broke the previous record by 11.

Counting the margin from the record set and the previous record, Dimaggio destroyed the record by 24 percent.

That is called a shatter, ladies and gents.

I'm not a great fan of cricket; it's hard to get games for me, but I do my best whenever there's an international tournament going on.

I understand the basics and when I learned of Donald Bradman, it took me a minute to gather my thoughts on how much of a sports God he was.

An average of 99.94 in any career field is considered mythical—a surgeon wishes he had that kind of success rate.

Now, any ordinary person would probably like to ask how many games he played and how many times he hit the ball…fair enough.

Bradman played in 52 matches and batted in 80 innings.

Looking at the list of batting averages, second place goes to Graeme Pollock, who had a career test batting average of 60.97 and if that doesn't shock you, he played in 23 matches and batted in 41 innings.

Are you impressed, yet?

Donald Bradman scored 6,996 runs, in the same exact time period, Wally Hammong scored 7,249 runs and his batting average was 58.45.

Only a radical—and I mean radical—change in hockey and the way it's played could produce another Bobby Orr; simply put, defensemen are not meant to win Art Ross Trophies.

They sure can, in theory, but in practice only one man has achieved this and he did it twice.

The NHL, like many sports leagues, hands out trophies to more offensive players than defensive players.

Some trophies, like the goal scoring title and the points title, are only a theoretical possibility for a d-man to win them, as in, a defenseman can win an Art Ross, but it'll never happen, especially when that player wins defensive MVP honors.

I'll compare to other sports here: it would be like in the NBA, when a player wins the scoring title and defensive player of the year in the same season, there was in fact a player that did that—Michael Jordan.

So you already can take to heart that Bobby Orr was, I could have just as easily posted his eight consecutive Norris Trophy wins as an unbeatable record as well, but the two Art Ross trophy victories will be forever unmatched.

To give even more insight to the legendary greatness that was Bobby Orr, he won his second Art Ross Trophy playing with one reconstructed knee—it was his fourth last season in the league, his last three were seldom played.

Orr was also fifth in goals that season he won his second Art Ross Trophy.

Now, you might ask, what a forward in the NHL would have to do to somewhat equal the accomplishment?

Well, nothing could really equal the accomplishment.

When Mark Moseley won the NFL League MVP, as a kicker, nothing a RB could do to match that exact accomplishment—for the record, Sergei Fedorov in hockey won the Hart Trophy in ‘93-’94 and the Frank Selke Trophy while scoring 50+ goals.

He did not, however, win the points scoring or goal scoring title that season.

Only one defensive player, since Orr, has led his own team in points: Ray Bourque, ‘86-’87.

Bourque wasn't top three in points scored that season; Bobby Orr came second in points; scored three times, all behind his own teammate, Phil Esposito, who undeniably benefited from Orr's presence.

Bobby Orr was the complete player, not many players can hold that label in any sport—perhaps Marshall Faulk in the NFL, Walter Payton or Babe Ruth in the MLB, however Babe Ruth didn't lead the league in home runs while leading in strikeouts as a pitcher—that would be a Bobby Orr accomplishment.

It's just too much to grasp really.

I could write a 5,000-word essay on how Bobby Orr's two Art Ross trophies are the greatest accomplishment in sports history, but sadly, nobody here would have the time to read it.

To re-iterate, Bobby Orr led the league in points scored twice and was top two in point scored five teams total—no other defenseman has ever been top three in points scored…ever!