The Chicago Bears fans in the house may be itching to comment on this one.
Nitpick: operant conditioning. Of course, some believe that no distinction should be made.
<AHEM-AHEM-AHEM> Football scholarships<AHEM-AHEM-AHEM>
Small heads-up. Any idea with the word “classical” in it is outmoded, primitive garbage. Especially in a field that is not physics.
I foresee the terrible scenario where a chimpanzee is pitching a perfect game in the 9th inning, and the ump calls a questionable pitch outside. The chimp goes berserk and everyone in the stadium starts running for their lives.
Oh, the humanity.
Even if that doesn’t happen, an intelligent ape would expect to be rewarded frequently, like a banana after every strikeout.
The games are long enough as it is.
If, when he first came up to the Yankees in the '40s you had asked Yogi Berra’s teammates about whether apes could be trained for sports, they would have found the question amusing. The story goes that early on when Yogi returned to the dugout his teammates would mock him by doing ape imitations (i.e. hanging from the dugout roof by their arms). They quickly forgot that he “didn’t look like a Yankee” when it became clear how good he was.
It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future. 
Hell, even a chicken can do that.
Would it be legal in any sport for a coach on the sidelines to call out commands to an ape player on the field, possibly via a helmet radio? You might not be able to teach a chimp when to use the various plays, but you probably could teach him to throw a long pass when you say “Hail Mary”, or the like. Well, assuming that he’s physically able to, at least.
How about rock climbing, or rowing? Also arm wrestling and many of the strong-man events; parkour as well (although they’d be “running” on all fours). Although not really sports, apes would be very competitive at Ninja-Warrior type events, as well as various types of acrobatics… but probably not those where points are awarded for strict technique.
While the basic idea of fighting would come naturally enough, it would take all of a second for an enraged chimp to begin biting his assailant and get a disqualification for using an illegal technique.
But… but we just did that in psych class!
I’ll be sure and let the dog know to stop drooling.
Wow, no fans of bad Fox television here? Look up “Man vs. Beast.”
They had a chimp there, he lost out to a retired Navy SEAL on an obstacle course.
EDIT: And, in a bizarre twist, that SEAL was one of the four contractors who were killed in Fallujah back in 2004.
Fascinating. I wonder if it’s out on DVD? And, if so, … What the DVD commentary is like?
I’m pretty sure I’ve seen that on YouTube. Thing is that the SEAL was giving it everything he had while the chimp was kind of ambling along, effortlessly but leisurely. I don’t think he realized that he was in a race.
I believe the chimps commentary was something along the lines of: “WAAAH! WAAAAH! WAH WAH WAHHHHHH! Eep! Eep!”
“Oh yeah? You show me in the rulebook where it says a chimpanzee can’t shoot free throws!”