I clearly remember talking with a friend at my old job at the good ol’ sub shop back in '90 or '91. We were talking about who the one marquee active players were in each sport…MLB, NBA, NHL, and NFL.
The list was pretty easy for me:
MLB - Jose Canseco (believe it or not)
NBA - Michael Jordan
NHL - Wayne Gretzky
NFL - Joe Montana
I was pondering the same question for 2007 and I can not come up with one single player that I could label “marquee” for any of the four sports. Pujols? A-Rod? Farve? O’Neil? Bryant? Crosby? Brady? Those are just a few names but I really can’t come up with one list of four names.
Basketball, it’s still Jordan. Prolly always will be. Everybody else is fighting for second.
Football = Peyton Manning
Baseball–dunno that they really have one at the moment.
Hockey–do they still have hockey? I’ll go with Gretsky, since he’s about the only hockey guy I can name.
Golf = Tiger Woods.
Pro Wrestling= Hulk Hogan. Yeah, he sucked and helped kill regional promotions, but the guy had a license to print money.
I was just thinking about what I would say if someone asked that exact question. I guess I’d describe the “marquee” player as the face of the league, the one player that stands out above all else. That automatically makes him a star, and it eliminates any off-field (ice) shenanigans…steroids, shootings and such. In 1990, when I thought of basketball, I thought of Jordan. When I thought of football, I thought of Montana.
Either I’m older, or it just doesn’t seem to be that way anymore (or both).
Not to sound like a homer, but Ripken is the last baseball marquee player I can think of, but he’s been out since '01.
So it’s a subjective thing, right? I mean, you thought Canseco was the marquee player of 1990, while someone else might easily have thought of Ripken or Nolan Ryan or Ryne Sandberg or someone else (Barry Bonds!). That being the case, this might go better in IMHO.
And MHO are as follows, using your criteria about who comes to mind when I think of a particular sport:
NBA: LeBron James or Dwyane Wade
MLB: Barry Bonds or Albert Pujols
NHL: Sidney Crosby or Alex Ovechkin
NFL: Peyton Manning or LaDanian Tomlinson
I don’t feel it’s quite there for Wade yet. In the two commercials I’ve seen him in he had had to be mentioned by name during the actual commercial!
Car commercial: he gets out of a car, a kid goes “Look, it’s Dwyane Wade”
Barkley commercial: “Look, I know you’re Dwyane Wade and all” (paraphrased)
Poor Guy! While he did lead the current NBA champions, I wouldn’t call him recognizable. LeBron James, however, I expect the Cavs to go 82-0 with all the hype he gets.
As far as the OP, I don’t think any of today’s stars match the mystique of the Big Three listed, but it is an admittedly exceptional trio. Heck I’d be hard-pressed to name an NBA, NHL, or NFL star bigger than that trio even in the past.
NBA - Michael Jordan (yep. Russell and Chamberlain aren’t as popular as Jordan)
NHL - Wayne Gretzky (yep)
NFL - Joe Montana (maybe Unitas or Jim Brown, but Montana belongs in that company)
It’s somewhat unusual that in 1990 you had the great hockey player ever, in Gretzky, still at the height of his powers, and arguably the greatest basketball player ever and certainly basketball’s greatest STAR ever, at the height of his powers. It’s quite a coincidence. That normally will not happen.
Today I think the NFL’s no-questions-asked marquee man is Peyton Manning. In the other sports, however, there’s no clear answer. Sidney Crosby is great but is, at this point, unaccomplished; the league’s MVP this year is obviously Martin Brodeur, and he’s a Hall of Famer, but he’s not really a big name star the way a scorer can be. Baseball has no clear #1 guy; Derek Jeter is its most popular player, Barry Bonds its most famous, Albert Pujols its best. The NBA has several guys who are looking to be the next megastar, and it’ll likely be Wade or James, but they haven’t decided which it will be.
The first two are easy picks. Few people will agree with the third pick. I do not even think he was the best player on his team or the best quarterback while he played. Jerry Rice was the more talented player. Elway and Marino were more talented QBs. Lawrence Taylor dominated his position more than any other player of the 80s.
I would take Unitas and Brown and Walter Payton over Montana without a second thought. There are many others as good. If you are basing it on his success than Brady is currently at least his equal and he does not have Rice to throw to. It is telling the QB that followed Montana is also in the Hall of Fame. The Team made Montana a great QB instead of just a very good one.
I think everyone has missed the biggest player of both baseball and football in 1990:
Bo Knows who I’m talking about.
For further proof, I bring you the ProStars cartoon from 1991 (ProStars - Wikipedia). In it, superhero athletes protect the world from bad dudes. Wayne Gretzky represented hockey, Michael Jordan for basketball and Bo Jackson for baseball and football.
As for today, Peyton Manning is the only clearcut winner. And I’d say Lebron James is a season or two away.
NASCAR is so competitive that you really can’t pluck one guy out right now. Several years ago
you could possibly argue Jeff Gordon, or (before he died) Dale Sr., but not right now. 20 guys
probably have a realistic shot at the championship, and if it’s not 20 it’s 10 at least.
Jackson was a major media star for a couple of years because he was so unusual, but certainly was not THE marquee player in either sport he played. He wasn’t a particularly noteworthy baseball player, and his football career was too short to matter. It’s telling he won no major awards in either pro sport, won no championships, and didn’t have any important individual achievements. A brief measure of pop stardom does not put him in a class with The Great One.
I mean, you thought Canseco was the marquee player of 1990, while someone else might easily have thought of Ripken or Nolan Ryan or Ryne Sandberg or someone else (Barry Bonds!). That being the case, this might go better in IMHO.