What Record in Sport Will Never Be Broken?

SoxJox

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Am putting this in the General Sports forum because I'm hoping it will generate discussion that will span a multitude of sports.
 
I've seen many records set and broken in my lifetime, and I've read of others before my time.  It got me to thinking what records might be out there that will never be broken.
 
In some ways the improved athleticism of the participants, and in other ways the dynamics or evolving rules of the contest itself have contributed to the ever-increasing levels of performance.
 
But for my nomination, just the opposite is true - especially as it relates to the rules of the contest, which actually held down what otherwise would have been an even greater performance:
 
Pete Maravich's NCAA scoring record of 3,667 points in NCAA Div I basketball.  His 3-year [varsity] career average was 44.2 PPG.
 
Two rules held him back from reaching even greater heights:
 
1) At the time, freshman were not permitted to participate in varsity sports.  Thus, his career consisted of only 3 years.
2) There was no 3-point line when he played college ball.  Supposedly, LSU coach Dale Brown plotted the Pistols' entire shooting history  (I've not been able to track down a copy of the summary) and calculated that had the 3-point line been in play, Maravich would have averaged a jaw-dropping 13 3-pointers and 57 PPG.
 
The type of talent that could produce this level will surely opt for the NBA after one or two years in the future.  It's a record that will never be broken.
 
As a second place: Oklahoma State's total of 35 national championships in wrestling.
 
I'd like to hold the discussion to college and pro sports.  Otherwise, we introduce the likelihood of endless possibilities, such as Washington HS (Sioux Falls, SD) record 35 state football championships.
 

PaulinMyrBch

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Pitching records that preceded the 5 man rotation. The most starts any pitcher made in 2013 was 34. Even if a team dared go back to a 4 man rotation there would be a period for each pitcher where they skipped a start or had some down time. So no way they get enough starts to break these records.
 
Pitcher, most wins in a season (dead ball era): Old Ross Hadburn - 59
Pitcher, most wins in a season (live ball era): Denny McLain, and others - 31
Pitcher, most losses in a season (live ball era): Paul Derringer -27
Pitcher wins all time: Cy Young - 511
 

PaulinMyrBch

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I'd also throw in Wooden's national title streak at UCLA. Can't see the current era with freshman leaving allowing a team to have a long dynasty.
 

Kliq

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If we are counting stock car racing, Richard Petty's 200 wins is the equivalent of Cy Young's 511 wins.
 
Here is a really good one: Wlit Chamberlain averaged 48.5 minutes per game in his 1961-62 season. Wilt played every minute of every game, except for the final 8 minutes of a game when he got ejected for a technical foul.
 
Hack Wilson's 191 RBI record is interesting. Unlike Cy Young's record or a lot of the old baseball stats, this one seems attainable, yet it is going on year 84 of existence. The way lineups are designed are different now , so maybe that will put the record out of reach.
 

Blacken

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Wilt Chamberlain's 100 points. The game's slowed down enough and competition gotten tight enough that it's not gonna happen.
 

PC Drunken Friar

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Blacken said:
Wilt Chamberlain's 100 points. The game's slowed down enough and competition gotten tight enough that it's not gonna happen.
See, i think it could be beaten. I mean Kobe recently had 81points. I can imagine a triple OT game or something that gets someone the record. Likely? Hell no, but certainty possible.
 

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pedro1918 said:
Goaltender Glen Hall started and completed 502 consecutive games for the Black Hawks.  As a side note, he wore a mask in exactly 0 of those games.
I see the pictures of those goalies with no mask and I'm just blown away. It's like a catcher wearing no mask. Insanity.

As for the record question, the first thing I thought of was Cy Young's win total. Completely untouchable. We might not see more than a handful of pitchers even reach 300 wins the rest of our lives. 511? Another galaxy.
 

deanx0

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Sam Crawford's 309 career triples.  Musial is the closest player that played post WWII and his career total is 177. Carl Crawford is the active career leader with 117.
 

johnmd20

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PC Drunken Friar said:
See, i think it could be beaten. I mean Kobe recently had 81points. I can imagine a triple OT game or something that gets someone the record. Likely? Hell no, but certainty possible.
 
Absolutely. It *can* happen. Cy Young's and complete games will never even be remotely touched. Even Joe D's hitting streak can be beaten. It is possible. But I think the Cy Young win record is so completely out of reach.
 

Kliq

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Rasheed Wallace had 41 technical fouls in 80 games in 2000-01.
 

SoxJox

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Speaking of The Stilt, despite the possibility of claiming it as a "sport", we won't accept his assertion of having slept with 20,000 women. That's a record many might like to have a go at, but likely would never reach.
 

Deathofthebambino

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Some great choices so far, but I'm kind of surprised to see these two not mentioned yet, considering we've had a lot of records related to wins and pitching.  Both are by Nolan Ryan:
 
Most no-hitters:  7.   He also holds the record in the American league with 6.  The next closest guy is Sandy Koufax with 4.  I'm willing to bet everything I own that nobody will ever get 8.  It's just too hard to get 1, never mind 2, never mind fucking 7. Only 3 other guys have ever thrown 3 (Larry Corcoran, Bob Feller and Cy Young) and there are maybe 2 dozen that have more than 1.  It's an insane statistic and the first one I think of in any of these conversations.
 
Most career strikeouts (pitcher):  Again, Nolan Ryan with 5,712.  While this records seems more attainable than the no-hitter record, it's pretty far out there, given pitch counts and such.  To reach that many strikeouts, someone will need to strikeout 300 batters for NINETEEN seasons.  19.  The way today's game is, I don't foresee a pitcher striking out 200 for 19 straight years, and that would still leave them almost 2,000 strikeouts short of the mark.  Just an incredible statistic that I don't think will ever be touched.  The next closest is Randy Johnson at 4,875 and then Clemens at 4,672, over 1,000 short of Ryan.  Unless Jamie Moyer is still pitching, the active leader is CC Sabathia at 2,389.  If he has an amazing season, he still probably won't have HALF as many as Ryan.
 

Deathofthebambino

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I love these topics, so I might have about 10 posts in a row here. 
 
How about the career records of stealing home base.  I'll bet most people would never even know it's held by Ty Cobb, but how many would know he did it 54 times.  You can count on one hand the number of times it happens in a season nowadays. The national league record is 33 by Max Carey.
 

cannonball 1729

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Section30 said:
Age and longevity record in baseball. Satchel Paige played pro ball from 1926 to 1961(not counting one day contracts and exhibition games), making his MLB debut at age 42. Playing triple A ball at age 56.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satchel_Paige
 
Satch also appeared in a major league game at 59.  He threw three shutout innings against the Sox.
 
Longevity, though, is one of the records that I think will fall.  In the last five years alone, we've seen two 49 year-olds in the bigs; I wouldn't be surprised to see the occasional player start to break 50 in the next 10-20 years.  From there, who knows?
 
I actually think that we're going to see more 300 game winners in the future for exactly the same reason.  In the olden days, you had to win at least 20 games a year for about 15 years; as career lengths start to reach 30 years (like Moyer's), a pitcher will only have to win 10 a year to hit 300.  Jamie Moyer absolutely would have been a 300 game winner if he hadn't been so bad in his 20s; he won exactly 6 games from ages 26-29, despite which he still finished with 269 wins for his career.
 
For unbreakable records, I'll add the 1899 Cleveland Spiders' record of 134 losses in a season.  It always seems weird to me that their record doesn't seem to count and people are only willing to observe the '62 Mets record; I know a lot of the statistics changed in 1901 and again in 1920, but team wins and losses are pretty much era-independent.
 
This one isn't UNBREAKABLE in the same sense as Cy Young's records or even Joe D's hit streak, but I have to throw in Mike Marshall's 106 appearances in a season.  Relievers seem to be throwing a huge number of games nowadays, but even in the era of the reliever, no one else has ever broken 94.
 

snowmanny

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Eight MVPs in a row (and nine in ten years) in a major sport.  Now someone could be in the conversation eight years in a row (LeBron James…Mike Trout) but actually win?  I don't see it, and I'm amazed it happened in my lifetime.
 

SoxJox

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cannonball 1729 said:
 

 Mike Marshall's 106 appearances in a season.  
 
Another interesting aspect about that year - 1974 - his teammate Andy Messersmith - finished 2nd to Marshall in the CY voting - one of only 3 times teammates have finished 1-2 in CY voting.  The other two times were Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling, in 2000 and 2002.
 

Kliq

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cannonball 1729 said:
 

 

 
For unbreakable records, I'll add the 1899 Cleveland Spiders' record of 134 losses in a season.  It always seems weird to me that their record doesn't seem to count and people are only willing to observe the '62 Mets record; I know a lot of the statistics changed in 1901 and again in 1920, but team wins and losses are pretty much era-independent.

 
 
Off the top of my head, but I believe the Spiders 1899 season shouldn't be considered the record because it was achieved under such dubious circumstances. The owners of the Cleveland franchise also owned the St. Louis franchise. In order to make the St. Louis team a dominant force, they traded or sold (I can't remember which) all of the valuable Cleveland players to St. Louis. That left the Cleveland team without any capable players and led to the 134 losses. They drew so low that they decided to cancel all home games and play the last 30 or so games on the road. Instead of the Mets just being a crappy expansion team, the Cleveland team was intentionally stripped of its players by its owners, which just seems dishonest when talking about worst team ever.
 

SoxJox

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John Stockton's record of 15,806 assists is likely beyond reach.  To break it a player would have to average 9.2 APG for every 82-game season for 20 years 
 
Jason Kidd, you say?  Over 4,000 shy.
 
But, but Steve Nash...well over 6,000 short.
 
Kliq said:
If we are counting stock car racing, Richard Petty's 200 wins is the equivalent of Cy Young's 511 wins.
 
He also won 27 times in 1967 alone, including 10 straight at one point.
 

Jnai

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Of the two types of result "won't be broken because this guy was the best ever" and "won't be broken because the rules/strategy of the sport have changed so dramatically", I find the former a lot more satisfying than the latter.
 
I mean, sure, no one will ever win 60 games again, but that's not really about the quality of the players.
 

RoyHobbs

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Baseball's traditional counting stats seem hard to touch. Young's 511, for the reasons stated. Rose's 4,256 -- it is hard to envision a hitter who's so consistent for so long coming onto the scene, and staying there, and producing and producing. I think of the hitting machines I've seen in my life -- Boggs, Gwynn -- and those guys wouldn't have done it. If only Ichiro came along sooner...but he didn't.
 

SoxinPA

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Edwin Moses winning 122 straight races in the 400 meter hurdles. In track and field, there is so much that can go wrong in any race, from a bad start to a small tweak of a muscle, to some other guy just catching you at the wrong time in your training cycle. To maintain elite status for ten years is remarkable. Plus, you know, maybe the other guy's chemist is just better than yours...
 

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SoxJox said:
Speaking of The Stilt, despite the possibility of claiming it as a "sport", we won't accept his assertion of having slept with 20,000 women. That's a record many might like to have a go at, but likely would never reach.
 
That's 2 women a day for almost 28 years, and you have to assume he likely repeated a few.   Man that record is way more exhausting than Ripken's
 

Euclis20

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SoxJox said:
John Stockton's record of 15,806 assists is likely beyond reach.  To break it a player would have to average 9.2 APG for every 82-game season for 20 years 
 
Jason Kidd, you say?  Over 4,000 shy.
 
But, but Steve Nash...well over 6,000 short.
 
He also won 27 times in 1967 alone, including 10 straight at one point.
 
Chris Paul is only about 100 assists or so behind Stockton's pace.  He still has an extremely small chance to match Stockton's durability and effectiveness through age 40, but that's a record that could fall someday.  I'd say it's less safe than most listed here.
 

moondog80

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cannonball 1729 said:
I actually think that we're going to see more 300 game winners in the future for exactly the same reason.  In the olden days, you had to win at least 20 games a year for about 15 years; as career lengths start to reach 30 years (like Moyer's), a pitcher will only have to win 10 a year to hit 300.  Jamie Moyer absolutely would have been a 300 game winner if he hadn't been so bad in his 20s; he won exactly 6 games from ages 26-29, despite which he still finished with 269 wins for his career.
 
Yep, the early start means everything.  Entering his age 24 year (same age as Allen Webster),  CC Sabathia already had 51 wins.  Now he only needs to average 12 a year until he's 40 (8 more years) and he gets to 300.
 

CaptainLaddie

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I actually think Cy Young has a much harder record to break than wins -- losses.  316 losses in his career means that he wasn't just a pitcher who got a ton of starts (800+), he was bad enough to lose 300+ of them, but still good enough to keep running in out there every 3 days.
 

Ramon AC

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FWIW Ryan came within 24 losses of Young's record.

Dimaggio's streak still looks unbeatable 73 years later. But I'll eat my hat if anyone beats Pedro's 1999 1.39 FIP.
 

DJnVa

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How about Wilt's 27.2 rebounds per game in a single season? Leader this year has 13.7.
 

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evensteven said:
Cal Ripkens consecutive games record probably won't be broken.
C. 1990 Sports Illustrated ran an article on this topic. Gehrig's consecutive games played topped the list, and they discussed extensively how Ripken had no chance at it.

It's an odd record because once you get 8years in there's an impetus to sneak you into the game briefly to keep the steak alive.

Pete Rose's hit record deserves a huge asterisk, imo, because he managed himself and played himself long after he deserved to be in the lineup (south of 100 ops+ most years from 1980 on while not playing a premium defensive position).
 

worm0082

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SumnerH said:
C. 1990 Sports Illustrated ran an article on this topic. Gehrig's consecutive games played topped the list, and they discussed extensively how Ripken had no chance at it.

It's an odd record because once you get 8years in there's an impetus to sneak you into the game briefly to keep the steak alive.

Pete Rose's hit record deserves a huge asterisk, imo, because he managed himself and played himself long after he deserved to be in the lineup (south of 100 ops+ most years from 1980 on while not playing a premium defensive position).
 
Huge asterisk?  He only managed himself as a player for just over the last 2 seasons.  When he became a player manager late in 1984 he was only 127 hits shy of Cobb. He managed himself for a grand total of 217 games.  In 1985 in 119 games he hit .265 with a OBP of just under .400. He was still a productive player going into that final year in 86 when he finally fell off the cliff. (He already had the record by then). 
 
M

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I love threads like this.
 
The 100-point game,  while incredible, requires such a brief statistical fluke that I think it could be broken someday.  Wilt Chamberlain (feats of virility aside) has many other records that may never see a serious challenge.  For example:
  • The 7 top NBA seasons for Rebounds are all owned by Wilt.  The top 18 (18!) NBA seasons for Rebounds are owned by either Wilt or Bill Russell, and the top 24 by those two and Jerry Lucas.  All but one of those 24 occurred before 1970.  The game and its players have changed dramatically.  I think his 2149 rebounds in the 1960-61 season are a more untouchable record than 100 points in a single game.  In the last 25 years, the closest is Rodman's 1530 in '91-92.  And the season hasn't gotten any longer.
  • Even if the season does get longer, his 25.7 rebounds/game that season, or better yet his 27.2 rebounds/game the previous season, will hold up just as well.
  • That 1961-62 season (the one in which he had the 100-point game), Wilt averaged 50.4 points per game.  50!  The closest since Wilt was Jordan in 86-87 (the year he dropped 63 on the Celtics, in the playoffs, on the road), and he averaged 37.1/game, barely 75% of the scoring.  Kobe's best season was 35.4.  LeBron's best so far is 31.4.
  • Likewise, Wilt's total of 4029 points that year seems pretty safe; Jordan got 3041 and Kobe 2832.
  • As you might expect, Wilt also dominates in # of field goals made, with the top 4 spots, 7 of the top 11, and his 1,597 FGs in 62-63 is pretty well higher than Kareem's 1,159 from 71-72.
  • In 1972-73, Wilt had a FG% of 72.7%.  That's a full 4% higher than the next-best, also held by Wilt.  This one is under a little bit of threat, given how people might be able to game it - Tyson Chandler got as high as 67.9% two years ago.  But there have only been 39 player-seasons that were 60% or higher in the history of the league.
  • Wilt's record Player Efficiency Rating of 31.82 is probably under significant threat from LeBron, who has come within spitting distance 4 times (as did Jordan).  But Wilt still owns the top 2 spots and 3 of the top 6.
 
About the only thing Bill Russell was better at than Wilt Chamberlain was having better teammates.
 

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PC Drunken Friar said:
See, i think it could be beaten. I mean Kobe recently had 81points. I can imagine a triple OT game or something that gets someone the record. Likely? Hell no, but certainty possible.
 
I think this is a more interesting conversation: what seemingly unbreakable record will be broken?
 

moretsyndrome

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Chief Wilson: 36 triples.  Second place is 31 (happened twice in the 19th century).  If more advances are made in positioning, it's going to be really tough.
 
It's my favorite play in baseball, so I'm hoping somebody breaks it, but in the last 50 years only one player has gotten past 21 in a year (Granderson w/23, '07).
 
23's not even very close.  That's the rough equivalent of saying the high mark in HR over 50 years of trying to catch Maris was 39.
 
I also find it entertaining, in a Jayson Stark sorta way, that Home Run Baker shows up on the top 100 seasons of triples twice.