Michael Phelps won 8 golds. What does/ should this suggest ?

True, I think that Michael Phelps is a really dominant, but its really debatable whether or not he is the BEST because there are other athletes that excelled in the sport that they played like for example Michael Jordan and Wayne Gretzky and they didn’t have a chance to compete for 8 medals. So maybe Michael is one of the best but maybe not one of the best athletes of all time

Sweeping statements like that are fraught with problems. He dominates a single aspect of a single sport in one point in history, so if we apply all those caveats, then yes. But “athlete” can mean many things, and if we were to place him on a basketball court or into the 100-meter dash or in the Tour de France, his dominance would quickly fade.

Phelps, like all Olympic athletes, has trained his body for many years for one extremely specialized function, and his commitment should be lauded. But one athlete’s “dominance” cannot be compared to another’s any more accurately than you can say a hammer is a more dominant tool for hammering than a table saw.

Well, he is the most dominant Olympic athlete in history because he has won the most Gold medals at the Olympics.

I think the most dominant olympian should be one who has a gold in multiple events