Mini Titans of Sport

When many people think of athletes they imagine a human specimen that is bigger than them in every way. In muscles and height. When people think about what you can do if under a certain height, their mind will jump to gymnastics, motor racing, or on top a Horse winning the Derby. Smaller people are often left out based solely on their size, you only have to look at who will be missing from the Euros to see the correlation between them. However there are some great examples of short athletes who not only excel in their chosen field, but in some cases change the rule book and sit on top of the world. 

 

Lionel Messi

Talking about sitting on top of the world we should start with Argentine football messiah Lionel Messi. The player from Rosario has spent his entire career, and is likely to stay, at FC Barcelona. His story of arriving on European shores is directly related to his height interestingly.  As a young boy in Rosario he was a prodigious talent, but as he grew older his physical frailty was showing. His coach at the time Adrian Coria said “When you saw him you would think, this kid can’t play ball. He’s a dwarf he’s too fragile too small. But immediately you would realise he was born different that he was a phenomenom, and that he was going to be something different”. Messi was born with a growth hormone disorder. It was Barcelona who offered to pay his medical bills if he joined them in Catalonia. At 13 Messi moved to Spain and as we know has gone on to become the best in the world if not in history itself. 

 

Muggsy Bogues

Bogues was drafted 12th overall in 1987 and at 5ft 3 is the smallest player to ever play in the NBA. He is known most for his appearance on Space Jam unfortunately, but back in his prime he was a skilled passer of the ball with an accurate jumper. He was said to have a 44inch jump, but his hands were too small to allow him to dunk with one hand. Players such as Spudd Webb and Nate Robinson who were a bit taller were capable of dunking a feat that looked like it went against the rules of physics. Bogues actually used his height disadvantage, to his advantage, and was adept at finding the smallest gaps, which is vital when distributing the ball. Muggsy Bogues proved that height is no barrier to playing professional basketball. Editor of Betting Tip Stars Gio Muratore thinks “there won’t be a player like Mugsy again. Players are picked on hundreds of tests the Mugsy simply woul not have passed.”

 

Wes Welker

At 5ft 8 Welker may not be the shortest in this three, but when you consider he plays in the NFL it suprises you. The bone crunching sport destroys men of bigger stature, yet Wes Welker is a franchise record breaker, and all with his diminutive stature. If he gets hit hard he will surely be mince meat, but that is where his skill comes in. He simply doesn’t get hit, and for New England Patriots he squirmed his way all the way to two Super Bowl Finals. Even a sport like gridiron could not stop Welker from making his dream. I am sure like many of us he was told he would be much to small to make it or it is dangerous, but his determination must be twice the size of the others even though he is half the size in body.