The 12 Athletes Who Changed Their Sport the Most

Not the best players, but the ones who left their sport being played differently than they found it.

1

Stephen Curry

Made the three-pointer the centre of basketball and every level of the game followed.

2

Dick Fosbury

Won 1968 Olympic gold jumping backwards and nobody has high-jumped any other way since.

3

Ronda Rousey

The UFC had no women's division until her; four years later it had four of them.

4

Babe Ruth

Turned baseball from a game of bunts and stolen bases into a game about home runs.

5

Royce Gracie

Won the first UFC tournaments and forced every fighter on earth to learn grappling.

6

Bill Russell

Made defence and the blocked shot a strategy rather than an accident.

7

Serena Williams

Brought a power baseline game to women's tennis that the whole tour now plays.

8

Johan Cruyff

Player and then coach behind total football, which is still the template at Barcelona.

9

Jackie Robinson

Broke baseball's colour line in 1947 and changed who American sport was for.

10

Muhammad Ali

Invented the modern athlete as a public voice, and the pre-fight sell along with it.

11

Simone Biles

Has four skills named after her, and the code of points had to be rewritten around her.

12

Usain Bolt

Ran 9.58 and moved the ceiling of the 100m so far that nobody has approached it since.