Alex Ovechkin’s pursuit of Wayne Gretzky has us thinking about sport’s unreachable records
The 2024 NHL season is underway, and one of the major storylines on the ice this season concerns one player’s pursuit of a record previously thought unreachable.
Washington Capitals star Alex Ovechkin began the year 40 goals shy of Wayne Gretzky’s all-time mark of 894 career NHL goals. But with Ovechkin off to a hot start this season the Capitals star is now just 15 goals shy of Gretzky, with 879 career goals. Goal #16 would put Ovechkin atop the leaderboard.
That pursuit got us thinking here at SB Nation.
What are the remaining unreachable goals in sports?
Here is our list.
Jerry Rice career receiving yards
Jerry Rice has 22,895 receiving yards, which is 5,403 yards ahead of second place Larry Fitzgerald, and 9,192 yards ahead of Julio Jones who is not yet retired and thus the leading active receiver on the all-time receiving yards list. If we look through players that have played less than ten seasons and thus could still have some big numbers in them, we get to Tyreek Hill. He has 10,601 yards, which means he’s not even halfway to Rice.
Here’s an even more impressive stat from Jerry Rice. He turned 30 on October 13, 1992. Since that date, he has hauled in 13,546 receiving yards. If we make a career out of just Jerry Rice’s receiving yards after he turned 30, he would rank 17th. And let’s not forget that his post-30 career includes his age 35 season lost to a torn ACL!
What makes these all the more GOAT-level numbers is the era in which he accomplished all this. Defensive players could do just about whatever they wanted to offensive players. The league wasn’t doing everything it could to protect quarterbacks and wide receivers and boost the offensive performances. While Joe Montana, Steve Young, and others were getting destroyed by pass rushers, Rice was having to fight off high quality defensive backs that could get extra physical with him. If we gave Rice the rules we see now to protect offensive players, he very well might be up over 30,000 career yards.
Bruce Smith 200 career sacks
Bruce Smith’s 200 career sacks might never be reached.
Smith holds that record by just two over Reggie White, but there is a substantial drop-off after those two sack masters. Kevin Greene is third on the all-time list with 160 career sacks.
The active leader? Von Miller with 126.5.
Cameron Jordan is next on the active list with 118.5 sacks, but both Miller and Jordan are nearing the end of their respective careers. Pittsburgh Steelers star T.J. Watt might have the most realistic shot, as he currently has 103 sacks. But he would need to put up some monster numbers to get within true striking distance of Smith at the top. For example, Watt would need to match or surpass his yearly average of 15.5 sacks for more than six more seasons to reach Smith.
Emmitt Smith 18,355 career rushing yards
When Emmitt Smith walked away from the NFL at the end of his long career, he did as the league’s all-time rushing leader with 18,355 yards to his credit.
He also did so as a member of the Arizona Cardinals, but that is a story for another time.
The league’s active rushing leader? That would be Derrick Henry, who is coming of an outstanding season with the Baltimore Ravens. In his first year in the AFC North Henry ran for 1,921 yards as the Ravens won the division.
That brought Henry’s career mark to 11,423 yards, 6,932 yards shy of Smith’s record.
At his career average of 1,428 yards per season, Henry would need another five seasons of such production to reach that mark. With Henry about to play his tenth NFL season, it is a possibility, but he would need to keep up an incredible pace to reach Smith.
Beyond Henry, the next active leaders are Ezekiel Elliott (9,130), Joe Mixon (7,428) and Saquon Barkley (7,216).
Wayne Gretzky 1,963 career assists and 2,857 career points
Ovechkin’s pursuit of Gretzky’s 894 career goals may see the Capitals star catch The Great One.
But some of Gretzky’s other records, in particular his career assist mark and his career points mark, are likely out of reach.
For example, when it comes to career assists Sidney Crosby is the active leader, with 1,015. That puts Crosby 948 shy of Gretzky’s mark.
Crosby is also in his 20th NHL season, and has already hinted at the end of his career.
The Pittsburgh Penguins star is also the active leader in points, with 1,613. He trails Gretzky by 1,244, and again, Crosby is in his 20th NHL season.
A player to watch might be Connor McDavid. The Edmonton Oilers star just joined the 1,000-point club, becoming the fourth-fastest player in league history to reach that milestone.
With 1,001 career points, McDavid would need to average at least 100 points for more than 18 seasons to reach Gretzky’s points record.
Cy Young’s 749 career complete games
The modern MLB has seen a growth in the use of relief pitchers. From the tracking of pitch counts to monitor the wear and strain on player’s arms, to the use of players at various stages of games to either close them out, or even get a single hitter out, has seen the complete game become a thing of the past.
Which means that Cy Young’s mark of 749 complete games, barring a massive shift in how the sport is played, will never be reached.
Why? The active leader in complete games right now is Justin Verlander.
With 26.
Don Bradman’s career test cricket batting average of 99.9
It’s impossible to appreciate just how unbreakable this record is because of how few people follow cricket in the United States — but I’m going to try. The greatest modern cricket player, India’s Sachin Tendulkar had a career batting average of 53.4 runs-per-game, which is truly astonishing.
Australian legend Donald Bradman almost doubled it.
When it comes to RBIs in baseball Albert Pujols is in second place with 2,218 and Hank Aaron owns the record at 2,297. So imagine for a second that Tendulkar is Pujols, and Aaron is Bradman. In order for the record holder to own the record to the extent Bradman does it would require Hank Aaron to have 4,059 RBIs.
Every single time Bradman was at bat he’d average a century. That would be like stepping foot on the field and hitting 1.5 RBIs every game, and doing that for your entire career. Nothing will ever break it.
Cal Ripken Jr.’s 2,632 consecutive games
The Iron Man stands alone in not just baseball, but every single sport. To take the field every single game for 16 YEARS is utterly impossible. It’s not just about being tough and playing through pain, but managing to avoid a minefield for injuries for over a decade and a half.
With athletes pushing themselves harder than ever it feels utterly impossible anyone will reach this mark again.
Night Train Lane’s 14 interception season
Night Train Lane set this record for the Los Angeles Rams back in 1952, and over 70 years later it still stands. Not only have only three people ever registered 13 INTs, but Lane did it when the season was only 12 games long.
We had a moment in 2021 when Trevon Diggs reached 11 INTs, but he was still short in a 17 game season.
In the last 24 years we’ve only had seven players register 10 or more INTs in a season, and the highest has been Diggs with 11. This is an era of Darrelle Revis, Charles Woodson, Champ Bailey — Hall of Fame cornerbacks, and none were close to 14 INTs.
With 72 years in the books and far more to come, this might be the most unbreakable record in the NFL.
Tiger Woods and Sam Snead’s 82 PGA Tour titles
For more than 50 years, Sam Snead’s record of 82 career PGA Tour titles stood the test of time, proving how demanding this accomplishment is. His last PGA Tour victory came at the 1965 Greater Greensboro Open, while his first came in West Virginia in 1936. He also managed to win seven majors in between.
And then Tiger Woods came along. Between 1996 and 2013, Woods won 79 PGA Tour titles, including 14 major championships. He dominated the sport, winning on courses such as Torrey Pines, Bay Hill, Muirfield Village, and Firestone Country Club year in and year out. Thirty-one of his PGA Tour titles came on those four courses alone, including the 2008 U.S. Open, which he won on one leg.
Injuries then plagued him from 2014 to 2018, and at the rate he was going, he would have passed Snead’s illusive record with ease. Then Woods had a late-career resurgence, winning three tournaments in 2018 and 2019, including The Masters. His victory at the 2019 ZOZO Championship in Japan gave him win number 82, thus tying the record.
As for today, too much talent exists in golf for someone to dominate the sport like Woods did in his heyday. Think of all the great players who headline golf in 2025. Scottie Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, and Rory McIlroy immediately come to mind, and combined, they have won 47 titles. McIlroy currently leads all active PGA Tour pros with 27 career victories, and he only has about a decade of his prime to go. So this is all to say that nobody is catching Woods or Snead anytime soon and, in all likelihood, ever again.
