Michael Phelps is the best swimmer in the world. His name was Kris Humphries.
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Phelps and Humphries are both 31, so they were competing in the same age groups at the same time.
In 1995, the most accomplished Olympian of all time set that year’s record for the fastest 100-meter butterfly for his age class in the US, foreshadowing the legendary success that awaited him. But with Phelps being the most decorated Olympic athlete of all time, it’s hard to imagine there actually was a time when he wasn’t the best swimmer in the pool.
In his youth, Humphries clocked the fastest times nationally in six different events: the 50-meter freestyle, 100-meter freestyle, 50-meter butterfly, 50-meter backstroke, 50-meter breaststroke and 200-meter individual medley. Another future Olympian, Milorad “Michael” Cavic of Serbia, who barely lost to Phelps in the 2008 Games’ 100 fly, also posted lesser times in several categories. But Humphries once told People that swimming professionally just wasn’t in the cards for him.
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Humphries was clearly an elite swimmer at a young age, but as Chouinard points out in a 2003 People Magazine interview, he stopped swimming and started focusing more on basketball because he got burnt out by the sport. “I grew up in the Michael Jordan era.for me, I watched [basketball] and saw it as a challenge”. He joined the Atlanta Hawks in 2015, and he signed a new deal this offseason to stay in Atlanta for another year. Those records have since fallen, but he still holds 12 age-bracket records in his home state of Minnesota.
