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Meagher vs Babashoff

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GOAT verdictgoatrank.world
MeagherWinner
86.7

Meagher wins: Dominance, Longevity

Babashoff
86.5

Babashoff wins: Honours, Statistics

Candidates
Locked to Swimming

Shareable URL · /compare/mary-t-meagher-vs-shirley-babashoff

Time range

Showing full careers. Pick a window to recalculate the selected period.

Category radar

Verdict

Weighted GOAT score
🇺🇸 Mary T. Meagher
86.7

Meagher leads in 3 of 5 weighted categories. Her 1981 200 m butterfly world record stood for almost 19 years.

1. Mary T. Meagher
86.7
2. Shirley Babashoff
86.5

Category breakdown

Season form · Form index per season

Career timeline · Form index per season

Cumulative output season by season — the shape of each career against the other.

GOAT pace tracker

Career stage · GOAT pace

Through season 5 · Form index per season
1. 🇺🇸 Mary T. Meagher5 seasons played · career day 1,825444 major golds
Setting the pace at this stage
2. 🇺🇸 Shirley Babashoff5 seasons played · career day 1,826376 major golds
-15.3% vs Meagher at the same stage
Ghost race · career day30100365100018253650
🇺🇸 Meagher0070162444776
🇺🇸 Babashoff0050116296484

Careers are aligned at debut, so a rookie's first 5 seasons are measured against the same window in a legend's career — Yamal against Messi at the same age-stage, a tour rookie against Tiger Woods in 1996.

MetricMeagherRetiredBabashoffRetired
Olympic gold medals32
Olympic medals58
World Championship golds3
World records set711
Years holding 200 fly world record19
World Championship titles3
US titles27
Dominance w25%8886
Peak w20%9494
Longevity w20%7672
Honours w20%8690
Statistics w15%9092

Fan vote — data vs the people

GOAT Rank · the data
Meagher86.7
Babashoff86.5
The people
Meagher
Babashoff

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Make your case for Meagher vs Babashoff. The scoring is published in full — if you can point at the pillar or the weight you disagree with, we read it. Read the methodology paper.

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