1. Fishing is the biggest participant sport in the world.

2. Soccer is the most watched sport in the world.

3. In 1927 the archaeologist Dr. E.A. Speiser discovered a 7,000-year-old stone tablet in Baghdad, Iraq, that shows two men preparing for a boxing match.

4. In 1975 the Japanese climber Junko Tabei became the first woman to reach the top of Everest.

5. The record for the most major league baseball complete games pitched is 749, by Cy Young.

6. Ancient Greek athletes practiced in the nude to the accompaniment of music. They also performed naked at the Olympics.

7. The first Olympic race, held in 776 B.C., was won by a chef.

8. The first modern Olympics was held in Athens, Greece, in 1896. There were 311 males, but no female competitors.

9. The high jump method of jumping head first and landing on the back is called the “Fosbury Flop.”

10. Before a game Major League Baseball teams have to have 90 new baseballs on hand; Major League teams collectively use about 850,000 balls per season; each ball lasts an average of 6 pitches.

11. About 42,000 tennis balls are used in the plus-minus 650 matches in the Wimbledon Championship.

12. A baseball ball has exactly 108 stitches and cricket ball has between 65 and 70 stitches.

13. A soccer ball is made up of 32 leather panels, held together by 642 stitches.

14. Basketball and rugby balls are made from synthetic material. Once was, pigs’ bladders were used as rugby balls.

15. In 1900 owners in the National League changed the shape of home plate to a pentagon. They theorized this would stop the arguments on called strikes.

16. Golf is the only sport that was played on the moon—in 1971, astronaut Alan Shepard hit a golf ball.

17. The oldest continuous trophy in sports is the America’s Cup for sailing. It began in 1851. Americans won each year until Australia took the Cup in 1983.

18. Volleyball was invented by William George Morgan of Holyoke, Mass., in 1895.

19.  Babe Ruth was the first baseball player credited with ordering a bat with a knob on it.

20.  Boxing was filmed for the first time in 1894 in a match between Mike Leonard and Jack Cushing.

21.  If a horse wins a race “hands down” it means the jockey never raised his whip during the race.

22.  Until 1859, the umpire in Baseball sat behind home plate in a padded rocking chair.

23.  Even though it was outlawed in 1920, the last legal spitball was thrown by New York Yankee Hall-of-Famer Burleigh Grimes in 1934. When the rule was changed, anyone already using a spitball was allowed to continue.

24.  Official baseball rules state that an umpire may not be replaced during a game except if he becomes ill, injured, or if he dies.

25. In bowling, three strikes in a row is called a “turkey.” The term originated in the 19^th century when at holiday time, the first member of a team to score three strikes in a row won a free turkey.

26. On October 30, 1945, Jackie Robinson signed a Major League contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers, thereby breaking the color barrier.

27. The Boston Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees on January, 1, 1920 for $100,000 to finance a Broadway play produced by Boston-owner Harry Frazee. At the time of the deal, the Red Sox had won five world championships. The Yankees had only been around for 17 uneventful years and didn’t even have a ballpark to call their own.

28. In front of an infuriated Adolph Hitler, on August 9, 1936, Jesse Owens, son of a sharecropper from Oakville, Alabama, set three world records and one Olympic record.

29. In 1954, Roger Bannister became the first man to run a mile in less than four minutes.

30. In 1969 Joe Namath stood up at a podium in Miami, Florida, and predicted his team’s win. The New York Jets and Namath did convincingly defeat the Baltimore Colts by a score of 16-7.

31. At the age of 21, Tiger Woods was the youngest golfer to win a Masters.

32. In 1976 Romanian Nadia Comaneci was the first gymnast to achieve a perfect 10.

33. In 1971, in perhaps the most anticipated and watched sports event ever, Joe Frazier beat Mohammed Ali, but Ali got him twice more in spectacular rematches.

34. In 1989 Wayne Gretzky became the NHL’s all-time leading scorer when he surpassed Gordie Howe’s total of 1,850 points.

35. In 1928 “Win one for the Gipper” became a popular saying after Knute Rockne’s famous halftime speech inspired Notre Dame to rally and beat Army 12-6.

36. On September 5, 1972, terrorists murdered eleven Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics.

37. In 1938 Joe Louis knocked out Germany’s Max Schmeling in 124 Seconds.

38. In 1919 eight Chicago White Sox agreed to throw the World Series, and were later deemed the “Chicago Black Sox.”

39. In 1962 Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points in a single game.

40. In 1984 Mary Lou Retton needed a perfect 10 to win the gold in the floor exercise, and the she nailed it.

41. In 1986 forty-six year-old Jack Nicklaus became the oldest man to win the Masters..

42. In 1975 John Wooden, the NCAA most prolific coach, won a 10^th consecutive title with an incredible .813 career winning percentage.

43. In 1938 Johnny Vander Meer pitched 18 innings without surrendering a hit.

44. On September 21, 1970, Monday Night Football was born as Howard Cosell gave his first nasal soliloquy.

45. In 1956 Don Larson pitched a perfect game in the World Series.

46. In 1991 Nolan Ryan pitched his seventh no-hitter when he was 44 years old.

47. In 1997 Mike Tyson took a bite out of Evander Holyfield’s ear.

48. In 1972 the Soviets beat the USA in basketball on a controversial “third try.”

49. On September 14, 1994, Bud Selig and baseball owners shut down baseball, letting a monetary dispute achieve what two world wars and the 1919 Chicago White Sox couldn’t.

50. In 1956, at the ripe old age of 31, Rocky Marciano retired as the reigning heavyweight champ with a record of 49-0.