Athletes that Deserve a Movie, and the Actors that Should Portray Them

(PointSpreads.com) – Not all heroes wear capes. Many of them wear football pads, cleats, sneakers, and skates, and some even carry a bat or a stick. We’re talking about transcendent athletes who can make the jump from the field of battle to the silver screen.

With the release of Air – a movie inspired by Michael Jordan – PointSpreads.com, known for its reporting on the latest sports betting news (and the latest point spreads, of course), has compiled a shortlist of athletes whose larger-than-life personas, accomplishments or backstory would be worthy of the big screen – as well as the best actor to portray each one.   Which athlete will be the subject of the next Hollywood megahit?

“That sounded like a fun bet, so we decided to put some odds to it,” says Robert Jones, a former bookmaker at a major sportsbook and senior contributor at PointSpreads. 

Tom Brady

Now that he’s retired, Brady is the glamor boy who showed the world he was much more than a pretty face. Brady had a career spanning two decades, rarely got injured, and has more records than Motown.

A handsome face and an ‘aw-shucks’ demeanor is what is needed to play the seven-time Super Bowl champ. So, who is the perfect fit? We believe Arnold Schwarzenegger’s son, Patrick, would be the man to do justice to the role, according to PointSpreads.com.

“We think Brady has great odds of a Hollywood portrayal of his life and career.  The man is a legend.  The consensus around our office would be +300, or 3-to-1 odds, just behind Kobe Bryant,” Jones says.

Kobe Bryant

The Black Mamba needs to be memorialized in film, and not just any movie, but one that will stand the test of time. An all-time classic with superb directing and cinematography worthy of capturing one of the most electrifying ball players ever to grace the hardcourt.

His tragic death, made even more heart-wrenching when his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna, and seven other souls lost their lives in a plane crash on that fateful day in January of 2020, will have the audience misty-eyed and searching for Kleenex. PointSpreads.com’s pick to play Kobe is Michael B. Jordan. 

“There must be a Kobe film coming. I’d give it +150 odds,” Jones says.

Conor McGregor

Another celebrity that is no stranger to the pages of PointSpreads.com is Conor McGregor. Love him or hate him, it’s impossible to ignore him. The Irish MMA superstar exploded onto the scene with outrageous trash-talking and a unique fighting style that seamlessly blended a hammer-fisted boxing approach with the nuanced techniques of capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art rarely seen within the confines of the Octagon.

McGregor is a natural southpaw but can switch to orthodox at the drop of a dime and his Billionaire Strut, fashioned after WWE founder Vince McMahon’s imperious swagger, is cinematic gold. Tom Hardy, an acclaimed martial arts practitioner himself, gets the gig with no audition required.

“McGregor’s personality, backstory and Irish heritage appeal to a big demographic and there must be a producer in Hollywood wanting to make this happen.  I’d give it a solid +450,” Jones says.

Simone Biles

Considered to be the greatest gymnast in the history of the sport, Simone Biles is a 4’8” pixie mounted on a pair of hydraulic lifts and a body of twisted steel that allows her to do what few others have been able to do.

Seven Olympic and 25 World Championship medals comprise her gymnastics resume but the Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded to her by Joe Biden in 2022 reflects how truly transcendent and entrenched in the fabric of American culture she has become. Marsai Martin has our full support to recreate the wonder that is Simone Biles on the big screen.

“Simone captured our hearts and attention and any movie about her would most certainly be well received.  I’d give it 6-to-1, or +600 odds that we’ll be seeing a trailer with her likeness in the near future,” Jones says.   

Image credit: Brian BAHR / AFP (PointSpreads.com)

Advertisement

FSM First Look: LeBron

From Jeff Benedict, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Tiger Woods and The Dynasty, this is the definitive biography of LeBron James, one of the greatest athletes of all time—the king of basketball, the figure at the center of social movements, the man everyone has an opinion on—based on three years of exhaustive research and more than two hundred interviews.

LeBron James is the greatest basketball player of the twenty-first century, and he’s in the conversation with Michael Jordan as the greatest of all-time. He wears the crown like he was born to it. Yet what makes LeBron’s story so compelling is that he won his destiny despite overwhelmingly long odds, in a drama worthy of a Dickens novel. As a child, he was a lost little boy living in a public housing project in Akron, Ohio. His mother, who had LeBron when she was sixteen, would sometimes leave him on his own. Scared and alone, destitute and fatherless, LeBron missed close to 100 days of school in fourth grade and didn’t play organized basketball. LeBron tells the full, riveting saga of how a boy adrift finds the will to become a titan.

Jeff Benedict, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Tiger Woods, paints a vivid picture of LeBron’s epic origin story, showing the gradual ascent of a star who, surrounded by a tight-knit group of friends and adult mentors, transformed into a speeding comet during high school. LeBron today has built not only a basketball career that will go down as one of the greatest in the sport’s history, but a solid family and a business empire. He produces Hollywood films and television shows, he has a social media presence that includes over 100 million followers, he engages in political activism and takes outspoken stances on racism and social injustice, he transforms lives through his visionary philanthropy, and he’s the first active NBA player to become a billionaire.

To tell the story of LeBron’s rise to dominance on the court and beyond, Benedict pored through thousands of pages of primary source documents and countless of hours of video footage. He conducted hundreds of interviews with the people who were intimately involved with LeBron at different stages of his life, taking us inside his early years through his famed NBA career spanning championships with three teams as well as his supremacy in the Olympics.

Destined to be the authoritative account of LeBron’s life, LeBron is a gripping and unprecedented account of one of the world’s greatest and most iconic athletes.

LeBron will be available to sports fans on 4/11/23.

FSM Editorial: Top 5 Reasons LeBron Ain’t Trump

Sports shock jock (and professional LeBron hater) Jason Whitlock made a big fuss about King James recently, comparing him to the president and calling him “Black Trump”. Whitlock pointed to a few similarities between Lebron and the Donald (mostly the incoherent curse-filled tweeting) but presented a pretty weak case overall. Keep in mind, Whitlock recently left Fox Sports because they wouldn’t pay him so he may just be trying to be extra provocative to generate buzz for himself (insert sarcastic shocked face emoji here).

Here is a taste of Jason Whitlock’s comments:

“LeBron fashions himself as a dignified statesman, role model, political activist and champion of racial equality. He is every bit as crude, undignified and inarticulate as our sitting president.”

To read the full editorial originally posted on OutKick, click here.

Now then, being the sports junkies that we are, we thought we’d do a little counter punching on the King’s behalf. Free Sports Mag is not a political publication in any sense so please read the following Top 5 Reasons LeBron Ain’t Trump as if you were reading The Onion or MAD Magazine.

5. Lebron James has 3 children with the same woman

4. Blaze Pizza > Trump Steaks

3. Lebron James has never been bankrupt

2. I Promise School > Trump University

1. Lebron James is a billionaire