Georges St-Pierre named to ESPN's Top 100 Athletes of the 21st Century

UFC Hall of Famer and former two-division champion Georges St-Pierre was recognized by ESPN as one of the greatest athletes of the 2000s.

With 2024 being the 25th year of the 21st century, ESPN.com began releasing its list of the top 100 athletes of the 21st century on Monday, with St-Pierre ranked 76th.

Named the greatest UFC fighter of all time by MMA Junkie last year in celebration of UFC's 30th anniversary, St-Pierre announced his retirement in early 2019, just months after ending a four-year retirement by winning the middleweight championship from then-champion Michael Bisping at UFC 217. St-Pierre had been the UFC welterweight champion for over five years, during which he made nine consecutive title defenses, so winning the title at the second weight class further cemented his legendary status. In his prime, St-Pierre was one of UFC's most popular pay-per-views and put Canadian MMA on the map.

ESPN will only release the first 25 players (100th through 76th) and will continue to release 25 each day this week through Thursday.

St. Pierre ranks ahead of such big-name players as Bryce Harper (baseball, 79), Chris Paul (basketball, 83), Kawhi Leonard (basketball, 85), Venus Williams (tennis, 86), Aaron Rodgers (football, 91), Pedro Martinez (baseball, 92), Rory McIlroy (golf, 93) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic (soccer, 95).

According to ESPN, the list “only covers achievements in sports since Jan. 1, 2000.” “ESPN.com utilized a panel of experts and ESPN's renowned stats group to rank the top 100 athletes across all sports. More than 75,000 votes were cast by ESPN reporters, analysts, producers, editors and experts around the world to narrow the original list of 400 athletes down to 100.”