To read an introduction to the list, click here.

For previous posts, click the links: 50-46 , 45-41 , 40-36 , 35-31

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30.Rickey Henderson steals 130 bases in a single season

Rickey Henderson–baseball’s “Man of Steal”–was one of my favorite baseball players to watch. But he established this single-season record one year before I was born (1982).

Henderson had 84 steals by the All-Star break in ’82. The 84 mark has only been eclipsed during an entire season 16 times since 1900, and not at all since Henderson last crossed it in ’88. Vince Coleman of the St. Louis Cardinals came closest to the record in 1985 with 110. The highest total in non-Henderson/Coleman seasons since 1982 is 78 by Marquis Grissom (1992) and Jose Reyes (2007). That’s only 60% of Henderson’s 130.

Henderson set the mark during one of the A’s worst seasons of that generation. They finished 26 games under .500. Surprisingly, his 1982 success rate of .756 is well below his career average of .808.

–Joey Sparks

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29. Cleveland Spiders finish 84 games out of first place

For baseball historians, the 1899 Cleveland Spiders represent one of the low points in sports history. The best players on the team, including pitcher Cy Young, were moved to the St. Louis Perfectos (no, I’m not kidding…today they are the Cardinals), because the same men owned both teams. The result was a decimated roster that drew a total of 3,049 fans to their first 16 home games!

The owners also agreed to play more games on the road, instead of at home, and the terrible attendance led the team to lose money at home games. So, the team played only 8 home games after July 1. The Spiders lost a remarkable 101 road games, while only playing a total of 42 games at home. Their longest winning streak of the season was two games.

To give you an idea of how awful this team was, they finished 35 games out of 11th place! Their final record of 20-134 continues to be the standard for futility, and they finished an astounding 84 games out of first place.  How far behind is that? The 1962 Mets, often considered the worst team in the modern era, only finished 60 games out of first place, and had a longer season (160 games, compared to 154 for the Spiders).

One More Insane Fact: The 1899 Spiders had six losing streaks of at least 11 consecutive games.

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28. Pete Rose collects 4256 career hits

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27. Richard Petty wins 27 races in one NASCAR season

This is an insane number. Not being a NASCAR fan, I had no idea how huge this number was until we started working on this project.

In 1967 driver Richard Petty won 27 races, but the reason this record will never even be approached is that the number of races has been reduced per season. You see, in 1967, Petty drove in an amazing 48 sanctioned races! Today, there are only about 30-35 races per year, meaning a driver would basically have to win every race he entered to even tie this record.

Most fans consider 1972 the year that the “modern era” of NASCAR began. Of course, Petty holds the record for most wins in that era, too, but he has been tied. How much of a record is his 27 wins? The modern era record, held by Petty and Jeff Gordon, is 13.

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26. Lance Armstrong wins 7 consecutive Tours de France

The Tour de France is the bike race that even the most casual sports fan has heard of. The race, which is most famous for including lots of mountain rides, totals over 2200 miles of cycling, including several climbs through mountainous terrain. It lasts 23 days, with just two rest days built in.

Several cyclists have won consecutive races, due to their own amazing physical abilities, and due to the fact that teams help with certain intricacies of the long race (which we, as casual fans, admit we do not understand). Just five riders have won at least 5 races total, and only 2 of those have won that many consecutively.

But Lance Armstrong has pushed that number to an amazing level. From 1999 through 2005, the American rider never lost the race. Seven straight Tours de France will never be touched. With the number being small (it’s not like 4000+ hits, it’s just 7 races), it will be approached (4 or 5 is “approaching” it), but it will never be reached.

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That’s half the list. What are your thoughts so far?