Regardless as to whether Michael Phelps does or does not win any medals this year at the Summer Olympics, he's going to go down as the best swimmer of all-time and arguably the greatest Olympian of all-time as well. He's already got 18 gold medals and 22 in totality, and he's smashed the record for both. But how many medals will Phelps ultimately end up with when his final Games are said and done with in Rio?
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MICHAEL PHELPS EVENTS AT THE SUMMER OLYMPICS
100-meter butterfly
200-meter butterfly
100-meter freestyle
200-meter freestyle
200-meter individual medley
4 x 100-meter freestyle relay
4 x 200-meter freestyle relay
4 x 100-meter medley relay
Though we have listed eight disciplines here, Phelps surely isn't going to end up running in all eight events. It's highly unlikely that he enters either the 100-meter freestyle or the 200-meter freestyle, and it's entirely possible that he isn't going to end up on the relay teams either even though he would be a tremendous force to be reckoned with when parlayed with Ryan Lochte.
The biggest problem Phelps is running into is that his competition is starting to really get closer as he embarks upon his fourth Olympic Games. Lochte is finally at the point that he might be ready to start claiming some gold medals in individual events, and the argument could be made that he should be the anchor to some of these relays instead of Phelps.
Chad le Clos, who beat Phelps for the 200 meter butterfly gold medal four years ago at the ripe age of 20, is only sure to be stronger, and he very well could end up taking down Phelps in the 100 meters as well. Lochte is a possibility for both events, too.
The biggest challenge Phelps would have in winning these relays assuming that he enters is the fact that the French are so strong with their freestyle swimmers. Four years ago, the team of Amaury Leveaux, Fabien Gilot, Clement Lefert and Yannick Agnel beat the United States by a comfortable margin in the 4 x 100 meters, though that's clearly their stronger of the two events. The United States dominated the 4 x 200 meters, winning that by a full three seconds.
The biggest concern we have with Phelps is that he's skipping an awful lot of the time trials for the United States swim team. Sure, he can pretty much just show up and have the credibility to end up on any of the relay teams, but there's a real chance that he's just focusing in on the tasks at hand with his individual races. That's generally a sign that age has caught up to a swimmer, and that might be the case for Phelps.
If we had to guess, Phelps will end up swimming in all of the events we've diagrammed except for the freestyle individual events, and he'll end up being the favorite to end up with at least five more gold medals. It's not nearly a given though, and we suggest exercising caution before just blindly betting on the greatest swimmer of all-time in his final go-around on the international stage.
Olympics Betting at BookMaker.eu
Load your betting bankroll from your smartphone or tablet with BookMaker’s new cashier feature! Depositing and withdrawing funds from your account has never been easier. BookMaker's live betting platform means you always have access to odds and lines to every sporting event. Michael Phelps and the rest of his fellow swimmers from across the world will be on display at the Olympic Aquatics Center in Rio de Janeiro in the first week of the Summer Olympics from Saturday, August 6 through Saturday, August 13. The NBC family of networks will have all of the live television coverage of the biggest events.
