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Top 10 Olympic Controversies

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Jim Thorpe (1912)

Jim Thorpe won the gold in the pentathlon and decathlon in the 1912 Olympic Games. He was stripped of his medals when it was discovered that he had played two seasons of minor league baseball for $25 a week, violating the amateur status rule. (At that time, professional athletes were not allowed to compete in the games.) He went on to play professional baseball and basketball. In 1999, Thorpe was ranked third on the AP's list of athletes of the century. His medals were eventually restored to him in 1983, 30 years after his death.