Indy 500: 10 non-racing driver athletes who should race in the Indianapolis 500

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INDIANAPOLIS, IN – MAY 28: Takuma Sato of Japan, driver of the #26 Andretti Autosport Honda (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images) /

Pick 3

If I owned an IndyCar team and all race car drivers were off-limits, but I could pick three of these athletes to drive in the Indianapolis 500 in a given year, here are the three I would pick.

23. . Olympic gymnast. USA Gymnastics. ALY RAISMAN

I barely knew anything about gymnastics until I started intensively covering the Larry Nassar sexual assault scandal when he received his first prison sentenced this past December, so the circumstances under which I learned about it were not exactly optimal. Nevertheless, I did learn about just how physically fit gymnasts are and just how precisely coordinated they must be to be successful. Aly Raisman is all of that and more. She made the United States Olympic women’s gymnastics team not once but twice, and she has six medals to show for it. Her dedication and passion both to her sport and speaking out against Nassar and the institutions that enabled his predatory behavior for decades are unparalleled. If she had any desire whatsoever to drive in the Indy 500, she could put her mind and heart into it and do it, and she could certainly handle it physically given her strength, stamina and coordination. The fact that Alexander Rossi taught her a little bit about what it takes to drive an IndyCar before she rode with Mario Andretti in the two-seater at Sonoma last year as opposed to her just riding with Andretti is a huge plus as well.

SHOHEI OHTANI. 23. . No. 17, Pitcher/Outfielder. Los Angeles Angels

As stated in the slide solely discussing Shohei Ohtani, he is a one-of-a-kind athlete that doesn’t even come around every generation. He is great at everything he does on the baseball field, so putting him behind the wheel of an IndyCar to try to match what Takuma Sato, a one-of-a-kind Japanese driver, did last year by becoming the first Japanese driver to win the Indy 500 may be interesting to watch. His height and weight are the only knocks against him as far as driving an IndyCar goes.

16. . No. 1, Point Guard. Vytautas Prienai–Birstonas. LAMELO BALL

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I didn’t intentionally select the youngest three athletes in this article for this slide of the article. However, with neither of the first two being LaMelo Ball, the third one pretty much had to be. I have no idea how well he drives or if he even has his regular driver’s license. What I do know is that he is a young kid prone to taking risks and with a little bit of training, he could be a decent IndyCar driver. Plus, the media attention his father LaVar would bring to the sport given the fact that he has become who he has become and the fact that he has said some of the things he has said over the years would be great for IndyCar in that it would cause all kinds of sports fans from all over the world to tune in to the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing”. I also have no doubt that LaMelo Ball’s car would be sponsored by Big Baller Brand with LaVar calling the pit strategy the way only he knows how to, which would make things even more interesting.

Next: Top 10 IndyCar drivers of all-time

Which non-driver athletes do you think should drive in IndyCar in the Indy 500? Which of these athletes do you think would perform at the highest level if they were to drive in the Indy 500?