Reasonable return on stock investments

If you get a return of 20% annually....how does this fair compared to other investments and is this average, above average, good, poor, excellet...?

When i ask my co-workers, i always get mixed answers.
some will say they will gladly take the 20% while others think it isn't that great and it really depends on the market.
for example, emerging markets have been giving 40%, real estate and natural gas at 39 to 44% and even stock market gave about 20-25% a year ....so the 20% annually would be considered standard.

what do you guys think is a reasonable return annually?


on a side note: maybe this question belongs somewhere else....
but ....  in one sports season (nfl,nba,mlb,nhl, college...etc.) what is a reasonable return on your bankroll?
this guy at work told me to sports bet instead of playing stocks.
he said he turned his initial 100 bucks to 1500. and asked me what stocks would give me that kind of return on his money in a 5-6 month period.

so that also got me thinking.
curious to hear some of your responses!

20% annually over a long period of time is almost impossible.  It is not standard.  Sure, you might beat that in a given year, but you will have down years as well.  Historical return for stocks is around 10%.  Anything better than 10% long-term is excellent.  20% is exceptionally phenomenal.

yeah, this guy at work was telling me these forex guys give 1% return a week for a year.
i don't know if its true or not, but he seemed to believe in it a lot.

i'm not saying it is impossible...but it is improbable.
or maybe i just don't know very much about forex trading.
?

Forex