Easy:

1. Anna Kournikova. No question on this. A brilliant marketer and business person who turned a good tennis career into a phenomenal modelling career s one of America's favorite pin-up girls.

2. Richard Virenque. The recently retired French climbing specialist cried about his mother during a press conference, saluted the sun during mountain top victories and made legions of French women swoon.

3. Mohammad Ali. "I'm a Bad man... I'm a bad man!!!" Say no more.

4. Bjorn Borg. In a heart wrenching and humbling display Borg once doused himself in a wheel barrow full of gold coins at center court while on his knees, then raised a crystal trophy to the sun in exultation.

5. Bernard Hinault. "The Badger" was combative and arrogant. Color commentator Sam Posey once said, "Hinault was rude and made enemies easily." His incidiary riding style was contrasted by his masterful gamesmanship when bluffing. His tell-all autobiography told a very human story of how he was ruthlessly stalked by the haunting specter of losing a race, and battled it with anger and huberous.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

Reinhold Messner -- how many sports personalities have claimed to have seen Yeti?

And also seen their soul leaving their body from the pain of exertion.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

1) Muhammed Ali

2) Arnold Schwarzenegger

3) Bob Roll

4) McEnroe





Entertaining in a bad way -

1) OJ

2) Pete Rose

3) Mike Tyson

4) Tonya Harding

5) Dennis Rodman

Ahem...

George Foreman (comeback). Here's a guy who realized that all the contenders were either bums or in jail and jumped at the opportunity. So he "gets into shape" by losing 40 pounds (380 to 340) and gets in the ring with a fighting style akin to a caveman. Plus, he lent his name to the George Foreman grill. And named all his sons "George."

Eddy the Eagle Edwards.

The Jamaican Bobsled team.

William the Refrigerator Perry

Old school NFL badasses. I love watching the old NFL films, particularly the profiles of guys like Butkus, Chuck Bednarik, Lambert, Jack Youngblood, Jim Brown, etc. Guys who ate too much rare red meat and didn't think anything of going out and getting loaded the night before a big game.

Babe Ruth.

Sorry,

McEnroe wasn't even #1 in Tennis, Ilie Nastase was a much better showman.....he'd yell and scream at an umpire with veins popping out of his forehead and then walk back to the baseline and wink at a TV camera or the fans. He was all show, McEnroe was a nut....still is, saw him speak at a sports hall of fame dinner a few weeks ago and he was insane.

1. Ali

2. George Best

3. Babe Ruth

4. Lee Trevino

5. Gareth Edwards

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill

I'd have to put Willie Banks on that list. The guy was magic at every meet.

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Some are born to move the world to live their fantasies...

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How-Wahd Co-Sell!!!

Baseball edition:

1. Mark "The Bird" Fidrych.

2. Bill "Spaceman" Lee.

3. John Kruk (who once justified his lack of physical conditioning by stating "You've never heard anyone go on the disabled list with pulled fat.")

4. Dennis "Oil Can" Boyd (trying to make a comeback now at age 45)

5. Al "The Mad Hungarian" Hrabosky

There is only one at the top, and he is so far above the rest that a top five is simply not warranted.



ALI



Everyone else is an imitator. "And I'm pretty".

The Worm - Dennis Rodman. Never really respected him personally, although he was a great defensive player. Definitely entertaining, never knew what he might try to pull off next.

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Dan Hollingsworth

Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years. People grow old only by deserting their ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up interest wrinkles the soul." - Douglas MacArthur

I'll post it here too:

Cipo.

Rodman/Jordan.

Warren Sapp.

1) Ali

2) Art Donovan

3) Charles Barkley

4) Bill Walton

5) Jackie Stewart

Alberto Tomba

Hilarious/obnoxious/amazing athlete

I was waiting to see Barkley. Glas you got him.

Add Ali (#1)

Spaceman Bill Lee

McCenroe

Neon Deon

Anna

John Daley

...

1. Maria Sharapova

2. Anna Kournikova

the hell with the rest ;)

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http://twitter.com/krepster || http://www.pedro-gomes.com || follow all the action on facebook

"I'm young, I'm handsome, and I can't possibly be beat!!!" Ali will always be the man.

Francois,

McEnroe heads the list of the most annoying sports personality. Ali wins hands down as the most entertaining followed buy a bunch of WWF wrestlers.

That's a fantastic list. I was just trying to explain Hrabosky to my wife the other day for some reason, but I couldn't do him justice. I almost forgot about "The Bird."

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What a drag it is getting old. -- Stones

My favorite Kruk-ism was when a reporter remarked about him smoking and drinking a beer at his locker after a game:

"I'm not an athlete. I'm a baseball player."

Scott Hamilton

Joe Namath

Jim McMahon

Jerry Tarkanian

Jose Canseco

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I'll be what I am
A solitary man

That's frickin hilarious. Love Kruk.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

1.Johnny Mc(What are you blind!)

2.Ali

3.Hulk Hogan

4.Bobby"Give me that fuckin Chair Knight"

5.Summer Sanders- only because I've seen her swim,plus she is a babe bar none!


HM-Joe Namath

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Seeing him in deep torment, I said. " You can have my last GU , but its been down my pants for most of the run". - John Hirsch

Take care of your body, its by far the coolest thing you're going to ever own.- Can't remember who told me this, but I love it.

This is a great topic. Most of the obvious ones have been named already. Here's a few of my personal faves:

• Lenny "Nails" Dykstra. Uniform always filthy, mouth always bulging to the seams with disgusting chew, never stopped fidgeting at the plate.
  
• Rob "Rayzor" Ray - perfected the art of the hockey fight. He used to take off his shirt and pads in one slick move to give him more freedom to punch, forcing the NHL to actually change the rules to say that you could not purposely remove your jersey to fight. His solution: sew his pads to his sweater and "accidentally" wriggle out of them (in about 1 second)
  
• McEnroe - yes, he's been named, but I need to respond to the Nastase comment. Nastase was even more of a jerk, maybe, but his theatrics didn't elevate his game the way Mac's did. As soon as Mac started
  
• Reggie Miller -- God, I hate him. I'd much rather put John Starks on the list, but you can't argue with Reggie's showmanship. Anyone remember him going at it with Spike Lee in the Pacers/Knicks series in the mid-90s? Check out these performances:

GAME FIVE [1994] (June 1 @ MSG): Of all the “Reggie Games”, this is the most memorable of them all... Reggie scores 25 of his game-high 39 points in the fourth quarter as Pacers take a 3-2 series lead with comeback 93-86 win before stunned MSG crowd... Reggie nails five three-pointers in the fourth quarter (then an NBA record, since broken by Antoine Walker), and his 25 points in the fourth fall four shy of one-quarter Playoff mark... Knicks came into the fourth quarter with a 70-58 lead. But Pacers seized control of the game with a 14-0 fourth quarter run, with Reggie scoring 10 of the 14 points... Reggie went 6-for-11 from Downtown on the night... Pacers had lost 11 straight at the Garden (combined reg. season+Playoffs) coming into the game.\

GAME ONE [1995] (May @ 7 @ MSG): Reggie caps a 31-point game by scoring eight points over an 8.9-second span, wiping out a six-point Knicks lead and giving Pacers series-opening 107-105 win at stunned MSG.

Shocking, unforgettable last-minute sequence: With Knicks leading 105-99, Reggie nails a three with 16.4 seconds left (105-102). Then Reggie – after pushing off Greg Anthony -- steals Anthony Mason’s inbound, steps back behind the stripe and nails another threeball to tie the score 105-105 with 13.3 left... Then comes the play everyone forgets: Sam Mitchell, thinking Indiana still trails by one, intentionally fouls John Starks on the inbound with 13.2 left, but Starks misses both FTA... Mason rebounds the second miss, Ewing fails to put back from close in, Reggie rebounds and is fouled by Mase with 7.5 left. Reggie nails both FTA (107-105 Indiana), then Knicks see last hopes fade as Greg Anthony slips and falls going to the hole as buzzer sounds.

On top of this, you have the head butts, the chewing gum incident, etc.

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What a drag it is getting old. -- Stones

McE was the most talented tennis player to ever live...period.
He was ultra talented and really wanted it bad....
two guys come to mind as well...huge talent but unfortunately, never as dedicated as McE...Miloslav Mecir, and Marcelo Rios (who has disappeared from the circuit)...also hicham Arazi from morroco...all fantastic players to watch, great touch, great knowledge of the game, all of them crazy.

"McE was the most talented tennis player to ever live"

Especially in his own mind. Bjorn was much more of a super star and a much classier individual. The British press didn't brand McE as "Super Brat" for nothing. His childish rants on the court were pathetic.

Just wish he'd come back today and try and do a Riggs/King against a Sabrina or somebody. Would love to see him get his ass kicked and his balls cut off.

Sorry Francois, but I never liked him.

and guess what, I don't care... ;-)
he was the most talented (the greatest being Pete Sampras)

Actually, I'd say all things considered the greatest/best was probably Rod Laver.

And you're half Aussie. Shame on You. :)

not the greatest is sampras. when Laver was playing, they were cruising the first 3-4 rounds of every grand slam like the girls were doing 5 years ago.
Sampras has more titles (albeit none at the french) but faced a much deeper field than Laver ever had...

and to cut short, the greatest is Steffi Graf :-)

she also wins the greatest pair of legs ever.

[1] Michael Jordan. The man definately capitalized on the media era ... but when Michael was on TV, people stopped what they were doing. People that don't even like sports liked Michael Jordan. I forget who said it but Jordan's impression on society was so great that "even white parents want their kids to grow up and 'Be Like Mike' ". IMO,

[2] Ali. 'Nuff said. best self-promoter ever. My favorite boxing highlight is Joe Frazier knocking Ali down (and winning) in their first fight. The things Ali said about Frazier in order to gain black fan support ... are simply low-rent. As a Frazier fan, I hold a grudge (especially since Frazier was the one that got Ali his license back and was paying the bill for much of his training). One heckuba fighter and entertainer, all opinions aside.

[3] Babe Ruth ... home-run or strikeout, it was a national event. Say whatever you want about any other individual, but Babe Ruth took being a celebrity athlete to the next level.

[4] Arnold the bodybuilder. Not sure if we are counting bodybuilders as athletes. But, Arnold changed everything. He taught us what "charisma" was, and sent a fitness industry booming (seriously). Steve Reeves could also go into this category. I've read reports of New York City traffic coming to a dead stop when Reeves walked the sidewalk.

[5] Johnnie Mac -- people that didn't even like tennis could watch an entire match if he was playing. That's the mark of "entertaining", when a person's personality can make you ewatch something you don't like. Tyson could also be here. Lots of people that could not care less about boxing stopped to watch Tyson destroy someone (or be destroyed).

Dizzy Dean. C'mon read a little history, this guy was one bad outing (pitcher) from being in the looney bin. Favorite sports headline (following Dean getting hit in the head with line drive): "X-Ray of Dean's head -- found nothing".

In truth, almost every heavyweight champ from the first part of the 20th century could fit here, as they were only a few the athletes actually known worldwide. Jack Johnson really comes to mind.

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That's a fantastic list. I was just trying to explain Hrabosky to my wife the other day for some reason,

Describe him as the "extremelly bitter former pitcher and current broadcaster of the St. Louis Cardinals. Al remembers his career being infinately more glamorous (and impressive) than it really was. Someone pisses in his oatmeal daily. I don't understand his poor disposition.

Bill "Spaceman" Lee.

The universal spokesman for us left-handed pitchers.

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-- Every morning brings opportunity;
Each evening offers judgement. --