Who is the biggest global icon?

[reignfire]

Kobe, because China is crazy about basketball and Kobe is the most likable one to them. Keep in mind that Kobe is also large in Europe.

[DarkXaero]

Messi is one of the most easily recognizable faces in the world overall. Ronaldo is quite a bit behind, so it could be argued that Federer and Bolt are on the same level of popularity.

IMO Ronaldo's definitely not "quite a bit behind" in terms of being easily recognizable. Everyone who knows Messi knows who Ronaldo is, but Ronaldo is surely the bigger name off the field. I bet more women know Ronaldo and that probably puts him ahead of Messi as an icon. Messi's just too quiet.

I agree with you. Ronaldo's more popular because of his off the field stuff and looks.

[advanced]

This thread is full of naivety and narrow mindedness. Kobe Bryant isn't even the biggest sports icon in the US, let alone the world. Jordan is still the most relevant basketball player worldwide. Tiger Woods dwarfs Bryant in terms of global awareness, as well as Messi and other "football" players.

Wrong. Asia is very much in love with Kobe. Europe and South America aren't the only continent. Kobe is definitely the most popular basketball player in Asia - by far.

Tiger Woods? stop it. He's popular in America but he's not a global brand. Most countries don't even know what golf is.

lol so much ignorance, you should be embarrassed

[Aeternus]

IMO Ronaldo's definitely not "quite a bit behind" in terms of being easily recognizable. Everyone who knows Messi knows who Ronaldo is, but Ronaldo is surely the bigger name off the field. I bet more women know Ronaldo and that probably puts him ahead of Messi as an icon. Messi's just too quiet.

Lol try asking women and girls you know about Ronaldo, see if they know him.
From my experience, people who follow/are strongly exposed to football are going to know Ronaldo, not a big gap with Messi indeed. The problem comes when you speak with people who don't follow/are exposed to football (mostly women and pre- football fandom age kids): they're much more likely to remember Messi because he's always associated with people of absolute renown who transcend sports like Maradona and Pele, rather than meaningless achievements (for them) like winning the Liga or a Champions League. It's hard to explain since I have no hard data to support my claims, but think it like this: Messi has Jordan-like fame, whereas Ronaldo has LeBron-like fame. It might be hard to believe there's a clear tier of difference between the two, because from the point of view of sports fans both levels already max out the possible level of exposure someone can be subject to. But from the point of view of someone outside the sport, the difference is very noticeable, for the people in that first tier are mentioned every time the sport is mentioned, the people in the second tier only when they did something (like winning a championship or MVP/FIFA world player).

If you don't follow tennis you'll probably have heard of Federer, but most likely not of Djokovic (despite having been #1 ATP ranked until Wimbledon). Because the first is a sport legend, the second (while still an all timer) "just" a sport superstar.

This thread is full of naivety and narrow mindedness. Kobe Bryant isn't even the biggest sports icon in the US, let alone the world. Jordan is still the most relevant basketball player worldwide. Tiger Woods dwarfs Bryant in terms of global awareness, as well as Messi and other "football" players.

You kid yourself if you think golf is anywhere close to relevant in any non native-english-speaking country. I don't think I have ever seen Tiger Woods mentioned outside the net AT ALL, nevermind him being more famous than football players.

[rafale]

Sorry guys, but Messi and Ronaldo are far above everyone else.
I'm french, and I can tell you, here in France, 90 % of the population doesn't know even one basketball player(except jordan who doesn't play anymore), and it's pretty much the same, for all the different european countries except Spain and Lithuania, people just don't care at all about basketball in Europe, it's all about football/soccer.

[iamworthy]

Didn't Lin and D Rose beat Kobe on jerseys sold internationally?

Kobe Bryant still king of international NBA jersey sales
Kurt Helin Jun 21, 2012, 10:35 AM EDT
6 Comments

Kobe Bryant is still the biggest brand in the NBA.

Others are in line for his crown, but if you want to use an NBA star to sell shoes or soft drink or whatever internationally, Kobe is the gold standard.

And he can sell jerseys, too.

The league announced the top NBA jersey sales internationally and Kobe was on top again. He sold the most jerseys in China, the most in Europe and the most in Latin America, too. Kobe is a true global brand. This really isn’t a surprise.

Second on the international list is Derrick Rose of the Bulls, followed by LeBron James, Kevin Garnett, Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade and Rajon Rondo. Carmelo Anthony, Blake Griffin and Kevin Durant round out the top 10.

Spain’s stars Pau Gasol (11) and Ricky Rubio (15) are in the top 15, while France’s Tony Parker is 13th.

http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports.com/ ... sey-sales/

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... EuRS7JlTms

Derrick Rose of Chicago and Jeremy Lin of New York ranked first and second on the list based on sales from April 2011 until now at the NBA Store in New York and on NBAStore.com.

Wow the difference between your article and mine has been 2 months. How the hell did Kobe surpass Rose and Lin within that timespan?

Im not sure. But here's a article from nba.com as well.

NEW YORK, June 20, 2012 – The National Basketball Association (NBA) today released its first-ever overall international top selling jerseys list and five-time NBA Champion Kobe Bryant has the most popular NBA jersey internationally. The top 15 list was based on sales at adidas locations outside the United States during the 2011-12 NBA season.

http://www.nba.com/bulls/news/bulls-der ... nally.html

[diablerouge]

It's clearly Messi and Ronaldo but, out of the 2, I would go with Cristiano because women that don't follow sports are still aware of him. I would put Beckham in front of any basketball player too.

[advanced]

it doesnt matter if you like the sport or even watch it, you KNOW who Tiger Woods is and what he does. the majority of people here dont even know Messi exists. Beckham is far more of a global icon than Messi. youre getting too caught up in whos better at the game or who likes the game...thats totally irrelevant

[kamelion4291]

I feel like the only people saying Kobe are Laker fans. Kobe isn't even close to the biggest global icon. He's not even the biggest basketball icon.

[Mr Grant Hill]

it doesnt matter if you like the sport or even watch it, you KNOW who Tiger Woods is and what he does. the majority of people here dont even know Messi exists. Beckham is far more of a global icon than Messi. youre getting too caught up in whos better at the game or who likes the game...thats totally irrelevant

beckham is a fashion/marketing/hollywood icon.
messi is considered to be the best soccer player in history (beckham doesn't even make the top100 all-time).
stop talking about things you don't understand.
and make sure you understand that 300m us citizens don't represent the world (7 billions).

[Game Show]

Not surprising that Kobe leads in a poll on an American basketball forum, but removing the bias it's clearly Messi/Ronaldo

[bigboi]

Honest question. Is Kobe even really that much more well known than like Neymar or Balotelli? I know a lot of US people don't know them, but they are pretty well known by the rest of the world.

[nbaintel1]

This thread is full of naivety and narrow mindedness. Kobe Bryant isn't even the biggest sports icon in the US, let alone the world. Jordan is still the most relevant basketball player worldwide. Tiger Woods dwarfs Bryant in terms of global awareness, as well as Messi and other "football" players.

Wrong. Asia is very much in love with Kobe. Europe and South America aren't the only continent. Kobe is definitely the most popular basketball player in Asia - by far.

Tiger Woods? stop it. He's popular in America but he's not a global brand. Most countries don't even know what golf is.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenha ... l-athlete/

You need to open your eyes.

Written by an American, on an American website, for Americans. Ok. No where did the article mention anything about Europe, Asian, South America, Africa.

The title was only used to grab attention. It gave absolutely no statistics on why he's the "most powerful athlete in the world". What a stupid article.

You need to open your eyes and realize that golf isn't even close to being as popular as basketball/soccer worldwide.

[Rip Mammoth Ton]

No basketball player is winning this poll.

[Aeternus]

Kobe. Not only is he popular in America, he is treated like a god in china. That's 1.6 billion people right there. Not to mention he is widely popular in Europe especially Italy where he grew up. Messi is not a household name in America and I'm pretty sure china really doesn't care about football.

Lol in Italy of all places?! Get out. You'd be lucky to find even just a single person every five or ten who can name you a single NBA player, and that single one is Jordan 99% of times, Magic the other 0.9% and Shaq the remaining 0.1%.

You do realize that Kobe spent nearly all of his childhood in Italy right? His dad also played for Italy.

You do realize we're talking about Italy right? Football occupies positions 1 to over 9000 in sports popularity rankings. Do you really think that people here remember about a dude that 20+ years ago played on low level teams? Or a kid that achieved national fame almost a decade after leaving Italy and was a complete unknown while there? Kobe is just as unknown here to non NBA fans as every other NBA player. Heck even italian NBA players are completely unknown to the non basketball following crowd.

it doesnt matter if you like the sport or even watch it, you KNOW who Tiger Woods is and what he does. the majority of people here dont even know Messi exists. Beckham is far more of a global icon than Messi. youre getting too caught up in whos better at the game or who likes the game...thats totally irrelevant

And you are not? People here barely know there is a sport like golf in real life, much less about Tiger. People in the US make big deals out of his family issues, but truth is it didn't even make the sports news in most of the world. Golf is a tiny sport, with a tiny audience outside the UK and USA, and you can realize it by just looking at the kind of sponsors its main champion can manage. I'd bet 99% of world population can only recognize Rolex among those brands (don't come back with Nike and EA because they sponsor Tiger only through golf specific sub-brands, and their golf-specific merchandise is absolutely unknown outside of the golf fans crowd).

[nbaintel1]

Honest question. Is Kobe even really that much more well known than like Neymar or Balotelli? I know a lot of US people don't know them, but they are pretty well known by the rest of the world.

BEIJING &mdash In China, Kobe Bryant is loved.

In China, Kobe Bryant is greeted with cheers.

In China, Kobe Bryant is a shut-in.

Well, at least for the duration of the USA men's basketball team's run at the Beijing Olympics, he is.

"The military won't let me go out," Bryant said, talking about the crowds that congregate wherever he goes.

Bryant has been able to attend other Olympic events and visit the athletes' village but even the few times he has done that have caused some angst for Chinese security worried about crowd control.

"If I go out in public, the military will be more than happy to walk with me and tell me to get my butt back to the hotel," Bryant said.

No other USA player attracts more people, more cheers - "Kobe-a!" the Chinese call him - or more love than the Los Angeles Lakers star and 2008 NBA Most Valuable Player.

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2008/08/17/4 ... rylink=cpy

[5DOM]

Honest question. Is Kobe even really that much more well known than like Neymar or Balotelli? I know a lot of US people don't know them, but they are pretty well known by the rest of the world.

At this moment, Kobe's surely bigger than Neymar. Even if you are supposed to be the next big thing, if you don't play in Europe (or haven't played in the WC at the very least), there's no way you are very recognizable to casual fans around the world. Balotelli's different because he's crazy and left a lasting impression this summer, but still Kobe should be comfortably ahead of both IMO. He's too big in the US and China.

[bigboi]

Honest question. Is Kobe even really that much more well known than like Neymar or Balotelli? I know a lot of US people don't know them, but they are pretty well known by the rest of the world.

At this moment, Kobe's surely bigger than Neymar. Even if you are supposed to be the next big thing, if you don't play in Europe (or haven't played in the WC at the very least), there's no way you are very recognizable to casual fans around the world. Balotelli's different because he's crazy and left a lasting impression this summer, but still Kobe should be comfortably ahead of both IMO.

That's exactly why I think by like next year Balotelli will be more known since we haven't seen a person with his combo of craziness, swagger, story, and skills. He's a walking storyline on and off the field

[j_n]

I think its safe to say that most pepole in europe dont folow NBA and most of them could only name Jordan or shaq, that was the case with me before I started watching the NBA.

Messi and Ronaldo(partly becasue of that other Ronaldo that was the best a decade ago) are probably the answer

[Aeternus]

^^^You're mostly correct, I'm just going to say that Magic is a much more well known basketball player than Shaq in Europe.

Honest question. Is Kobe even really that much more well known than like Neymar or Balotelli? I know a lot of US people don't know them, but they are pretty well known by the rest of the world.

Neymar is just a prospect. He's the equivalent of a college level player in terms of fame. Most casual football fans have never heard of him. I'm pretty sure Kobe is more popular.

Balotelli is different. Basically every european football fan has laughed at his endless stream of retardation, and his many questionable actions have broken into general news section in the most popular newspapers and broadcasting networks of at the very least Italy and UK, probably even Spain, France and Germany, giving him a popularity that transcends sports in these countries.
I don't know world-wise, but Europe-wise he's certainly more popular than Kobe.