Glad you specified that you're limiting the name recognition to the US. I'm a Canadian who has worked as a sportswriter in Beijing for the past seven years, so I can offer a different perspective. A couple of years ago my paper (circulation 675,000) ran a contest in which readers named their "all time favorite" sports hero. The No. 1 response, by a considerable margin, was Ali ... followed by NBA stars Yao Ming and Michael Jordan. Pele was fourth and David Beckham was fifth.
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