The others don't even begin to come close to the OP. Pele and Ali were probably the two most famous people on the planet bar none in latter half of the 20th century.
Well if it's fame that counts I'll just quickly go and dig out a picture of Justin Beiber meeting Barrack Obama. Your point only proves they were all about the hype and the frenzy that followed them around. Santos and NY Cosmos FFS.
Brilliant mate, two original superstars of their respective sports, not posing ****s adorned with pointless bling to prove their worth, just genuine stars with bags of talent and what looks like a genuine respect for each other.
If you're referring to FMJ and Ronaldo with that bling comment, they also have a fair amount of belts, medals and records to prove their worth too
It's absolutely unbelievable the amount of hype around Pele, his "1200 goals" is an absolute farce, his record for Brazil was good but not unique. He is the most "Look at me" player ever, he still is, it takes 2 mins to google some of the guff he comes out with but let's all pretend he's humble because he has a nice face. Ali I can have for sure, he was an incredible talent but Pele isn't even close. He's a manufactured icon.
He had friendlies against ****ty part time teams arranged to bump his tally up, the level he played them at was a joke. He even counted goals from when he was an amateur I believe.
It doesn't really matter whether you think Pele was a fraud or not, barring some major controversy being dug up the fact is he's one of, perhaps the, most iconic players in the sport. Same for Ali. I don't believe people will look back on Ronaldo and FMJ in the same wistful, rose tinted way. I don't even like them now.
Being liked doesn't make them better though mate. If that was the case Beckham would have been the best player, Bruno the best boxer. I suppose the OP maybe wasn't trying to say 'beat that', in a talent way. Maybe I've misinterpreted how he wanted us to go about actually beating 'that'.
It's not so much that they were nice chaps, it was the combination of extraordinary talent combined with huge personalities and entertainment value. Ali had a big role to play too outside of boxing in terms of cultural significance.
