Federer, Nadal In Top 10 Of ESPN's World Fame List

Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal have been named among the world’s Top 10 most famous athletes in new analysis by ESPN. Federer is fourth on ESPN’s World Fame 100 list, Nadal is ninth and Novak Djokovic is close behind at 12th.

Federer and Nadal both move up one place from their positions in last year’s inaugural list. Djokovic rises four places from 16th in 2016.

Kei Nishikori surges to 20th from 47th last year. Andy Murray slips one spot to 32nd and Stan Wawrinka, at No. 42, is the other ATP World Tour star to make the Top 100 list.

Real Madrid footballer Cristiano Ronaldo heads the World Fame 100 list, followed by Cleveland Cavaliers basketballer LeBron James in second and Barcelona footballer Lionel Messi in third.

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ESPN.com explains how the ratings are calculated…

The ESPN World Fame 100 is our annual attempt to create a ranking, through statistical analysis, of the 100 most famous athletes on the planet.

We started with Forbes’ annual list of the highest-paid athletes and expanded the pool from there using a variety of domestic and international sources to make sure we didn’t overlook any legitimate candidates. We also sought input from ESPN journalists around the world, including colleagues in our bureaus in Australia, South Africa, Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Mexico and the United Kingdom.

The data for each athlete in the pool was then fed into a formula created by ESPN director of sports analytics Ben Alamar that weighs athletes’ endorsements, their following on the social media Big Three (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) and Google search popularity, producing a comparative ranking system. The analysis includes five categories: endorsement money, Twitter followers, Instagram followers, Facebook followers and Google Trends score.

Nadal is competing this week at Roland Garros, where he is attempting to win a historic 10th title. Federer will return to the ATP World Tour 12 June in Stuttgart, when the grass-court season begins.