The Names Have a Few Things in Common

Athletes at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia, are showcasing considerable talents, but who are these people?

Some pretty big names, it turns out. Muhammad Ali, for instance, is representing Ghana in table tennis. Brad Pitt is representing Australia as a heavyweight boxer.

OK, so these aren’t the celebrities. Ali is a policeman and Pitt a painter.

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Name game (cont.): Also competing at Melbourne: Prince Octopus Dzanie, a boxer from Ghana; Ransford Goodluck, a sharpshooter from Guyana; Endurance Ojokolo, a sprinter from Nigeria.

“There’s a Moses but no Jesus, although there are plenty of Marys,� Agence France-Presse news service reports. “Likewise there is a Cain but no Abel.�

There’s a sprinter named Dolphin and a swimmer named Hercules. There’s even a Batman (Daniel Batman from Australia), but alas, no Robin.

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Trivia time: Babe Ruth hit 29 home runs, then a single-season record, in 1919, his last season with the Boston Red Sox. Whose record did he break?

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More Ruth: According to baseball lore, New York Yankee owner Jacob Ruppert made pinstriped uniforms permanent in 1927 in an attempt to make a ballooning Ruth look thinner.

Best friend: Tiger Woods tells Ed Bradley in a “60 Minutes� interview that will air tonight that he stuttered as a child. “The words got lost, you know, somewhere between the brain and the mouth,� he says.

He eventually overcame the problem -- by talking to his dog. “He would sit there and listen, and he’d fall asleep,� Woods says. “I finally learned how to do that, without stuttering all over myself.�

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Got food? Detroit Piston guard Richard Hamilton loves winning, but he’s passionate about food, which is why he has a personal chef prepare all of his meals. Asked by the Detroit Free Press what foods the player prefers, chef Shawn Loving said a mouthful:

“He likes Japanese, Italian, soul or Southern, comfort food. He likes a good steak if you’ve got that. He enjoys a nice white chicken lasagna. He loves fish. He loves sea bass. He loves barbecued salmon. There’s really no seafood he doesn’t eat.�

Said Hamilton: “Whatever he cooks, I eat.�

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Blame the parents: Brock Little, who chose riding big waves over a career as a contest surfer, to Surfer magazine on what could have been: “I went to high school for way too long. My parents made me go, but if I had quit in sixth or seventh grade instead of 10th, I would have been Kelly Slater.

“I had to take the bus to town every day and didn’t get home until 5 and it ruined my surfing career. I had to pick up big waves because I didn’t have enough talent otherwise.�

Slater, the most successful competitive surfer, is vying for his eighth world title.

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Trivia answer: Edward Nagle “Ned� Williamson hit 27 with the Chicago White Stockings in 1884.

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And finally: From Jim Armstrong of the Denver Post: “So the Cowboys were the highest bidder for Terrell Owens. That’s highest as in Ricky Williams, I suppose.�