squidpants

so apparently lots of Brazilian soccer players' moms are getting kidnapped, which is too bad. They usually get released though, so that's good. However, this reminded me how much I hate that Brazilian athletes only use one name. It's annoying, you're not that spectacular. I first heard it in men's soccer, like Ronaldo and Elson and Ronaldinho, which to me is the stupidest - someone already had Ronaldo, so now you're "little Ronaldo." Why not just be Ronaldo Smith, or whatever your real name is. Imagine if we did that here.

"That young man is quite a slugger, what's his name?"
"Little Mark McGwire."
"No, really, what's his name?"
"That is his name. Read the jersey."

Honestly, it's not that hard to remember people's last names, think about every American sports star. But then I started to hear the one name Brazilians thing during the Women's World Cup, "Ana passes to Veronica," whatever. Like there is only one Ana playing soccer, come on. Of course, then Mia Hamm stole the ball and scored, because she has a full name. Eat it, Brazil. And they even do it now in beach volleyball. Beach volleyball?!?

But since there can only be so many first names, they are starting to get stupid. I saw a list of players and one was called "Dunga." Great, Dung-a. But then my favorite has to be Kaka. I suppose that doesn't translate in Brazil, but good luck becoming famous in the US. I mean, Ronaldo and Juninho and people are on Nike commercials, but I don't think Kaka is going to get a lot of advertising deals. "Hey kids, Kaka wants you to eat Gogurt!" "Kaka wears Reebok." "Kaka smells great when he uses Ralph Lauren cologne." Actually, that last one is actually kind of clever.