Four Famous (and Infamous) Sports Celebrity Couples
Figure 1 Marilyn Monroe was one in one of the first big sports celebrity couples
Sports stars have always been celebrities really. But before they started earning so much money there were not that many that transcended their sports and dominated the celebrity circuit as well. These days it is unusual for a top sports star not to date or marry another stellar personality.
It is not being too unkind to suggest that some of the biggest sports stars may not be in with quite the same chance of dating supermodels and the like if they were not so good at their day jobs! But there have been some couples that brought together the worlds of sports and celebrity more than others. Here are four such romances.
Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe
Possibly the original power celebrity couple, Joe DiMaggio was a baseball star for the New York Yankees and Marilyn Monroe is one of the most famous people ever to walk the planet. Their whirlwind romance began in 1954 and they eloped to be married almost immediately.
Unfortunately, love didn’t last long – officially. DiMaggio was reported to have been incredibly jealous and possessive and the couple divorced just nine months after tying the knot. DiMaggio never remarried though – and when Monroe tragically died in 1962 it was he who claimed the body and organized a funeral without any of the Hollywood crowd that DiMaggio thought was a bad influence. He reportedly had red roses delivered to her crypt three times a week for 20 years.
David and Victoria Beckham
Looking at David Beckham today it is strange to think that he was the relative unknown of the two when he started dating Posh Spice Victoria Beckham. The Spice Girls were the biggest pop group in the world and he was just a talented soccer player with what was then the most successful team in England.
The media frenzy in the UK was intense, as Posh and Becks became the power couple of the day. Beckham’s coach frowned upon the relationship but there was a marriage in 1999 and the couple now has four children. Victoria Beckham moved into fashion but does not have nearly as high a profile as David now – who is a team owner in Major League Soccer and the face of a thousand advertising campaigns.
Figure 2 Sports stars are celebrities in their own right these days
Tony Parker and Eva Longoria
Television actress Eva Longoria was already a famous face in 2004 thanks to her role in daytime soap The Young and the Restless when she burst into superstardom as part of the smash comedy drama Desperate Housewives. It was around the same time that she met and married Tony Parker, a star player on the San Antonio Spurs NBA basketball team.
The couple got engaged in 2006 and were married a year later in Paris. For a while they were the go-to Hollywood/Sports couple but all was not well behind closed doors. Longoria discovered that Parker had been conducting an affair with the wife of a teammate and divorce papers were filed. The couple officially split in 2011 and now Longoria is happily married again.
Dennis Rodman and Carmen Electra and Madonna
There have been countless other sports celebrity couples over the years. But in the 1990s a lot of the media’s attention was on Dennis Rodman. A larger than life figure who played for the very successful Chicago Bulls basketball team, Rodman was equally well known for his outlandish fashion sense.
His look attracted Madonna – and they dated for a few months in the 90s. Rodman later claimed that the singer offered him $20 million to impregnate her. By the end of the decade he was married to Carmen Electra. But – like many sports celebrity couples before – it didn’t last long and the two split in March 1999.
