What's in an athletic name?

Michael Jordan. Brett Favre. Jerry Rice. Aaron Rodgers. If you know anything about sports, you probably know these four men are some of the top names in their respective sports. But did you know that they now have relatives trying to pick up where they left off?

Here is some background on five young athletes trying to make a name for themselves, even though the names on their jerseys belong to some of the best athletes in history:

Jeffrey and Marcus Jordan

Jeffrey and Marcus are both sons of legendary NBA star and current Charlotte Bobcats owner Michael Jordan. They both currently play on the University of Central Florida’s men’s basketball team. Jeffrey is 23 and Marcus is 21. ESPN actually televised some of the brothers’ high school basketball games in the mid-2000s as they led the Loyola Academy basketball team in Illinois to a conference championship. Jeffrey played three seasons at the University of Illinois prior to transferring to UCF before the 2011-12 season. Now a senior, he’s seen very limited playing time at the college level. Marcus, however, has had more opportunities to play and is averaging an outstanding 17.5 points per game as a junior this season, following up on a year where he scored over 15 points per game. The two point guards will likely never come close to matching their dad’s prolific NBA career, but it should be interesting to see which one can make it to the next level and how he ends up doing. Wouldn’t it be something to see another Jordan on the Bulls’ roster?

Dylan Favre

Dylan is the nephew of longtime NFL quarterback Brett Favre. He is just a freshman and plays quarterback at Mississippi State. In 2011, Favre saw some action and threw for 119 yards on 13-of-26 passes along with a touchdown and no interceptions. It seemed as if he came in more often for wildcat plays and unique formations, demonstrating an ability to be a little more mobile than his uncle was. In high school, he set a Mississippi high school passing record. If Dylan has the passion for football that kept his uncle from un-retiring all those years, you never know what the 19-year-old’s future might entail in another few years.

Jerry Rice, Jr.

Not only does this kid have his dad’s last name, but he also has his first name. Jerry Jr. is a redshirt sophomore wide receiver for the UCLA Bruins football team. The 20-year-old has only seen limited playing time thus far in his college career. He still has a long way to go to prove himself as a potential NFL player. Oddly enough, he is three inches shorter than his father and a few pounds lighter. The good thing he has going for him is that he’s at a recognized school in UCLA. His dad, who attended Mississippi Valley State, essentially came out of nowhere in the 1985 NFL Draft.

Jordan Rodgers

Most people know Aaron Rodgers by now since he won Super Bowl XLV back in February. But did you know that Aaron’s little brother, Jordan, is a college football quarterback? Jordan is the starting QB for Vanderbilt University. The 23-year-old attended Butte College in northern California where his brother also played. He started his first game for the Commodores on Oct. 22, 2011 and led the team to the Liberty Bowl – a rare bowl appearance for the school. In 2011 as a junior, Rodgers had a solid 119.6 QB rating, throwing for 9 touchdowns, 9 interceptions, and completing 51.5% of his passes. Aaron certainly did not appear to be a future NFL star in college at California, so who knows what the future may hold for Jordan.

Fortunately, these five players share the names of very successful athletes. Unfortunately, simply having a name won’t mean you will be successful, and that goes for any profession. In fact, they may even have a tougher road than most athletes because everyone will be comparing them to the ones who came before them – just like I did in this blog post!

Spammers need grammar lessons

The other day, I got an e-mail from someone named Emil Chepiga. The subject line was simply “Well well.”

Here is what the e-mail read:

Here is [NAME REMOVED] writing to you.

My age is 21.

Don't you remember me? We met at the park.

I was at the party with my friends and we made some crazy and cool videos.

You must check the videos, here is the attachment.

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Bed chronometer lunge bra

Hope you like it. Keep in touch sweetheart

The name of the attached file was “grdokyux.htm.”

First of all, it looks like a 3-year-old wrote this (nothing against 3-year-olds, though). Or it’s someone whose first language is something other than English, which is probably more plausible. Plus it is confusing because the writer is talking about a park and then mentions a party and the fact that there are videos from the party.

Do people actually fall for e-mails written this poorly? This e-mail is much less convincing than some of the ones sent by Nigerian e-mail scammers. But it is beyond me that people will actually send money to those who send them these fake e-mails about how they are the great-grandson of a prince and need to get out of the country, but must make a financial transaction with someone in order to do so. In this particular case, you’d have to be just as ignorant to open the attachment. Good luck getting rid of the virus on your computer afterward.