Viewed from a distance, the JAR sapphire earclips might be a pair of especially gaudy Christmas baubles, while legend has it that the ping-pong diamond rings were Taylor's reward for besting Burton in a game of table-tennis.
By besting an overrated Duke, little-respected Lehigh showed that quantitative methods can indeed identify teams that are stronger or weaker than their seeds would indicate.
Instead, after 12 rounds of mostly glancing blows, Mr Mayweather extended his undefeated record to 48-0 in a unanimous decision, besting his rival by a score of 118-110 oneone judge's card and 116-112 on the other two.The only people at the 16,700-seat MGM Grand arena in Las Vegas questioning the result were Mr Pacquiao; his trainer, Freddie Roach; and his promoter, Bob Arum.
Politically, Ewa Kopacz, the new prime minister, should try to recreate Mr Tusk's warm close personal relationship with Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, which was one of the reasons he got the Brussels job.Yet future challenges are not taking away Poles' delight at finally besting their old foe and current close ally.
On January 13th the book's ranking was 33, briefly besting President Barack Obama's popular tome, "The Audacity of Hope .Tellingly, the spikes in the novel's sales coincide with the news (see chart).
Since besting the double-digit price rises of the 1970s, most central banks have set inflation targets of around 2% per year.
And what's Hispanophone Uruguay doing in fourth, ahead of Australia and America (both of which are bonkers about other sports referred to as "football" to boot)?One reason could be that Uruguay hosted the first World Cup in 1930 (which it won, defeating Argentina; it also emerged victorious in 1950, this time besting Brazil).
Leading almost wire to wire, he reached the finish line in two minutes and 26.55 seconds, besting the runner-up by five and a half lengths.There are good reasons why the Triple Crown has proven so elusive.
Vietnam is now in eighth place for maths, besting many rich countries which spend far more.
Mr Gagosian was also in the running for this one, but dropped out before it sold for $7.1m, besting its top estimate.
In virtually every anecdote, Mr Denktash is besting the Greeks or fending them off.
