Yes, fame equals Instagram followers to a large extent. You're right. It's always going to be somewhat subjective, but I can't think of a better way to measure fame in 2026 than Instagram followers. I don't really think "India bias" matters when talking about fame unless you specifically decide that fame is based not on the number of people who know who you are, but rather how dispersed those people are around the world, in which case obviously soccer players are still going to be the most famous athletes, far ahead of any baseball player.

I think anybody who believes Ohtani "is one of the most famous athletes in the world" doesn't understand that most of the world doesn't watch or care about baseball, that most of the world does watch and care about soccer, and that India has over a billion people and loves cricket.

And to your point, Ohtani's financials are extremely misleading because the majority of his fame comes from fans in very high GDP countries. Someone could be extraordinarily popular across all of the continent of Africa and not generate the kind of money Ohtani does from the U.S. and Japan.

So in the end, it's going to be subjective, but any discussion of money has to take into account global economics and until someone can suggest a better metric, I can't think of a better way to measure fame today than Instagram.