A few points at random ...
Bruce Lee is widely admired (especially by the general public) more than other martial artists of equal or greater accomplishment largely because he was a charismatic film performer. For some reason, many people are star-struck by action heroes on the big screen. That's the reason people tell jokes about "Chuck Norris facts" rather than "Joe Lewis facts" or "Mike Stone facts" or "Bill Wallace facts".
His early death probably added to the pop culture mystique, in a sort of James Dean way. No one had to see Bruce Lee getting old and fat, getting involved in scandals, making embarrassingly tacky commercials, etc.
In addition to his pop culture fame, he was an genuinely influential martial artist. He was neither the first nor last to espouse the ideas that he did, but he was one of the most visible proponents at the time of independence from style. Ironically, given that outlook, he founded a martial art which has survived in various forms and lineages and is being trained by plenty of people today. Some very good martial artists trained with him at the time and some very good martial artists have carried his legacy.
According to people who trained with him, he was a very dedicated and very talented martial artist. Of course, those kind of claims are made about just about every famous martial artist, but I take the judgment of guys like Joe Lewis pretty seriously.
(Those last two points could be made about a bunch of great martial artists who are not as well known or venerated as Lee, but most of them weren't film stars.)
Jacky Chan and Sammo Hung have only marketed themselves as performers, not as great martial artists. (Although I'm certain both could handle themselves in a fight.)
Chuck Norris is like Lee in that he is a genuinely high-level martial artist (who also created his own style), but is famous primarily due to movies and TV. He's not as charismatic as Lee and didn't get the mystique from dying young, but he gets a least a bit of the same mythologizing.
His Kung Fu was not that good, or he would be still alive.
Hmmm ... so the test for having good Kung fu is to live to at least 77 years old? I wonder how many CMA lineages you've just insulted. I'm pretty certain at least a few prominent CMA sifus have died earlier than that.
On the other hand, Bruce's student Dan Inosanto is still going strong at age 80 and looks better than most martial arts instructors half his age, so maybe Bruce passed some kind of good Kung Fu on to him after all?
Why is there so much worship of a man, who is dead, buried and rotten?
I'm not much for worship of anyone, alive or dead, but I do note that veneration of past instructors is pretty standard in much of the martial arts world. I was at a WC seminar this past weekend and at the end the instructor had us bow to the picture of Yip Man, who has been dead, buried, and rotten longer than Bruce Lee. When I took Judo classes, we typically bowed to a portrait of Jigaro Kano, who has been dead, buried, and rotten much longer than either one.
