British Expatriate Network

Who are the top 10 highest paid sportsmen in the world? A quick google only led me to hundrends of news stories about such-and-such's new deal making them "one of the highest paid sportsmen in the world". These included American baseball players, British footballers, Indian cricketers and F1 drivers of various nationalities. So -excluding sponsorship deals- who currently gets paid the most per annum? And who gets the most endorsement cash?

Forbes magazines the best place for lists like that. The list for 2004 looks like this

Tiger Woods
Michael Schumacher
Peyton Manning
Michael Jordan
Shaquille O'Neal
Kevin Garnett
Andre Agassi
David Beckham
Alex Rodriguez
Kobe Bryant

The earnings include endorsements, there isn't a list for just salaries. Tiger earned about 82million last year - 70million of it was endorsements; I think that makes him the receiver of the most sponsership money.

40million of Schumachers 80million annual income comes from a salary - he is the highest paid sportsman.

The two at the top get nearly double the 3rd placed earnings - Manning gets around 42million.

Kobe Bryant at the bottom of the list gets a piffling 26.1million, Beckham 28million.

Thanks, I tried Forbes, but only found current fortunes -obviouslty didn't know where to look.

So does Beckham earn more than Jordan, I wonder (just for playing)? Is Jordan subject to salary capping?

Isn't Jordan retired (for good) now and therefore capping is not an issue? I thought he just made money off endorsements and public appearances nowadays?

I think you are correct, I'm not sure if he is still connected to management, but the salary would be small. By his standards it would be small, to most of us it would be, large.

Jordan is no longer in the game. He came back to be part owner of the washington wizzards, and even played for a bit on the team. Don't think he can match the kids around now.

No he is not subject to the capping, still makes loads from Nike royalties and other stuff.

Thought shuie was up there thought he was on over 25 million a year

Of course you are right. So how can Jordan be considered in the list of highest paid sportsmen when none of his money is earned through playing sport? ???

I agree with you goose, i personally thought schuy's salary was 25 million from ferrari alone besides his sponsers..

I think I read somewhere that Michaels total earnings (everything) is somewhere up in the $55 million area...

Jordan also runs Jordan Motorsports with Suzuki and currently has three riders, Steve Rapp, Jason Pridmore and Montez Stewart as part of the team. He's also a very down to earth person...

Andrew )

To be honest though, a lot of it is just estimates, am sure no one really knows how much these people really earn. Wasn't shuey suppose to be on 1 million dollars a race?

Jordan receives no money from any basketball team after he was sacked as VP of operations of the Washington Wizards. He still has endorsement deals with Nike, Gatorade, Hanes and Ball Park franks, but most of his income comes from his own Jordan line of clothing and sports apparel. I think it operates as a company under the Nike umbrella.