This Is the Athlete Who Makes the Most Money Off the Field

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Feb 14, 11:34AM EST · Published Feb 13, 8:58AM EST

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This Is the Athlete Who Makes the Most Money Off the Field — © Jamie Squire / Getty Images Sport via Getty Images

The Winter Olympic Games remind us that not every athlete makes money as a champion. An Olympic Medal is worth about $750. Some medal winners go on to be paid athletes. Others make money from endorsements. However, the Olympics have rarely been the best path to a massive athlete payday.

Professional athletes, on the other hand, can be paid huge sums for their time on the field. Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs, who many consider the best quarterback in the NFL, recently signed a contract that pays him $45 million a year. NBA player Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors makes about the same.

Even athletes who are paid these towering sums make more money via endorsements than they do on the field. Shoe company Nike pays out endorsements that, when combined, run into hundreds of millions of dollars. The theory is that if players use Nike gear, people everywhere will want to do the same. That may work. Air Jordan shoes, named after basketball great Michael Jordan, were introduced in 1985. Jordon retired in 2003. The Air Jordan line of products still brings Nike over $1 billion a year.

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OLBG recently released a study titled “Off-Field Earners”.

The study does have a weakness. Its overreliance on Forbes data on athlete pay and endorsements.

An athlete whose career appears to be over tops the list. This is not unusual. Several athletes who do well by these measures will never return to the field. Conor McGregor, a UFC fighter, has had a history of wins. However, he is barely listed in the top 10 in his sport and was badly beaten in his last outing in July 2021. He has been a mainstay of the pay per view part of the league’s success. His total earnings come to $180 million last year, of which only $22 million was earned in the ring.

McGregor is followed by one of the greatest players in tennis. Roger Federer’s total income was $90 million last year, almost all of which came from endorsements. He is followed by basketball great Labron James, whose total is $96.5 million, of which $31.5 million was earned on the court.

Next, Tiger Woods, who is almost certainly retired made $60 million, virtually all of which was from endorsements.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.