by Scott
I’m always interested to find out how much NBA players are worth and I don’t just mean how much they make from their lucrative contracts because we can all just hop on over to HoopsHype to get a breakdown of their salaries What I’m interested in is how much they make from endorsements. Thankfully, Forbes have stepped up to the plate as they have just released a list of the NBA’s highest paid players with a breakdown of both on-court and off-court earnings, and you may be surprised by the order of the names in this list:
(1) Kobe Bryant - on-court: $27.8 million; off-court: $32 million
(2) LeBron James - on-court: $17.6 million; off-court: $40 million
(3) Derrick Rose – on-court: $16.4 million; off-court: $16 million
(4) Dwyane Wade - on-court: $17.2 million; off-court: $13 million
(5) Kevin Durant - on-court: $16.7 million; off-court: $13 million
Ahhhh, the life of an NBA superstar. Can’t be too bad.
You know what’s crazy though? Kobe is set to make $3 million more next season from the Lakers. So he’s doing pretty well for himself as a 34 year old NBA player. Something else that’s pretty crazy: LeBron ($40m) nearly makes as much as Rose, Wade and Durant combined ($42m) from endorsements. So when you felt bad for him taking less money when he moved to South Beach, well, he’s been doing okay.
Note: Following them were Carmelo Anthony, Amar’e Stoudemire, Dwight Howard, Chris Paul and Pau Gasol.
See how much they are all worth at Forbes.