Sixers

Just One Philly Player on Forbes’ Highest Paid Athletes List

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Jun 5th, 2018 · 10:38 AM EDT

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It’s two-time Arena Bowl champion Dan Raudabaugh.

Just kidding.

It’s JJ Redick, who checks in at #86 on the list with $23.5 million in combined salary and endorsements from June of last year to June of this year.

That’s it, just one Philly player, though Joel Embiid and Jake Arrieta will enter the top-100 next year with their beefy deals. Carson Wentz will be there when/if he gets a long-term deal.

Otherwise, the list is pretty interesting, with a top five of Floyd Mayweather Jr., Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Conor McGregor (who hasn’t fought in almost a year), and Neymar Jr. All five made more than 90 million dollars, with Ronaldo pulling in $47 million in endorsements alone.

The ridiculous purse of the Mayweather/McGregor superfight was strong enough to put both fighters in the top five. Mayweather got a $275 million payday in his only boxing match dating back to September of 2015.

The rest of the top ten is LeBron James, Roger Federer, Steph Curry, Matt Ryan, and Matthew Stafford. There are some head-scratchers on the list, with Alex Smith clocking in at #20 overall ($41.4m), Jimmy Garoppolo at #28 ($36.2m) and Ryan Tannehill at #32 ($35.2m). Gotta find that franchise quarterback, no matter what the cost.

There are a couple of foreign race car drivers and a cricket player represented. Clayton Kershaw is the first MLB player on the list, at #37. No women entered the top 100.

Here’s the breakdown of the top 50:

• basketball – 19
• football – 9
• combat sports – 4
• soccer – 4
• golf – 4
• tennis – 3
• baseball – 3
• auto racing – 3
• track – 1

Mostly NBA and NFL stars on the list with more baseball players on the bottom half. No NHL players were in the top-100. Hassan Whiteside is also in there, and he definitely earned his $24 million dollars this season.

For what it’s worth, here’s the highest-paid player on each team going into next season, according to Spotrac numbers:

• Eagles: Fletcher Cox, $17.9m
• Sixers: Joel Embiid, $25.2m
• Phillies: Jake Arrieta, $30m
• Flyers: Claude Giroux, $9m
• Union: Borek Dockal, $1.7m

Not sure about the endorsement money, but tack on some extra dollars to those amounts for a better ballpark figure.

The @Forbes list of highest paid athletes from June 2017 to June 2018:

1. Floyd Mayweather, $285M

2. Lionel Messi, $111M

3. Ronaldo, $108M

4. Conor McGregor, $99M

5. Neymar, $90M pic.twitter.com/gNzXpQhU9g

— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) June 5, 2018