Mar
12Not all professional athletes make a lot of money such as those that participate in smaller non revenue accumulating sports. In order to be able to be a professional athlete full time, many of these less popular athletes have to rely on the products and paychecks they receive from their sponsors and advertisers. Other athletes, that are in the limelight however, make a lot of money playing their sport and even more sometimes from their sponsorship deals. One of the first athletes to really do this was professional basketball player, Michael Jordan who used his basketball skills to promote several products in addition to apparel, toys, items and even basketball videos with his name on them.
Wherever there is room to promote a sponsorship company, they will find a method to do it whether it is on the helmet of a race car driver or in the form of a temporary tattoo to professional beach volleyball players like Gabrielle Reece. Athletes are given wonderful package deals to promote a certain brand as a sort of spokesperson and in exchange they receive monetary and product compensation. For the lesser known athletes, this is extremely helpful to offer them the needed income to be able to train full time. For other highly compensated athletes like professional baseball, basketball and football players it is simply the cherry on top.
Michael Jordan was one of the first professional athletes to start this trend and he ended up making more from those endorsements than he did playing basketball. Certain businesses saw the total star power in Michael Jordan and knew he would make the perfect marketer for their product. One example was Gatorade which was a sports drink that had existed for some time but when they got Michael Jordan to endorse Gatorade, sales rose quickly and it became the best selling sports drink.
Now younger professional athletes that are making it to the big leagues see product endorsements as part of the package deal when they become a professional. A lot of new athletes that are confident in themselves and their ability to sell items even hold out for multi million dollars endorsement these days. One example of that youthful professional player is Le Bron James. He was in the headlines for his basketball abilities and noted to be the next Jordan when he was just a sophomore playing in Akron, Ohio. Now he is one the biggest paid athletes with several lucrative endorsements.
The largest grossing professional athlete to have the greatest amount of endorsement deals ever is PGA professional, Tiger Woods. As an individual athlete, he is not paid by salary but rather by performance and how many big golf tournaments he wins. Because he has been such a high profile, successful and marketable player, his endorsements deals are earning him several million each year on top of his golf earnings. He also has recently lost many of these sponsors with the latest scandals of his several infidelities.




