Here S Exactly How Much Kobe Bryant Made From Salary And Endorsements During His Entire Career

Kobe’s rookie salary was just $1.01 million. After his rookie deal expired he got his first pay bump with a six-year, $70 million extension in 1999. Over the next six seasons his salary grew about a million season going from $9 million for the 1999-2000 season to $14.175 million for the 2004-05 season. At that point he had three NBA titles under his belt and was certainly do for another pay raise so he opted out of his contract before the 2004-05 season. The Lakers made him a $100 million dollar man by signing him to a seven-year deal worth $136.4 million. Over the course of the last six seasons he had the highest salary in the NBA, and became the only player next to Michael Jordan to make over $30 million for a single season (2013-14). When the curtain falls for him at the end of the 2015-16 season his career earnings will total $323,312,307. The only player in the NBA who earned more on the court is Kevin Garnett who has been paid $332 million during his career. But here’s the best part: NBA salaries are only half the equation! One of the good things about being the greatest player of your generation is that companies line up to pay you enormous amounts of money to endorse their products. Many companies certainly paid big to have Kobe on their team. He was signed with Adidas for the first few years of his career until he signed a $10 million/year deal with Nike in 2003. Last year his shoes accounted for $105 million in sales for the company. Over the years Kobe helped sell products for Sony, Nintendo, Sprite, McDonald’s, Hublot, and Mercedes Benz just to name a few. Interestingly, his endorsement money did not take a major hit in 2003 and 2004 in the aftermath of his sexual assault case. He did lose some endorsers, most notably McDonald’s, but overall the main negative impact was that his endorsement income stayed flat for a few years. Here is a year-by-year breakdown of Kobe’s endorsement income: 1996 – $1 million 1997 – $1 million 1998 – $1 million 1999 – $2 million 2000 – $9 million 2001 – $9 million 2002 – $10 million 2003 – $10 million 2004 – $13 million 2005 – $13 million 2006 – $13 million 2007 – $15 million 2008 – $15 million 2009 – $20 million 2010 – $20 million 2011 – $20 million 2012 – $30 million 2013 – $28 million 2014 – $26 million 2015 – $26 million = $280 million When you combine $280m and $323m you get $603 million earned from salary and endorsements during his career! Not too shabby! The only professional athletes who have earned more from their actual sports as active athletes are Floyd Mayweather, Michael Schumacher and Tiger Woods. Michael Jordan has obviously earned much more, but most of it has come during his retirement years. For comparison’s sake, Floyd Mayweather’s career earnings are $695 million. And Kobe isn’t the only one who benefited from his incredible success. When he first joined the Lakers in 1996, the team was worth $200 million. According to the latest numbers, the Lakers are now worth $2.6 billion. Perhaps even more. Congrats to Kobe Bryant on an impressive career on and off the court. Can’t wait to see how you spend the next few decades! Post script: When Kobe was asked about his endorsement future, he responded: “I don’t have patience to do commercials anymore.”