And the award for the wealthiest (and most overpaid) sport goes to....

[Johnny English]

........soccer. Again.

7 of the 12 highest paying sporting franchises in the world are soccer teams.

[Ignatius J Reilly]

World's most popular sport w the most teams worldwide. I'd be shocked if it was anything else.

[Johnny English]

I always thought that baseball was by far the highest paid sport.

[eyedea]

[dcm1602]

I always thought that baseball was by far the highest paid sport.

Well if you look at elite players they are

My guess is that like baseball's minor league players and crap get averaged in bringing down the average salary way down.

[dcm1602]

Ie breakdown of the Yankees contracts

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/team/new-york-yankees/salary/71596?q=new-york-yankees

If you average their top 15 players I'd imagine the average is like 12-14 million a year

But once you get into the 25th  roster spots and what not it's like backup nobodies

[Miamipuck]

There is 1 Baseball player in the top 30 of all highest paid athletes and he is #30.

There are a bunch between 30-50 though.

[eyedea]

Not surprised, Mayweather is the highest paid athlete.


http://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2014/06/11/floyd-mayweather-heads-2014-list-of-the-worlds-highest-paid-athletes/

#1 Floyd Mayweather
Total Earnings: $105 million
Salary/winnings: $105 million
Endorsements: $0

#2 Cristiano Ronaldo
Total Earnings: $80 million
Salary/winnings: $52 million
Endorsements: $28 million

#3 LeBron James
Total Earnings: $72.3 million
Salary/winnings: $19.3 million
Endorsements: $53 million

#4 Lionel Messi
Total Earnings: $64.7 million
Salary/winnings: $41.7 million
Endorsements: $23 millio

#5 Kobe Bryant
Total Earnings: $61.5 million
Salary/winnings: $30.5 million
Endorsements: $31 million

#6 Tiger Woods
Total Earnings: $61.2 million
Salary/winnings: $6.2 million
Endorsements: $55 million


#7 Roger Federer
Total Earnings: $56.2 million
Salary/winnings: $4.2 million
Endorsements: $52 million

#8 Phil Mickelson
Total Earnings: $53.2 million
Salary/winnings: $5.2 million
Endorsements: $48 million

#9 Rafael Nadal
Total Earnings: $44.5 million
Salary/winnings: $14.5 million
Endorsements: $30 million

#10 Matt Ryan
Total Earnings: $43.8 million
Salary/winnings: $42 million
Endorsements: $1.8 million

[dcm1602]

Silly that they're counting endorsements and other excrement.

It would be like having shaquille O'Neil on there because he's making a movie.

Doesn't tell you much about how much any sport pays

And judging by Matt Ryan on the list I'm assuming it also doesn't take contract structure into mind either.

Pretty useless list as far as I'm concerned

[Johnny English]

Well if you look at elite players they are

My guess is that like baseball's minor league players and crap get averaged in bringing down the average salary way down.

That's true in soccer as well.

[Libero_2]

What I take from this is that NFL players are underpaid compared to other major sports, which is downright amazing to think about.

[Ignatius J Reilly]

What I take from this is that NFL players are underpaid compared to other major sports, which is downright amazing to think about.

Fewer games, more players per team.  It's the sport with the most impact on your body, but they get paid what the economics support.

[dcm1602]

What I take from this is that NFL players are underpaid compared to other major sports, which is downright amazing to think about.

Nfl players by far get paid the most per amount of time played

[Tommy]

Fewer games, more players per team.  It's the sport with the most impact on your body, but they get paid what the economics support.

Well, the cap has a lot to do with it as well.

[Johnny English]

Fewer games, more players per team.  It's the sport with the most impact on your body, but they get paid what the economics support.

...unlike soccer, in which a huge amount of clubs can only pay the astronomic wages they do thanks to the largesse of their extremely wealthy and presumably very bored owners.