The highest paid athlete of 2016 is not a basketball player, boxer or golfer. Instead, this year's top paid athlete has toppled great names like Floyd Mayweather, which has ranked first three times, and golfer Tiger Woods who has previously dominated the list hitting the number one spot 12 times. But with Mayweather retiring and Woods plagued by injuries, space had opened up at the top for another ambitious sports star to fill—a space that soccer and Real Madrid superstar Cristiano Ronaldo has happily just entered.
The soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo is worth a whopping $88 million. This 31-year-old Portuguese native is the star forward of his Spanish national team, Real Madrid and is the first football player ever to be ranked as the number one highest paid world athlete. Ronaldo's Real Madrid contract which runs through 2018 is worth $56 million a year in salary with bonuses, and is only a portion of his total earnings the rest come from endorsements.
That seems to be the going rate for being Real’s all-time leading scorer. He has racked up more than 50 goals in each of his last six seasons, won the Champions League for his club last month (second in three years), has three FIFA Best Player of the Year awards and four European Golden Shoes in his personal trophy case. The three-time FIFA Player of the Year is a marketing force earning more than $32 million in deals and endorsements. Ronaldo just kicked off a contract extension with Nike last year worth $14 million, and they have even launched his soccer cleats collection call Mercurial CR7s. Other Ronaldo endorsement partnerships include Tag Heuer, the prestigious Swiss watch company, Herbalife, Pokerstars, Clear Shampoo, Armani and more. Ronaldo has his line of suits, cologne, shirts, shoes and underwear, which he is slowly launching called the CR7 collection. He also has a chain of hotels under construction.
The football star also owes his success to his huge fan base. Ronaldo is the most famous athlete in the world by social media standards, with 215 million followers across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. It seems we should keep an eye out for Ronaldo's success and to see if his rival Lionel Messi will surpass him next year for they are head to head on the soccer field and in the race to be the world's highest paid athlete.
