On September 12, 1984, Michael Jordan (then 21) made history. The basketball legend signed his first professional contract in the North American NBA league with the Chicago Bulls 40 years ago. This was followed by an extraordinary career with six NBA championships and the best points average in league history at 30.1.
SPORT BILD shows the historical document. His first salary: a measly $455,000 by today’s NBA standards – taking inflation into account, this would be equivalent to 1.25 million euros today. The current top earner in the NBA is Golden State’s Stephen Curry (36) with 50.4 million euros!
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Source: BILD10.09.2024
Those were different times in the NBA: Jordan (61) came into the league as a rookie from the University of North Carolina. His contract with the Bulls was actually for seven years (for $6.3 million including a signing-on fee of $250,000) – that is, $900,000 per season (equivalent to €2.46 million today). But it quickly became clear that Jordan was underpaid given his performance. In his first four NBA seasons, he averaged 32.7 points per game. In 1987/88, he was voted “Most Valuable Player” (MVP) for the first time – he received this award five times in his career.
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So the contract was terminated and extended under improved conditions: eight years for 25.7 million dollars (an average of 3.21 million) – today that would be 61.6 million euros. In the first year of the contract, 1988/89, Jordan earned around two million dollars (today that would be 4.8 million euros), but was still only sixth in the NBA. New York’s Patrick Ewing was ahead with 3.25 million dollars (today: 7.8 million euros).
The first page of the NBA contract that Michael Jordan signed as a rookie in the league in 1984
Photo: Private
In his 16 NBA seasons, Jordan only really cashed in at the end: in 1996/97 he received $30.14 million (equivalent to €54.5 million today), and in 1997/98 he even received $33.14 million (equivalent to €58.1 million today). In total, he earned $93.8 million in NBA salaries (equivalent to €175.7 million today).
For comparison: LeBron James (39) leads the NBA’s all-time money list with 432.5 million euros. In 2024/25 he will receive another 43.9 million, and if he exercises his contract option for 2025/26 he would be guaranteed another 47.4 million. He would then have a salary total of 523.8 million euros (over 23 NBA years).
Jordan became a billionaire off the NBA court: The basketball legend has earned 2.4 billion euros through sponsorship contracts – including with Nike and its shoe brand “Jordan Brand”. Jordan is set to receive five percent of each “Jordan Brand” revenue. In 2023, this was 315 million euros (out of 6.3 billion in sales). In 1984, he signed with the shoe brand for 2.5 million dollars over five years (that would be the equivalent of 6.9 million euros today).
Last year he sold the majority of his shares in the NBA club Charlotte Hornets, which are worth around 2.7 billion dollars. It is not known exactly how much he received. It was certainly a good deal: in 2010, Jordan acquired the majority of the club for 250 million euros.
NBA contracts specify what a player is not allowed to do, such as boxing, riding mopeds and skydiving
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Other special features of the contract: It lists activities that Jordan was prohibited from engaging in, including boxing, wrestling, motorcycling, moped riding, car racing, skydiving and hang gliding. It also excluded that Jordan could only make sponsorship appearances with the permission of his club. This gave him complete freedom to do commercials for Nike.
The contract stipulates that Michael Jordan will receive a signing bonus of $250,000
Photo: Private
An appendix to the contract specifies the signing bonus of $250,000. It was paid in four installments – $100,000 upon signing, then three times in installments of $50,000 each (until 1989). Below that are the agreed salaries: In his first year in the NBA, Jordan received $455,000. The money was paid in 24 installments over the course of the year.
The NBA contract signed by Michael Jordan
Photo: Private
The contract was signed by Michael Jordan (bottom right), his agent Donald Dell (top left), Chicago manager Rod Thorn (below) and Bulls owner Lester Crown (above Jordan).
2024-09-12 10:31:49