The Most Powerful Athletes

A MAY 2012 ARTICLE ( )

The world’s most powerful celebrity athletes span across sports and the globe. The 17 athletes that qualified for our 2012 Celebrity 100 (14 men and 3 women) play seven different sports and were born in nine different countries.

Leading the way among athletes isTiger Woods, who ranks No. 12 overall–down from No. 6 in 2011. Woods’s annual income dropped to $58 million from $75 million due to continued sponsor defections like Tag Heuer and Gillette, but he remains one of the highest paid athletes in the world. His fame quotient exceeds any other athlete as mentions of his name on TV and the radio were tops among athletes and sixth highest among all celebrities.

Soccer players rule among the men, as the only sport where three players made the cut with David Beckham (No. 32), Cristiano Ronaldo (No. 44) andLionel Messi (No. 50). In addition to their prodigious incomes, all three are social media giants with a combined 95 million Facebook followers. The avid following makes them more attractive and valuable to sponsors like Nike(Ronaldo) and Adidas (Beckham, Messi).

The three female athletes are from the world of tennis (Nascar’s Danica Patrick just missed cut). Maria Sharapova (No. 71) remains the world’s highest paid female athlete with earnings of $26 million over the past 12-months, while Serena Williams (No. 76) is the most compelling figure in women’s tennis. Li Na (No. 88) is a newcomer who last year became the first Chinese player to win a Grand Slam event with her French Open title. She scored big off the court with seven multimillion-dollar endorsement deals including Mercedes and Samsung after her Paris triumph. Li’s fellow newcomers include Rihanna and Kim Kardashian.

NBA players got dinged by the five-month NBA lockout, which cost players 20% of their paychecks when the season was reduced to 66 game per team. The reduced incomes cost All-Stars Dwyane Wade and Dwight Howard their spots after appearing on the Celebrity 100 in 2011. They join other notable drop-offs like Charlie Sheen and Jay Leno.

Making the final cut for the Celebrity 100 among sports stars requires a massive level of fame and a thick wallet. Three-time Super Bowl champ Tom Brady had the lowest earnings over the past 12-months, among the men, at $27 million. The cut-off among the women was $13 million, which Serena Williams earned over the past year.

What athletes are destined to make future Forbes Celebrity lists? We identified two NBAers that are included among our rising stars. Kevin Durant won his third straight NBA scoring crown during this season and has established himself as one of the NBA’s best players in his first five seasons in the league. Nike snapped up Durant in 2007 with a seven-year, $60 million deal. Derrick Rose’s income is set to explode next season when contract extensions with the Chicago Bulls ($95 million over five years) and Adidas ($185 million over 13 years) kick in.

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