“Poor soccer players are certainly overpaid,” the legendary former Juventus president Gianni Agnelli once mused. “The good ones never earn enough.”
Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are undoubtedly the two best players of their generation—if not any other—and have been financially rewarded for their sporting prowess over the years. Even at this advanced stage of their glittering careers, they remain the top two earners in the sport.
As Inter Miami co-owner Jorge Mas confirmed earlier this year, Messi earns somewhere in the region of $70–80 million each season when all the various bonuses and add-ons of his complicated contract are taken into account. In the eyes of the MLS Cup champions, he’s “worth every penny.”
Whether any services performed by a human being are worth what Ronaldo gets paid to score for Al Nassr is a question worth debating. The figurehead of the Saudi Pro League project bankrolled by the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund earns $225 million per year, according to The Athletic.
That truly staggering sum, the equivalent of more than $7 every second, comfortably makes Ronaldo the highest-paid athlete across any sport on the planet. However, there are some stars from across America’s favorite pastimes which challenge the Portuguese winger and Messi.
NFL
| Athlete | Team | Annual Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Cristiano Ronaldo | Al Nassr | $225 million |
| Lionel Messi | Inter Miami | $70–80 million |
| Dak Prescott | Dallas Cowboys | $60 million |
| Joe Burrow | Cincinnati Bengals | $55 million |
| Josh Allen | Buffalo Bills | $55 million |
| Jordan Love | Green Bay Packers | $55 million |
| Trevor Lawrence | Jacksonville Jaguars | $55 million |
No one in the NFL can match the earnings of the two leading players in the other version of football. The stars of the National Football League are bound by a salary cap dictated by the total valuation of the division, which has steadily risen in almost every season over the past three decades.
Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott comes closest after penning a four-year contract worth $240 million in 2024. However, as Sports Illustrated’s Matt Verderame points out, the inflation of the salary cap and wages specifically for quarterbacks suggests that Prescott may not hold top spot for too long. Given he is not considered the standout player in the sport’s most important position by pretty much anyone, that dethroning is perhaps overdue.
NBA
| Athlete | Team | Annual Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Cristiano Ronaldo | Al Nassr | $225 million |
| Lionel Messi | Inter Miami | $70–80 million |
| Steph Curry | Golden State Warriors | $59.6 million |
| Nikola Jokić | Denver Nuggets | $55.2 million |
| Joel Embiid | Philadelphia 76ers’ | $55.2 million |
Ronaldo and Messi may not be able to reach the same shelves as their basketball counterparts but they can at least pay for a more expensive stepladder.
Much like the NFL, the NBA is beholden to a salary cap. Each player’s renumeration is a proportion of this ever-changing total, forcing contracts to change in valuation each year. According to The Athletic’s estimate, Golden States Warrior point guard Steph Curry is expected to be the competition’s highest earner across the 2025–26 season. The future Hall of Famer has earned this status by revolutionizing the way the sport is played to such an extent that he is referenced as an example by even soccer managers like Pep Guardiola and Mikel Arteta.
Reigning Most Valuable Player Shai Gilgeous-Alexander boasts a larger average annual take-home wage ($68.3 million) than Curry after his latest contract extension, yet even that sum is below the lower end of Messi’s salary.
MLB
| Athlete | Team | Annual Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Cristiano Ronaldo | Al Nassr | $225 million |
| Lionel Messi | Inter Miami | $70–80 million |
| Kyle Tucker | LA Dodgers | $57.1 million |
| Juan Soto | New York Mets | $51 million |
| Shohei Ohtani | LA Dodgers | $46.1 million |
Even without the constraints of a salary cap, Major League Baseball can’t surpass soccer’s leading earners.
LA Dodgers account for two of the division’s highest average annual earners. Kyle Tucker’s new contract theoretically earns him more than Shohei Ohtani, but the two-way superstar’s contract is complex.
The generational all-rounder penned what was initially billed as a $700 million, 10-year contract ahead of the 2024 season. However, it was more of a 20-year deal. Ohtani is set to be paid $2 million across each year he’s playing for the Dodgers (2024–33) with a lump sum of $68 million to drop in his account on July 1 for the 10 years after that (2034–43).
This financial trickery—which is entirely within the rules—has given the Dodgers greater scope to build a roster around Ohtani, who is realistically considered to earn an average of $46.1 million per year, per The Athletic.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as How Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo’s Salaries Compare to Richest NFL, NBA, MLB Stars.
