Athletes Gone Bankrupt

In 2008, the NBA Players' Association claimed that 60% of pro basketball players go broke within five years of retirement. It’s not hard to see why. In the annals of “easy come, easy go,” few people see it come and go like professional athletes. While it’s true that many take their salaries and invest them in sensible and enduring business ventures, many others squander their multimillion-dollar salaries on expensive cars, jewelry and mansions, and when the checks stop coming in, they have little to show for it.

Quarterback Mark Brunell is estimated to have earned over $50 million. However, on June 25, 2010, he filed for bankruptcy, listing over $5 million in assets and nearly $25 million in liabilities.

At issue are multiple lawsuits stemming from failed real estate ventures and business loans from Champion LLC, a company that included fellow Jaguars Todd Fordham and Joel Smeenge. Still, the lawsuit hasn’t hurt his playing career any, and in July 2010, just one month after filing for bankruptcy, Brunell signed a two-year deal to play for the New York Jets. 
 

Basketball player Latrell Sprewell went on to a substantial career, earning almost $100 million. It all came to an end when he turned down a a three-year contract extension from the Minnesota Timberwolves worth $30 million. According to Sprewell, this was simply not enough money. He said, "I have a family to feed".

By the end of the 2005 season, he was unemployed. By 2007, his yacht, “Milwaukee’s Best,” had been repossessed by federal marshals after missed payments and insurance worth over $1 million. In 2008, he defaulted on the mortgage on his Milwaukee home, sending it into foreclosure. His Westchester mansion went into foreclosure two years later. 

 

Kenny Anderson earned an estimated $60 million during his NBA career after playing for nine different teams. He was married three times, and the divorce from his first wife, Tami Akbar, had cost him dearly. She successfully challenged their prenuptial agreement and walked away with half his assets and $8,500 a month in child support. To celebrate her court victory, she had a custom license plate made that read “HISCASH.” 

In addition to monthly child support and alimony payments to Akbar, Anderson was also supporting six other children and two other ex-wives, as well as making monthly payments on his mother’s house. He also owned eight cars and an estate in Beverly Hills, and gave himself a $10,000-a-month allowance that he referred to as “hanging out money”. At the time of his bankruptcy filing, he had $41,000 in monthly expenses to pay.

Mike Tyson, Money shouldn’t have been a problem for Tyson. After all, according to the New York Times, he had earned more than $400 million in his boxing career. However, he had spent almost all of it, frittering it away on extravagances like mansions, luxury cars and pet tigers. He also owed $9 million for his divorce settlement and $13 million to the IRS. When he filed for bankruptcy in 2003, he claimed debts of $27 million.

Scottie Pippen is best remembered for his tenure with the Chicago Bulls. The 2010 Basketball Hall of Fame inductee was there when they won six NBA Championships, and he was there during the 1995-1996 season in which they won 72 games. 


Unfortunately, Pippen’s successes on the court couldn’t stop him from losing career earnings worth $120 million, including over $4 million for a corporate jet that was grounded just months after he bought it. He sued his attorneys for $8 million for failing to monitor the purchase, and he won the lawsuit. However, the jury ruled that Pippen bore plenty of responsibility for the purchase himself, and he was awarded only one quarter of the reward that he sought ( $2 million ).

Johnny Unitas is as legendary a player as there is. Nicknamed “The Golden Arm.” The legendary quarterback had attempted to parlay his earnings into shrewd business moves, such as restaurants, real estate ventures and bowling alleys, but these endeavors never performed in the way that he had hoped. Ultimately, he declared bankruptcy in 1991, and when he died in 2002, Unitas Management Corp was also forced to file for bankruptcy to protect itself from an unresolved lawsuit plaguing the Hall of Famer’s estate.