Get to know James Harden; he is an NBA player who plays for the LA Clippers. In 2023, he was placed 12th on the list of 50 highest paid athletes in the world by Forbes. He occupied the position with a total earning of $74.4 million.
As per Forbes, the figure comprised $44.4 million from salary/winnings and $30 million from endorsements. The athlete has sponsorship deals with Adidas, Block Inc, Body Armor, Gopuff, Pura, Therabody, and Vanguart. His net worth is estimated at $170 million.
Aside from his earnings and endorsement deals, Harden is also an entrepreneur. He is the owner of J-Harden brand wine which sold out during a Chinese live stream event in 2023. The event, hosted by online celebrity Crazy Brother Yang, showcased the power of live streaming in China, a country passionate about basketball.
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He participated in the live stream with around 15 million viewers, where he promoted his J-Harden brand wine. Yang asked Harden about his usual daily sales, and the NBA player mentioned selling only a few cases per store.
During the live stream, Yang challenged Harden to witness the speed of sales. Harden accepted and watched as Yang initiated the sale. In just 14 seconds, Yang halted the sale, having received 5,000 orders at $60 for two bottles. This lightning-fast selling generated an impressive $300,000 in revenue, according to CNN.
In addition to J-brand, he is an investor in sports drink company BodyArmor. His decision to invest in the multi-million dollar brand was influenced by the late Kobe Bryant. In an interview on the “Earn Your Leisure” podcast, he noted that Bryant proposed establishing a vehicle dedicated to investments, including sports drink company BodyArmor. According to him, Bryant had invested $6 million in BodyArmor back in 2014, as per Afro Tech. However, Harden did not disclose how much he invested in the company.
“Kobe basically was like ‘We going to put a stash of $5 million and then any like business opportunities — it might be as little as $200,000, it might be $500,000 just depending on what, you know, what investment it is. But we going to put a pot together and we just going to invest our money,’ rest in peace before he passed away,” Harden explained to “Earn Your Leisure” hosts Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings. “But BodyArmor was the beginning of that, and we seen how it is.”
It is unclear how much Harden invested in BodArmor but he struck it lucky with that move as the company, which was established by Mike Repole and Lance Collins, and subsequently sold to Coca-Cola for $5.6 billion, is now valued at $3.30 billion. That value is expected to reach $5.83 billion by 2034, according to Precedence Research.
