Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Two athletes have dominated the top of Forbes’ annual look at the highest-earners in sports over the past decade and a half: Golfer Tiger Woods landed the No. 1 spot 12 times, while boxer Floyd Mayweather ranked first three of the past four years.

But with Mayweather hanging up his gloves and Woods hampered by injuries, there is an opening at the top. Filling the gap is the biggest star in the biggest sport on the planet. This year, soccer icon Cristiano Ronaldo is the world’s highest-paid athlete, with earnings of $88 million over the past 12 months from salary, bonuses and endorsements. Ronaldo is only the second team athlete after Michael Jordan to rank as the top-paid since Forbes began tracking athlete earnings in 1990.

It is a good time to be a world-class athlete in a popular team sport. TV money is fueling massive increases in player salaries across baseball, basketball, football and soccer. The cutoff for the top 100 athletes is $20.8 million, up $2 million over last year....

Cristiano Ronaldo signed a five-year contract extension with Nike NKE +0.31% that kicked off last year and is worth $13 million a year. It is the most expensive athlete sponsorship deal in all of soccer, and it is an absolute bargain for the $31 billion-in-sales sportswear giant.

Ronaldo generated $36 million in value for Nike on social media alone via his own accounts through 59 posts over the last 12 months, according to a study of the top-paid athletes by Hookit, which tracks sponsorship value in social and digital media. All of Ronaldo’s partners got a total of $176 million in media value from his promotional work on social platforms.

The three-time FIFA player of the year is the highest-paid athlete in the world at $88 million, including $32 million from endorsements. His partners are getting their money’s worth thanks to Ronaldo’s 215 million followers on social media across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, 60% more than any other athlete. He became the first athlete with 200 million followers in February and has added 56 million over the past year. His 112 million Facebook fans are more than any other person on the planet....