$250m deal puts Big Ben at top of the pile

Forget Greg Norman, Pat Rafter, Rod Laver and even fellow basketballer Andrew Bogut. Ben Simmons is now top of the pile.

Australia’s NBA superstar Ben Simmons will climb the rich list

Forget Greg Norman, Pat Rafter, Rod Laver and even fellow basketballer Andrew Bogut. No one in the history of Australian sports has become so rich so quickly as 22-year-old Ben Simmons, who is on the cusp of signing a record-breaking contract worth almost $250 million.

He’s only three years out of college and has already gone through a break-up with a member of the Kardashian clan, splitting with Kendall Jenner only weeks ago. There’s even doubts about his jump shot.

But his Philadelphia 76ers are poised to extend his contract for another five years, with news emerging Simmons will soon clinch a $US170m contract ($243m) before heading to Australia next month to play for the Boomers national team.

Along with endorsements, Simmons will earn at least $50m annually — more than 30 times any Australian-based footballers and the equivalent of five NRL teams’ annual salary cap payments.

Given he will be only 28 by the time the mooted five-year deal is finished, Simmons likely will take his career earnings well past the $500m mark should he stay healthy and among the top players in the lucrative NBA.

It could also mean he enters The List — Australia’s Richest 250 by the time he is 40.

Simmons’s new deal for now at least puts him at the very top of the Australian sports stars plying their trade in rich global competitions, spanning basketball, golf, tennis and motor racing.

It also comes at the same time as tennis champion Ashleigh Barty is rapidly moving towards the $10m earnings mark for the year, a figure unheard of for an Australian female athlete.

Barty will pass $10m should she win Wimbledon and maintain her No 1 world ranking, having already taken home almost $7.4m this year after winning the French Open.

Simmons’s earning power likely just exceeds that of Formula One star Daniel Ricciardo, who has had a frustrating first season at his new team, Renault, after switching from Red Bull at the end of last season in a two-year deal said to pay him about $49m annually.

Otherwise, Simmons’s fellow basketball stars top the list of Australia’s highest-paid players — just about all of whom will play in Australia next month in a series of exhibition games against the United States and Canada ahead of the World Cup in China.

Utah Jazz forward Joe Ingles is in the middle of a contract worth $18.6m, while Patty Mills earns about $17.2m at the San Antonio Spurs.

Both Matthew Dellavedova and Dante Exum have deals worth more than $13m at the Cleveland Cavaliers and Utah respectively and Aron Baynes, just traded to the Phoenix Suns, will next season be in the last year of a deal with $7.8m.

Golfers Adam Scott and Jason Day have earned more than $6m this year, including endorsements.

Other high earners include Socceroos goalkeeper Mat Ryan, who is said to be on £35,000 ($63,000) per week at EPL side Brighton, and NFL punter Jordan Berry is paid $2.7m by the Pittsburgh Steelers.