https://thewagebill.com Sport's finances, examined properly. en-gb https://thewagebill.com/sport/golf/liv-golf-chapter-11-guaranteed-contracts https://thewagebill.com/sport/golf/liv-golf-chapter-11-guaranteed-contracts Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Saudi Arabia's PIF has reportedly put around $5 billion into LIV Golf. Chapter 11 is where that money meets the players' multi-year guarantees. https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/twg-cadillac-insurance-probe https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/twg-cadillac-insurance-probe Sun, 27 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT TWG Global says Cadillac's Formula 1 team isn't for sale. The insurance companies that helped bankroll owner Mark Walter's sports empire are now being forced to unwind billions in loans to his own ventures, and that is a harder problem to deny. https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/kroenke-angels-record-sale-media-rights https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/kroenke-angels-record-sale-media-rights Tue, 22 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Stan Kroenke is paying an MLB-record price for a team with the league's longest active playoff drought. The number makes more sense once you stop looking at the roster. https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/wpbl-governance-dispute-delaware-lawsuit https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/wpbl-governance-dispute-delaware-lawsuit Tue, 22 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT The WPBL raised about $3 million and drew 55,000 fans in its first season. Its largest outside investor now says she can't get a straight answer on where the money went. https://thewagebill.com/football/mbappe-on-equity-deal https://thewagebill.com/football/mbappe-on-equity-deal Sun, 20 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT On ended Mbappé's 20 year run with Nike by reportedly handing him equity instead of just a paycheck, the same structure it used to sign Roger Federer, now aimed at football's biggest market. https://thewagebill.com/football/chelsea-boehly-clearlake-full-ownership https://thewagebill.com/football/chelsea-boehly-clearlake-full-ownership Sun, 20 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Boehly and Mark Walter walked away with a combined £950 million for the stakes they bought in 2022, as Clearlake Capital consolidated full control of the club. https://thewagebill.com/sport/boxing/garcia-benn-purse-saudi-financing https://thewagebill.com/sport/boxing/garcia-benn-purse-saudi-financing Sun, 20 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Nevada no longer requires purse disclosure, so the real number is an estimate, but the funding source behind it is on the record: Saudi Arabia's Sela, not the gate or TKO itself. https://thewagebill.com/flagship/ipl-fixed-purse-franchise-valuations https://thewagebill.com/flagship/ipl-fixed-purse-franchise-valuations Sun, 20 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT A flagship deep dive: the IPL locks every franchise to the same auction purse and the same guaranteed central payout, on purpose. What it can't equalise is what a franchise is actually worth, and that gap is the real business of Indian cricket. https://thewagebill.com/sport/ice-hockey/nhl-escrow-record-rebate https://thewagebill.com/sport/ice-hockey/nhl-escrow-record-rebate Thu, 10 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT The NHL handed players back a record $170 million this summer under its escrow system. That number only exists because the system took the money away from them first. https://thewagebill.com/sport/cricket/rcb-sale-fixed-purse-cap https://thewagebill.com/sport/cricket/rcb-sale-fixed-purse-cap Mon, 07 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Diageo turned a $112 million cricket bet into a billion-dollar exit, but the fixed auction purse that decides what RCB can actually spend on players next season is exactly the same as everyone else's. https://thewagebill.com/sport/ufc/ufc-paramount-deal-fighter-pay-share https://thewagebill.com/sport/ufc/ufc-paramount-deal-fighter-pay-share Fri, 04 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Paramount is paying the UFC roughly double what ESPN did. The fighters got doubled bonuses too, which sounds generous until you look at what share of the business those bonuses actually represent. https://thewagebill.com/football/monaco-dncg-deadline-day-sales-collapse https://thewagebill.com/football/monaco-dncg-deadline-day-sales-collapse Wed, 02 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT France's financial regulator forced Monaco into a corner: sell or breach a wage cap. Deadline day came and went, and both intended sales fell apart. https://thewagebill.com/sport/cricket/big-bash-salary-cap-ben-stokes-record-deal https://thewagebill.com/sport/cricket/big-bash-salary-cap-ben-stokes-record-deal Wed, 02 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Ben Stokes just became the most expensive player in Big Bash history. The salary cap didn't move. What changed is who's allowed to spend it. https://thewagebill.com/football/liverpool-bezos-stake-sale https://thewagebill.com/football/liverpool-bezos-stake-sale Tue, 01 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT FSG sold roughly 30% of Liverpool to a consortium including Jeff Bezos, valuing the club at £5.5bn. FSG paid £300m for the whole thing in 2010. That's the number worth sitting with. https://thewagebill.com/sport/basketball/lakers-sale-iger-kushner-leveraged-financing https://thewagebill.com/sport/basketball/lakers-sale-iger-kushner-leveraged-financing Tue, 01 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT Bob Iger and Josh Kushner just bought the Lakers for a record $12.5 billion, months after the previous owner paid $10 billion. Here's how you buy something bigger than your own net worth. https://thewagebill.com/flagship/manchester-united-debt https://thewagebill.com/flagship/manchester-united-debt Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT A flagship deep dive: how a leveraged buyout from 2005 turned into today's record debt, why cost-cutting at the edges barely touches it, and why a new stadium might actually be the sanest financial decision the club has made in years. https://thewagebill.com/football/wage-comparison https://thewagebill.com/football/wage-comparison Fri, 21 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT Premier League clubs spend far more on wages than La Liga's. So why is La Liga's pay gap so much wider? https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/verstappens-new-red-bull-deal-is-about-an-exit-clause https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/verstappens-new-red-bull-deal-is-about-an-exit-clause Fri, 21 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT A new deal to 2030 looks like loyalty. It's actually Red Bull finally closing the exit routes built into his last contract, and driver pay sitting entirely outside the sport's cost cap is why they could afford to. https://thewagebill.com/sport/tennis/nick-kyrgios-suspension-real-financial-cost https://thewagebill.com/sport/tennis/nick-kyrgios-suspension-real-financial-cost Fri, 21 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT A positive cocaine test could keep Kyrgios out for up to four years. The real financial exposure isn't ranking points, it's the nine sponsor deals watching how this plays out. https://thewagebill.com/football/ronaldinho-ravenna-shirt-sales https://thewagebill.com/football/ronaldinho-ravenna-shirt-sales Fri, 21 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT Ronaldinho is 46 and hasn't played professionally in over a decade. What Ravenna actually signed was reach, attention, and a name that sells itself, the shirt queue is just the easiest part to measure. https://thewagebill.com/sport/american-football/in-the-nfl-your-rookie-contract-is-decided-before-you-sign-it https://thewagebill.com/sport/american-football/in-the-nfl-your-rookie-contract-is-decided-before-you-sign-it Wed, 19 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT One draft slot can swing a rookie's guaranteed money by tens of millions, before he's thrown a single pass. https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/mlb-doesnt-have-a-salary-cap-it-has-something-that-behaves-like-one https://thewagebill.com/sport/baseball/mlb-doesnt-have-a-salary-cap-it-has-something-that-behaves-like-one Wed, 19 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT There's no hard limit on what an MLB team can spend, just an escalating tax that starts to bite hard the more you go over it. https://thewagebill.com/sport/golf/golf-split-in-two-over-a-single-financial-question-do-you-get-paid-if-you-miss-the-cut https://thewagebill.com/sport/golf/golf-split-in-two-over-a-single-financial-question-do-you-get-paid-if-you-miss-the-cut Wed, 19 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT LIV pays you for showing up. The PGA Tour doesn't. That one difference explains most of the last few years. https://thewagebill.com/sport/basketball/why-a-76-billion-tv-deal-doesnt-just-show-up-in-players-paychecks-overnight https://thewagebill.com/sport/basketball/why-a-76-billion-tv-deal-doesnt-just-show-up-in-players-paychecks-overnight Wed, 19 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT The NBA's new media rights deal is enormous. The league still won't let salaries jump all at once. https://thewagebill.com/football/barcelona-palancas https://thewagebill.com/football/barcelona-palancas Fri, 14 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT La Liga's spending rule is stricter than anything in England. Here's how Barcelona keeps finding a way through it. https://thewagebill.com/sport/tennis/why-ranked-200-in-the-world-still-might-not-break-even https://thewagebill.com/sport/tennis/why-ranked-200-in-the-world-still-might-not-break-even Wed, 12 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT No salary, no team, no guaranteed pay. Tennis runs on the purest pay-to-play model left in professional sport. https://thewagebill.com/sport/boxing/the-number-in-the-headline-is-never-the-number-in-the-bank-account https://thewagebill.com/sport/boxing/the-number-in-the-headline-is-never-the-number-in-the-bank-account Wed, 12 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT A $10 million headline purse can shrink by half before the fighter ever sees it. Here's where it actually goes. https://thewagebill.com/football/haaland-contract https://thewagebill.com/football/haaland-contract Fri, 07 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT Man City just signed the longest deal in Premier League history. The interesting part isn't the money, it's why the length matters. https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/how-formula-1-stopped-being-a-money-pit https://thewagebill.com/sport/f1/how-formula-1-stopped-being-a-money-pit Wed, 05 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT Team values are up 89% in two years. The cost cap did more than level the racing.