Lionel Messi × Adidas

Adidas has backed Messi since 2006 — nearly his entire senior career — and upgraded the relationship to a lifetime contract in 2017, reported at roughly $1 billion over its life, or about $25 million a year. Lifetime deals are among the rarest structures in sports marketing: only a handful of athletes (Messi, Ronaldo at Nike, LeBron James) have ever commanded one, because the brand is underwriting the athlete's commercial relevance decades past retirement.

The Inter Miami move quietly added a second Adidas income stream. As MLS's apparel partner, Adidas agreed to share profits on Messi-driven MLS merchandise — a mechanism separate from and on top of the lifetime deal. Given that Messi's №10 Inter Miami shirt became the league's best-seller the moment it went on sale, that clause converts jersey demand directly into personal income.

For net-worth purposes the deal matters twice: it anchors his ~$70M/year off-field income today, and it guarantees a post-retirement floor most athletes never have. We rate the deal's existence High confidence (extensively reported by Forbes and Sportico) while the precise annual value remains a well-sourced estimate rather than a disclosed figure.