Last seen getting ejected for throwing a nasty elbow over in Australia, former NBA player and Hawk Josh Childress recently sat down with Grit Media to break down the economics of a NBA contract and explain how much a player really gets from his NBA contract.

I’ll be honest on camera. 21 years old…6th pick in the draft…I signed a 4-year $11 million deal. The first thing, the first mistake is people say, “Okay I got $11 million.” You got $5 million over 4 years so that million dollar house that you thought you had $10 million more. That house then becomes more expensive.

Most people buy their mother a house or a car. They buy themselves a car. You got a 2-4% agent fee. You got the NBA escrow. So that check gets eaten up.

That’s the 6th pick...now, if you’re at the rookie minimum, thats $350k. So you’re looking at maybe $200k.

Childress also talked about the pressure from vets to live a certain style. Matt Barnes recently told an amusing story about that pressure and going to the strip club with Allen Iverson and watching him throw $40k in the air. But unlike most rooks who would have felt the pressure to do the same, Barnes was smart enough to pick up some of the cash for himself.

Also in the past week, we heard a story about the widow of another former Hawk, Lorenzen Wright, spending a million dollars in 10 months.  Before his mysterious death, Wright was paying his wife over $26k a month in alimony and child support payments and after his death she received a check for a million dollars.  Here's a sample of things she bought with that money.

• $32,000 for a Cadillac Escalade

• $26,000 for a Lexus

• $69,000 on furniture

• $11,750 for a New York trip

• $339,000 for purchase and improvement to a new home

• $7,100 for a pool deposit

• $5,000 for lawn equipment

• $34,000 on legal fees

$5k for lawn equipment? I know a guy who started a successful lawn business with $5k. Maybe they meant to say $5k on the gardener who...nevermind.

 

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