Lionel Messi's Ferrari cost more than peak Michael Jordan's annual NBA salary
Published on Jun 02, 2023 at 2:40 PM (UTC+4)
by Kate Bain
Last updated on May 13, 2025 at 7:46 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Kate Bain
Remember when Lionel Messi dropped a cool $36 million on a Ferrari?
Yeah, it’s one of those things that’s pretty hard to forget.
The world’s second highest-paid footballer spent $36m on the one-of-a-kind Ferrari 335 S Spider Scaglietti in February this year.
READ MORE! Lionel Messi’s rumored multimillion-dollar move to Saudi Arabia is reportedly a ‘done deal’
To put that kind of money in perspective, that’s more than Michael Jordan earned in an entire season when he played for the Chicago Bulls in the NBA.
Yep, Jordan earned ‘just’ $33 million during the 1997/98 season and he was the highest-paid basketball player in the NBA at the time.
The supercar in question was the 1957 Ferrari 335 S Spider Scaglietti that Sir Stirling Moss raced in the Cuban Grand Prix in 1958.
The Ferrari has a 4.0-liter engine and can reach a top speed of 300 km/h (186 mph).
After the crazy purchase, Messi took to Instagram with a photo of a Hot Wheels car, joking that was his new ride.
What made the purchase even sweeter for Messi was the fact he reportedly kicked his biggest rival, Cristiano Ronaldo, out of the bidding war.
But while Messi might have won the bidding war, he’s still trailing behind Ronaldo in earnings.
Cristiano Ronaldo became the world’s highest-paid athlete once again this year.
The Portuguese forward, 38, moved to Saudi Arabian side Al Nassr at the beginning of this year after leaving Manchester United.
The football superstar was paid extremely well for the deal, with his base salary amounting to about USD $75 million (and that’s without commercial deals on the side).
But Messi could be about to knock him off the number one position.
Messi, 35, is rumored to be in talks with Saudi team Al-Hilal for a behemoth £400 million (USD $505 million) contract.
The deal would make him the highest-paid athlete in the world, and make that $36 million he dropped on the Ferrari look like a drop in the ocean.
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Kate is Lead Editor, overseeing coverage across automotive, tech, and lifestyle content on the site. She has more than 10 years’ experience as a journalist and news editor, having worked across a range of major publications including News Corp, Daily Mail Australia, and Sky News. Kate holds a Bachelor of Business Management from University of Queensland and a Postgraduate Diploma in Journalism from Queensland University of Technology. She has been with Supercar Blondie since 2020 and played a key role in establishing supercarblondie.com as a leading automotive news destination.
