How The 76ers Star Wants To Go ‘From Rich To Wealthy’

Philadelphia’s star center, a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, is eyeing bigger paydays than million-dollar endorsement deals.

Give Joel Embiid an inch, and the Philadelphia 76ers’ star 7-footer will cram a dunk in your face with rim-rattling authority. Come into his space, and he’ll swat away your shot with one of those go-go-gadget arms—and then tell you all about it with a trash-talking eloquence admired around the NBA for both its creativity and its brutality.

“He’s unrelenting,” says billionaire Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin, who met Embiid years ago as a part-owner of the 76ers and has remained one of his close friends since selling his stake in the team last year. He tells the story of Embiid mercilessly beating his young daughter at Monopoly, as well as a more embarrassing anecdote from this past summer.

“Joel is at my house in the Hamptons, and he decided he wanted to play five-on-one basketball with us,” Rubin says. “It was five respectable people. He beat us 15-13 or something like that. I think he also injured half the players. You knew every time he had the ball, you had to put your body at risk to die.

“He’s not backing down to anybody for anything. Whatever it is, he’s literally going to try to kill you.”

That drive has made the 28-year-old Embiid one of the most dominant players of his generation, a five-time All-Star and the runner-up in league MVP voting the last two seasons. It has also made him rich, with a $33.6 million salary this season plus an estimated $8 million annually from endorsements and licensing income, ranking him among the world’s highest-paid athletes.

Embiid, recently honored as a member of the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 list in the sports category, acknowledges that he doesn’t need more money—“but then again, I’m competitive.”

“The business model of endorsements is great, but that’s not how you become wealthy,” Embiid says. “I’m at a period of my life where I’m learning a lot because I’m still trying to find what I’m interested in, what I want to do, so this summer was big as far as meeting a bunch of people that helped me a lot, teaching me about what’s the best model to go from rich to wealthy.”

He put the lessons into action in October with an investment in Mitchell & Ness, a sports apparel brand owned by Fanatics. Rubin, whom Embiid calls his biggest business mentor, was happy they got to work together after the sale of his 76ers stake gave him new opportunities to collaborate with NBA players without conflict.

“From the early days, Jo was always incredibly inquisitive, asking you lots of questions, wanting to learn, trying to be a sponge to how he can grow,” says Rubin, who recalls Embiid coming to his office to observe meetings. He adds: “Different than a lot of NBA players, Jo is very financially disciplined. He may save more and invest more, and spend less, than maybe any player.”

Embiid also had a big score in August 2021 when he signed a four-year, $196 million “supermax” contract extension with the 76ers that is expected to take his salary to $46.9 million next season, and a whopping $58.2 million in 2026-27. The best part: He negotiated the contract himself, sparing him an agent’s commission of up to 4%.

“If there’s one thing that I learned, it’s that I’m a tough negotiator, and whatever I want, I’m going to get it,” he says.

As Embiid figures out how exactly he wants to build out his investments, he has no shortage of potential models around the NBA, the world’s most entrepreneurial sports league. The Los Angeles Lakers’ LeBron James, the Brooklyn Nets’ Kevin Durant and the Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry have thriving production companies—the SpringHill Company, Boardroom and Unanimous Media, respectively—and Embiid is already expressing an interest in working in TV or film. The Phoenix Suns’ Devin Booker runs a sports-drink business. Embiid’s teammate James Harden has his own wine collection, a fleet of Crunch Fitness franchises and a slew of other equity plays.

Comparing Embiid to the likes of James and Durant, on or off the court, would have been tough to imagine only a few years ago. Raised in Cameroon, he didn’t start playing basketball until he was 16, and while he went No. 3 in the 2014 NBA draft out of the University of Kansas—the 76ers’ reward for their “Process,” a sustained stretch of losing designed to eventually land them a franchise star—injuries wiped out most of his first three years in the NBA.

He has emerged from that adversity, and much worse: His 13-year-old brother, Arthur, was struck by a truck while walking home from school and died in 2014. This fall, Embiid launched a foundation in his brother’s name to invest in Philadelphia-based nonprofits, continuing a philanthropic streak that has also seen him support local families, organizations serving the homeless and the effort to develop Covid-19 antibody testing for frontline workers. When word leaked early in the pandemic that the 76ers planned to temporarily cut some employees’ pay, Embiid said he would donate money to help cover the difference, prompting public pressure that led the team to reverse its decision.

“He understands his responsibility to give back,” says New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who met Embiid when they both attended the 2017 MLB All-Star Game. Kraft, who acknowledges that some might find his connection to Embiid surprising, says he has “tremendous affection” for Embiid and put him on an exclusive invitation list for his wedding in October. Embiid couldn’t attend but wanted to send a gift, so Kraft directed him to a college fund he and his wife had set up for the daughter of a healthcare worker who had worked with his wife’s mother. Kraft and Embiid declined to reveal publicly how much the gift was for, but it was “very generous,” Kraft says, adding, “There were other substantial people who gave nothing like that amount.”

“I’m one of the lucky ones to be in this position, especially from Africa,” Embiid says. “I’ve got big goals in mind when it comes to helping, especially in Africa as far as building schools and hospitals and all that stuff.”

Rubin has no doubt Embiid will give himself that kind of platform.

“Look, how many NBA stars are billionaires? Two?” Rubin says, correctly, in reference to Michael Jordan and James. “I think Jo has the potential to do that. I think he’s focused on it and he cares about it. He invests such a large percentage of what he makes, and he’s doing it in smart places, and that’s going to give him the ability to go accomplish that.”