How Much Money Did Andrew Luck Give up by Retiring This Young?
Andrew Luck didn’t just give up football when he shocked the world and announced his retirement at 29, he gave up a lot of money in the process as well. Although his recent career before his comeback season in 2018 was marred with injury, Luck was believed to be on pace to becoming one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL when he signed his deal in 2016. Now we may never know what would have become of his comeback.
Andrew Luck’s contract
In 2016, Andrew Luck signed a contract that reworked his final year on his rookie deal and added five more onto the end. The deal was worth $139,151,525 in total. By bypassing the last three years of his deal, he is giving up over $58M dollars in the process. His base salary in 2019 was set to be over $9M before incentives, with $6M more being added if he made the roster on September 17.
In the future seasons, the pay was only going to go up, with Luck making $11M roster bonuses over the next two seasons and a $10M bonus in 2021.
The contract will remain on the Colts’ salary with a pro-rated $6.4M signing bonus affecting them starting next season. If the Colts wanted to, they could ask for Luck to return this signing bonus as a means to offset, but signs show that they won’t be doing this.
Payback?
The Colts have announced that they would not make Andrew Luck give back the base salaries that remain on his contract, so despite retiring, he could still put nearly $25M into his pockets before his current contract ends. If the Colts went back and asked him to return the money, he would likely need to give back $12.8M.
The decision to let Luck keep the money may not be simply based on kindness, either. Although Luck wants to retire today, nothing is stopping him from coming back in a year or two. If this were the case, and Luck maintained his current skillset, the Colts would want to have a good working relationship with Luck, so the agreement could be mutually beneficial.
Future earnings?
Andrew Luck likely had several years ahead of him if he were able to conquer the injury bug and play going forward. At a position where the best often play into their late-thirties, if not into their forties, Luck likely had at least one big contract left before he called it quits.
According to Irsay, retirement may cost Luck upward of a half-billion dollars, though current trends show that he may have been on the market for $225M or so. Irsay could have been including endorsement money.
What did Andrew Luck earn?
All in all, Luck earned a cool $97M in his career. While people can speculate about how many times he could have multiplied that deal by staying, he isn’t going to be starving any time soon if he spends his money wisely.
His highest-earning season was 2016, in which he netted $30M and his second-highest was the following year, with $27M. His lowest-earning year was 2013 when he banked just $1.4M.
Time will tell what his partnerships with companies such as Nike, DirecTV, and BodyArmor bring with his retirement, but his endorsement money likely added a healthy amount to these career-earnings, as well.
Andrew Luck’s retirement was bigger than money. He did what many players refuse to do and put his health over his bank account. Still, when we see the amount of money he both earned and potentially lost, we can see just how important health was to him if he’s willing to give up this much in the process.
