Even before starting his third season in the best league in the world, Danny Avdia received good and reassuring news – Washington will exercise the option on him for a fourth season, the 2022/23 season, in which he will earn a whopping $6.26 million. In honor of the happy news for Avdia and for basketball fans in Israel, we decided to check for you who are the Israeli athletes who earned the most money in one season. The results are in front of you:
*The amounts indicated in the news are based on reports from Israel and the world
Danny Avdia, Washington, 2023/24 season – will earn $6.26 million
The young Israeli star, who was selected with the ninth pick in the 2020 NBA draft, has already earned quite a bit of money in the first two seasons ($9.2 million) in the best league in the world and in the upcoming season he will even earn close to five million dollars. Last night it was reported that the Wizards will exercise the option on the player also in the 2023/24 season, where he will already earn over six million dollars.
Yossi Benyon, Arsenal, year 2011 – earned NIS 24 million
Bennion’s journey in England began in 2005 at West Ham and with the move to Liverpool the really high sums began to arrive (45 thousand pounds per week in his first contract). Both in his new contract with the team and when he moved to Chelsea Bennion received extremely high sums and in the season when he was loaned from the Blues to the Gunners he was 80 A thousand pounds a week, which of course puts him in first place among Israeli athletes.
Beavers Natcho, CSKA Moscow, 2014 – earned NIS 11 million
The Israeli midfielder and captain of the national team these days returned to Russia after half a season in Greece and won a huge contract of 2.5 million euros per season, which came after four great seasons in Rubin Kazan. Later he also received nice contracts in Olympiakos and Partizan, but not those that came close to the amounts that are paid in Russia.
Eran Zahavi, Guangzhou, 2018 – earned $12 million
Already upon signing in the Chinese league, it was clear that the star would earn huge sums, and within half a year he also signed a new contract where his salary was estimated at seven million dollars per season before bonuses. After Shanghai Shenhua unsuccessfully tried to acquire him, he signed a three-year contract in February 2018 with the astronomical salary, which no Israeli has come close to today. In addition to the huge base salary, Zahavi also received handsome bonuses in the contract for clauses such as the goal royalty, qualification for the Asian Champions League and a bonus for each goal.
Omri Caspi, Sacramento and New Orleans – 15/16 and 16/17 seasons – earned $3 million each season
The first Israeli in the NBA did a lot of honor to Israeli basketball with ten beautiful years in the best league in the world. In all his years in America, Kaspi earned a handsome sum of 17.8 million dollars, when in the two seasons in question, which came in the middle of his career, he pocketed six million dollars in two years.
Tal Ben Haim, Portsmouth, year 2009 – earned $4.4 million
After not easy times professionally at Chelsea and Manchester City, the stopper arrived at Foremouth with a huge contract, having already seen very handsome sums in the two English empires (about £60,000 per week at Chelsea). That season he qualified with his team to the FA Cup final but was relegated and from there he continued his wanderings until he returned to Israel in 2015.
Eyal Berkovich, Manchester City – year 2001 – earned NIS 9.1 million
The magician came on loan to Blackburn in the 2000/01 season and helped them get promoted to the Premier League, but chose to stay in the minor league and joined the Blues, where his salary was about 30 thousand pounds per week. He also helped City get promoted and the mark he left on the team and on the Premier League in general we hear to this day. It is likely that a few years later he would have made much higher sums.
Bonus – the coaches:
Abraham Grant, Chelsea, 2007 – Earned £2.5m
After a great start to the season, the Israeli coach received an expression of confidence from Roman Abramovich and he was signed in the winter of that season on a four-year contract with sums never seen by an Israeli coach. At the end of that season, Grant led the Blues to the first championship final in their history and finished the league in second place but was fired, and later said that he refused to stay with the team as a professional manager.
David Blatt – Cleveland, 2014 – earned $5 million
After the huge win with Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Euroleague, the Israeli coach joined the NBA with a contract of 20 million dollars for four seasons and became the first Israeli coach in the best league in the world. In his first season he led the team to the finals, where they lost to Golden State and in the following season he was fired and finished his way in the NBA. Of course, no Israeli coach has yet come close to the amounts received by Blatt.
