Wednesday, February 8th, 2012 at 10:28 am  |  16 responses

Study Shows UNC Alumni Have Earned the Most Money in the NBA


Which college basketball program has produced the best NBA players? There are many ways to go about answering this question. Here’s one from the Wall Street Journal: “But what if you tried to measure the success of every college basketball team by another, more coldly practical measure: how much money its alumni have earned by playing the sport professionally? The Wall Street Journal collected the names of every college player who entered the NBA in or after 1985, the year the NCAA tournament expanded to 64 teams (now 68). For all the players on that list, we looked up their total NBA compensation and assigned those dollars to the college teams they played for. For the most part, The Journal’s ranking looked a lot like most lists that rank college basketball programs by wins. Marquee names like UCLA, Kansas, Kentucky, Arizona, Michigan and Georgetown all cracked the top 10 with at least $496 million in aggregate earnings.”

Here’s the complete list.

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  • bike Posted: Feb.8 at 10:30 am
    Wonder where they would rank if you took Jordan out of the calculation?

  • Ben Osborne Posted: Feb.8 at 10:30 am
    Really cool story.

  • LA Huey Posted: Feb.8 at 11:11 am
    Well, one of them does OWN an NBA team so I’m not surprised.

  • jarrett Posted: Feb.8 at 11:16 am
    seeing that they had jordan,, and kobe/lebron didnt go to college then yea this make sense

  • l2ising Phoenix Posted: Feb.8 at 11:21 am
    Cool Story Bro.

  • Joe Posted: Feb.8 at 11:39 am
    Read the article, Jordan isn’t counted (I don’t mean read the SLAM summary, read full article on Wall Street Journal) Salaries are 1985 and on @LA Huey, @ Jarrtt #readbeforeyoucomment

  • dfrance21 Posted: Feb.8 at 12:07 pm
    I don’t have access to a WSJ, why is Jordan not counted? Do you mean his salary as an owner is not counted?

  • bashmo Posted: Feb.8 at 12:16 pm
    It all depends on whether they are talking about salary made within the league, i.e the salary paid by the NBA to the players bi-weekly, or money accumulated through their careers including endorsments and what not. If thats the case…MJ isn`t a fair comparison. If it isn`t the case, Jordan didnt make as much in the league as what a Kobe/tim duncan/shaq/garnett made.

  • Noel Posted: Feb.8 at 12:27 pm
    “every college player that entered the NBA in or after 1985″ Jordan came in ’84, jesus people

  • Noel Posted: Feb.8 at 12:38 pm
    Oh yeah, go Heels! Beat Dook

  • justin Posted: Feb.8 at 3:47 pm
    Was this even close? Everyone knows which college program has produced the best pros for the last 3 decades. UNC, nothing like it!

  • Enigmatic Posted: Feb.8 at 3:57 pm
    I would’ve guessed Duke since so many of their guys have been grossly overpaid over the years, such as Grant Hill, who was injured, Elton Brand, who was injured, and Carlos Boozer, who…sucks.
    Wouldn’t be surprised if, like the article says, they did this study again in 10 years and Kentucky jumps up a few spots.

  • LA Huey Posted: Feb.8 at 4:29 pm
    My bad #hashtag

  • BossTerry Posted: Feb.8 at 4:32 pm
    Cosign Bike, and 12ising (I love failbook). I wonder if guys drafted str8 outta high school were included in this study, because Garnett and LeBron have also made boat-loads of money..

  • unf*ckwitable Posted: Feb.8 at 5:50 pm
    …Kobe, Tmac, Dwight. HS dudes would be up there i think.

  • hushabomb Posted: Feb.8 at 9:58 pm
    You might make the most money and get great contracts. Yet how many NBA players stay rich? As Chris Rock has said “Rich is the guy getting the 20 million contract. Wealthy is the guy paying you the contract”.

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