How Jimmy Garoppolo Achieved a Net Worth of $25 Million

Here’s a fun question for your buddies when you’re hanging out watching the NFL divisional playoff games this week: Which quarterback among the remaining teams has one the most Super Bowls? The answer is Jimmy Garoppolo with two wins. Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers each have one win while all the other quarterbacks are yet to win one. Garoppolo has also had the most circuitous route to get to this point among his peers still vying for a championship. Circuitous may not be the best way to describe it, but he and Ryan Tannehill are the only guys to not be drafted by their respective teams they are leading this weekend. The major difference between those two is that Tannehill was bounced around while Jimmy G had the privilege of working under Tom Brady and seeing first hand what it takes to win a Super Bowl… twice.

The 49ers Take a Chance

Jimmy Garoppolo was drafted in the second round of the 2014 NFL Draft by the New England Patriots. Once can assume at the time the team felt Brady, who would have been 36, would be hanging them up sometime soon. Fast-forward five years, Tom Brady is still going strong and Garoppolo is now leading the 49ers who finished tied with the New Orleans Saints for the best record in NFC. In between those two points, halfway through the 2017 season Jimmy G was traded from the Patriots to the San Francisco 49ers for a second-round pick. At the time, he had only played sparingly for the Patriots, but did start two games and win them both. That didn’t seem to bother the new brain trust of the Niners, which at the time featured first-year General Manager John Lynch and rookie coach Kyle Shanahan. Tony Romo’s fellow Eastern Illinois alum was given a 5-year, $137 million dollar contract at the age of 26 with just 2 wins as a starter and 12 career touchdown passes. With all that money and a resume that didn’t back it up, the 49ers became his team.

Cashing In

Garoppolo’s 5-year, $137 million contract will see him earn approximately $27 million a year. The contract was built with a $7 million signing bonus and $71.4 million of guaranteed money. With everything that goes on in the NFL these days you always have to keep an eye on the guaranteed money and in this particular case kudos to Jimmy’s agent. Between the 2017 and 2018 seasons, the first year and half he was with the Niners, #10 earned approximately $36 million. Over the next three seasons his yearly cash earnings will hover right around $24 million per year.

Garoppolo’s NFL salary is very nice, but he doesn’t have the stable of endorsements his peers have at this time. In the summer of 2018 he announced that he signed with the Jordan Brand despite interest from Under Armour, Nike and Adidas. The details of this contract were not released, but they are projected to be around $200,000 a year according to Forbes. Without any other major deals that puts the Niners quarterback firmly around $24.5 million a year and solidifying his net worth at $25 million. At 28-years old, Jimmy G doesn’t have the runway like fellow playoff quarterbacks Mahomes, Watson and Jackson. However, everything changes if he can lead the San Francisco 49ers to a Super Bowl win in 2019. If you do some quick math, his contract will expire in 2022 at the age of 30. If he has a Super Bowl victory under his belt and continues to be sneakily very good he could be due for a nice pay increase. The fortunate thing for him is that Patrick Mahomes, Deshaun Watson and Lamar Jackson are going to set the NFL quarterback pay grade even higher before he’s due again so he could benefit mightily from their contracts.

The Story Continues

The Jimmy Garoppolo story is far from over. You’d be mistaken to think the 49ers are just a great defense – after the mid-point of the season they surrendered an average of 26 points per game which was 9th worst in the league. You’d also be mistaken if you thought they were just a running team – after the mid-point of the season they averages 117-yards per game which was 13th in the league. The truth of the matter is #10 has been the key to the Niners success for quite a long time. He’s shown he can win the prime-time game and he has sneaky good stats where it counts. It’ll be interesting to see where he finishes this year and the impact the next few years have on his $25 million net worth because he is firmly entrenched as the signal-caller and leader of the upstart San Francisco 49ers.