New York: Defending NBA champion Golden State and the Warriors’ star guard, Stephen Curry, remain the NBA’s top jersey and merchandise sales leaders for a third consecutive season, the league announced on Tuesday.
Without revealing sales totals, the league announced the top money-spinners on its website in terms of teams and players for the 2017-18 season.
Cleveland Cavaliers superstar LeBron James, a four-time NBA Most Valuable Player, ranks second to two-time MVP Curry with Golden State All-Star forward Kevin Durant, the 2014 MVP, third on the player list.
The Cavaliers, who lost last year’s NBA Finals to the Warriors, were also second to Golden State on the merchandise sales team list followed in order by the Philadelphia 76ers, Los Angeles Lakers, Boston Celtics, Milwaukee Bucks and Oklahoma City Thunder.
Milwaukee’s Greek star, Giannis Antetokounmpo, ranked fourth on the player list and topped the chart for non-US players.
Boston’s Kyrie Irving was fifth, climbing seven spots from the ranking update in January.
Next on the list were Oklahoma City’s Russell Westbrook, New York’s Latvian centre Kristaps Porzingis, Philadelphia’s Cameroonian big man Joel Embiid, NBA scoring champion James Harden of Houston and Philadelphia’s Australian playmaker Ben Simmons.
San Antonio’s Kawhi Leonard, who missed much of the season with an injury, was 11th with Lonzo Ball, a 20-year-old Los Angeles Lakers rookie point guard, 12th.
