The world of professional sportsmanship depends on a litany of factors, but a factor that can make or break any sportsperson is their agent. If a sportsperson picks up one of the most powerful agents in the business, they will have a far easier time off the pitch, knowing that their career is in good hands and all they have to do is excel at their physical performance. Let's take a look at the most powerful names in sports agencies.
Scott Boras
Nobody goes anywhere in baseball without Scott Boras getting involved in some way. He's the founder of the Boras Corporation and has made some of the biggest contracts that have ever graced the world of baseball – like Gerrit Cole moving to the Yankees for almost a third of a billion dollars. He's a lawyer with $3.2 billion dollars in contracts.
Jeff Schwartz, Casey Close, Mark Steinberg and Sam Goldfeder
Schwartz, Close, Steinberg, and Goldfeder is a bit of a mouthful for a company, so it's a good thing that these sporting agent giants picked the name Excel Sports Management for their company. Schwartz is arguably the biggest name in Excel, representing $1.8 billion dollars worth of contracts in Basketball. He's made deals for Kemba Walker, Kevin Love, and Nikola Jokic.
Close is another baseball agent, with clients including Paul Goldschmidt and Clayton Kershaw, bringing in $1.3 billion in contracts.
Mark Steinberg only brings in $101.2m in contracts but is the foremost golf agent in the world. His clients never fail to rank highly on Masters Odds and are the favorites more often than not. Tiger Woods and Justin Thomas are included in his roster.
Sam Goldfeder has been an NBA agent for almost 20 years, representing people like CJ McCollum, Cody Zeller, and Blake Griffin.
Jonathan Barnett
Barnett is the Executive Chairman of ICM Stellar Sports and represents huge names in soccer. He has 388 clients, including Gareth Bale and Jordan Pickford. He masterminded Bale's move to Tottenham and is almost constantly in the press for one reason or another – he is a genius at playing the media to get positive outcomes and hype for his clients.
Jorge Mendes
This former DJ currently represents Cristiano Ronaldo, Bernado Silva, Ederson, De Gea and more – he has negotiated more than $1 billion dollars of currently active contracts. He has caused controversy in the football world for his relationship with Wolverhampton Wanderers, where he was hired as an agent for the club after their takeover in 2016 and filled them with many players from his native country Portugal – including 12 players signed in just a six weekperiod. He's now turning his eyes towards cycling.
Mino Raiola
Raiola is another soccer agent who has made some massive deals for the likes of Paul Pogba, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, and Zlatan Ibrahimović, no doubt in part due to his proficiency in 7 languages, including Dutch, Italian, German, French and Portuguese. He's represented some legends throughout the years, including Dennis Bergkamp and future rising star Erling Haaland. He also owns a house formally lived in by Al Capone.
