If you had to ask anyone what they would guess is the richest sporting event, chances are the answer would be soccer. The only way to confirm the correctness of that guess would be reading the yearly list released by Forbes. It is super exciting to find out where the Cricket World Cup, World Poker Series, Horse Racing, PGA Cup or even the FIFA World Cup is listed when it comes to the top ten wealthiest sports events.

Cricket

The name Allen Stanford jumps to mind when it comes to wealthy cricket fanatics, but while the disgraced financier has been convicted as a Ponzi-schemer a lot took place, and the wealthiest cricket event is the ICC Cricket World Cup which qualifies as the most prosperous sports event at $4 million.

The World Series of Poker

At more than double the riches World Series of Poker takes the ninth position with $8.7 million. No poker fan would probably ever forge the win enjoyed by Pius Heinz, nicknamed the ketchup pope, who enjoyed victory in the $10,000 buy-in main event.

Just beating the World Series of Poker, the UEFA Europe League qualifies in eight and the most memorable moment is that of the Atletico Madrid won against the Athletic Club.

Horse Racing

The Dubai World Cup Night qualifies in seventh with $10 million, the winning horse, Monterosso owned by the prince who is the son of the founder of the race, the winner’s name Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum.

Golf

Qualifying in the sixth position is golf, and when it comes to one of the biggest winners, it is Bill Haas winning the FedEx Cup worth $11.4 million.

Baseball

When the Texas Rangers were beaten in seven games by the St. Louis Cardinals the winning team members each got $323,169.

Football

When the New England Patriots were beaten by the New York Giants the winning team’s players each walked away with $172,000. The big surprise was that the Giants started as a wild card.

Soccer

Soccer has been the richest since way back, and some of the wealthiest payouts recorded include that of 2008, when Spain won, the 2012 tournament that started in June and held in Ukraine and Poland had an increase in prize money which began in 2008 at $230 million then went up to $246 million. In 2018 the prize fund of the FIFA World Cup was increased by a 12%, which then brought the total up to $400 million and the champion gets $38 million. According to figures released by Forbes, World Cup soccer players get paid around $950,000, and the top players like Ronaldo can exceed $60 million in a year. In 2018 each of the FIFA World Cup qualifying teams got $1.5 million, which was increased from $1 million in 2014 and the losing sides in the quarterfinal $16 million, increased from $14 million in 2014. The winners get $38 million and the player by player payments were $209 million in 2018 vs $170 million in 2014.