Adidas is stepping up in a big way for the upcoming sneaker free agent James Harden.
ESPN reports that the company has submitted a bid of $200 million over 13 years to sign Houston Rockets guard. All good news for Harden since his Nike deal recently expired. Nike has until the end of next week to match or risk losing the superstar.
A $200 million offer is huge, considering it represents half of what the brand paid for 11 seasons as the NBA’s official uniform supplier. Earlier this year, Adidas announced that it would not fight to renew that deal, which will see its competitor Nike take over after the 2016-17 season.
With incentives, if the deal is consummated, Harden could very well make more from Adidas in the coming years than the Rockets. Harden signed an $80 million contract extension with Houston in 2012 that goes through the 2017-18 season.
James would be adidas’ first star in recent years. In 2012, they signed a 14-year deal with Derrick Rose, only to see him miss plenty of action because of knee injuries.
Leave a Reply