Highest earning athlete from every state

Taking a look at the highest paid athlete born in each state for 2017.

Year by year, athlete contracts across sports are only getting bigger and bigger.

Thanks to massive new television deals, free agent contracts in Major League Baseball are growing to unprecedented amounts. Twelve different active players now have contracts worth more than $200 million, with 10 of those mega deals signed since 2014.

While other sports are limited in the total amount due to salary cap restrictions, football, hockey and basketball teams have also been dishing out huge amounts. The NBA had a number of record contracts in the 2016 offseason, which will only grow with a huge salary cap increase on the horizon.

LeBron James was the highest-paid American athlete in 2016 at a total earnings mark of $77.2 million, with five others topping the $50 million mark. The world’s top 100 paid athletes earned a cumulative $31.5 billion, a number that will continue to climb as some of those big deals scale up.

Next: Every State's Sports Mount Rushmore

From populous California to rural Wyoming, each state is the birthplace if at least one active athlete making some significant money. Here are the highest paid athletes born in each state for 2017.

Alabama: Phillip Rivers 

While The Yellowhammer State has produced a number of recent football stars, Rivers remains its highest-paid athlete with his career winding down.

Rivers was born in Decatur and started at quarterback all four years for Athens High School, becoming a highly touted recruit in the process. Despite offers from both major in-state programs, Rivers attended North Carolina State, and played well enough to be a top-five pick in the 2004 NFL Draft.

In one of the strangest moments in recent draft history, Rivers was selected by the New York Giants, but was instantly traded after Eli Manning refused to sign with the then-San Diego Chargers. Since then, Rivers has earned six Pro Bowl nods while piling up some hefty career earnings.

A huge rookie contract got Rivers started off on the right foot, and his first big deal was worth a whopping $91.8 million over six years. Two years ago, the Chargers rewarded their franchise star with a four-year deal worth $82.5 million that includes a $20 million payday for 2017.

Following a move to Los Angeles, Rivers and the Chargers will now try to capture an elusive Super Bowl ring. For now, Rivers’ earnings easily outpace other Alabama-born stars.