Kawhi Leonard NBA Star's Frugal Ways

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NBA star with a $90 million contract drives a 1997 Chevy Tahoe - The New York Mets’ star outfielder Yoenis Cespedes made headlines this Spring Training for driving a different car to the field each day. One of the vehicles he drove was a $65,000 tricycle. But another professional athlete is in the news for what he drives — and it’s pretty much the opposite of Cespedes’s three-wheeler.

The NBA’s Kawhi Leonard was profiled by Lee Jenkins in Sports Illustrated this week, and while most of the feature is about why the 24 year old San Antonio Spur is one of the best young players in the world — he works incredibly hard and was the Finals MVP in 2014 — some details about his personal finance savvy have gotten a lot of attention.

Here’s an excerpt: “Leonard spends his summers in a two-bedroom apartment in San Diego” and he “often drives a rehabbed ‘97 Chevy Tahoe, nicknamed Gas Guzzler, which he drove across Southern California’s Inland Empire as a teenager. ‘It runs,’ Leonard explains, ‘and it’s paid off.’” (Read the full profile here.)

Leonard signed a $90 million 5-year contract in 2015. The Kelley Blue Book value for a 1997 Tahoe is $1,152.

MarketWatch profiled the former NFL player Ryan Broyles last year. Though he made a lot less than Leonard’s $90 million, he keeps to a $5,000 monthly budget and plans to make what he earned last a lifetime.