Antoine Walker earned more than $108 million over a 12-season NBA career, anchored by a six-year, $71 million contract he signed with the Boston Celtics at age 21. He made three All-Star teams and won an NBA championship with the Miami Heat in 2006.
At his peak, Walker said he owned as many as seven properties at once, including a $4.1 million, 15,000-square-foot house he built for his mother. He gambled heavily in Las Vegas, co-signed loans for friends and family that went unpaid, and put money into real estate deals that collapsed when the 2008 financial crisis hit — all without much financial planning behind any of it.
He filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2010, listing $12.7 million in debts against just $4.3 million in assets. Walker has since rebuilt his life as a financial educator, speaking to current NBA players about the mistakes that cost him almost everything.
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