Ice Cube is taking his basketball league public, and he wants fans to own a piece. Messi and Ronaldo became billionaires while still playing. Jude Bellingham is buying into a cricket team at 22. Welcome back to The Closeout. Let's get into it.

We are now four issues deep with The Closeout. There's a certain pattern that has emerged through my coverage. I talked last week about how Brunson surrendered $113 million to build a (now) Championship Knicks roster. A few months ago, Steph Curry walked away from his Under Armour deal to own his brand outright. Serena Williams worked her way to a $350 million portfolio, largely while still playing the game. Drake found the right formula outside of music and is now mingling with a soccer team's front office. Different names, different professions, the same move: the biggest plays are happening away from the game and stage, and the smartest operators aren't waiting until their time in the limelight is over to make them.

Last week, the biggest world stage landed on American soil for the first time in 32 years. The World Cup is back, 48 teams playing across the US, Canada, and Mexico, bringing together some of the world's most recognizable athletes. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo have been dueling on the field for two decades, compared sometimes as the best to ever do it. Both have recently crossed into billionaire status while still competing for Ballons d'Or. While they've both signed lucrative team deals in their career, the biggest moves are what happens off the pitch.

Not only did they both sign the richest deals of their careers with their current teams, they used those deals to buy ownership into the clubs and platforms they play for.

When Ronaldo extended with Al-Nassr in 2025, a deal reportedly worth $400 to 600 million through 2027, he didn't want to just retire with the Saudi team. He reportedly took a 15% equity stake in the club, with plans to grow it toward majority ownership and run Al-Nassr after he retires, turning his contract into a seat at the table. On top of it sits his CR7 empire: a 50/50 hotel partnership with Pestana across five cities, a flagship opening in Riyadh, and a lifetime Nike deal. He became football's first billionaire before he ever stopped playing.

Messi ran the same play from the other direction. When he chose Inter Miami in 2023 (now MLS's most valuable franchise, thanks to him) the move came with an ownership stake in the club and a revenue-sharing structure tied to Apple TV's MLS Season Pass and Adidas jersey sales. Not only did he make the move to the US, he leveraged his influence to build a revenue stream on a platform he knew his arrival would popularize. A lifetime Adidas deal sits on top.

Two players, two different blueprints, one shared instinct. The richest athletes in the world's biggest sport realized contract money can only go so far. Equity is how you cement your legacy beyond the game.

We are now starting to see the changing of the guard in the athlete's financial mentality. The generation behind them already gets it. Beckham didn't buy into Inter Miami until his playing days were over. Ronaldo and Messi are doing it at the tail end of their careers. But Jude Bellingham, 22 years old and one of the faces of this World Cup, just bought a stake in a cricket franchise in the city where he grew up. Kylian Mbappé has taken equity in clubs while still in his prime. Across sports, leagues, countries, athletes of yesteryear played the game first, then thought about building wealth afterwards. The athletes of today are building before they step foot on the pitch. The learning curve is gone. The next generation isn't studying the playbook. They were raised on it.

The lesson stitched through every issue of this newsletter: Athletes and artists of today aren't relying on their craft alone. Equity is the new paycheck.

The World Cup will crown a champion next month. Many athletes competing have already won.

Jude Bellingham picked up a 1.2% stake in Birmingham Phoenix, the Hundred cricket franchise valued at roughly £82 million, for about £1 million. The 22-year-old grew up playing cricket in the West Midlands before football took over. He's a Real Madrid Galáctico buying into the sport he left behind. 

Jay-Z's MarcyPen Capital Partners is reportedly in talks to buy LVMH's 50% stake in Rihanna's Fenty Beauty, a brand valued between $1 and $2 billion. The firm he backs runs nearly $1.1 billion in assets. Twenty years ago Jay-Z signed Rihanna to Def Jam. Now he wants to buy into the empire he helped build. 

Tom Brady co-launched Good Nut, an organic coconut water line he owns, exclusively on Gopuff. The hydration market is projected to hit $11 billion by 2030, and coconut water sales jumped 115% year over year on the platform. Brady already has equity in NoBull, Hydrow, and now this. 

Chaka Khan partnered with HarbourView Equity Partners on her catalog, the same firm that's scooped up Slipknot, Kelly Clarkson, and Christine McVie. Terms weren't disclosed, but the deal isn't a cash-out: it's built around catalog development, global licensing, and new creative ventures. Fifty years in, the Queen of Funk is treating her catalog like the asset it always was.

Lionel Richie filed four trademarks to protect the actual sound of his voice. In an era where AI can clone a vocal in seconds, the four-time Grammy winner is moving to own his most valuable instrument before someone else rents it out.

Champ made its first move. The athlete-backed fund, a partnership between L Catterton, Patricof Co, and a roster of 250-plus pros including Tyrese Haliburton, Mike Trout, and Livvy Dunne, took a minority stake in Rhoback, the activewear brand that did $150 million last year. Cowboys first-rounder Caleb Downs, an early Rhoback NIL partner, is already vouching for it. 

Most people know Ice Cube three ways: N.W.A founder, multiplatinum solo artist, the actor and producer behind the Friday and Barbershop franchises. Add the one that may outlast them all: founder of the first publicly traded professional sports league in American history.

In 2017, Cube and partner Jeff Kwatinetz launched Big3, a 3-on-3 league built on former NBA talent that nobody took seriously. A traveling all-star game, critics called it. Nine seasons later, Big3 has a CBS broadcast deal, eight city-based franchises, and now a path to Wall Street. The league announced a SPAC merger with Graf Global Corp at a $290 million pre-money valuation, targeting a Q4 2026 close under the ticker TONT. Cube stays on as CEO. Clyde Drexler runs it as commissioner.

The part that makes this interesting isn't the valuation. It's who gets to own it. "You can't participate in the upside besides winning," Cube told Bloomberg, "and we need the fans for the league to be successful." Going public means fans can buy stock in the league they watch, the same democratized cap table thread running through Jameis Winston's Kinexx and Victor Wembanyama's Barcode.

Cube spent years fighting lawsuits and investor disputes to keep Big3 alive. Now he's handing fans a piece of it. Nobody took a 3-on-3 league seriously in 2017. Since then, the format became an Olympic sport, and leagues like Unrivaled have proven 3-on-3 can draw real money. In 2026, Cube's is the first of any kind to hit the NYSE.

Nike's X2 collection turned the World Cup into a designer showcase. Nike paired seven national federations with seven creative collaborators, and the headliners are artist-owned: Drake's NOCTA designed Canada's capsule, "Les Rouges," and G-Dragon's PEACEMINUSONE built South Korea's "The Tigers of Asia." Palace, Jacquemus, Patta, Slawn, and the Virgil Abloh Archive round out the roster. Each pairs apparel with a Cryoshot sneaker, a classic Nike boot rebuilt for the street. Two issues ago it was one artist inside one Nike capsule. Now it's a global roster, at the biggest tournament on earth.

Full disclosure: this one's personal. I'm American, my wife is Australian, and Friday our living room becomes a border dispute. The stakes are real beyond the couch. Both sides opened with wins, the USMNT with a runaway 4-1 win against Paraguay and the Socceroos shocking Türkiye 2-0, so the winner at Seattle Stadium punches a ticket to the Round of 16 with a match to spare. I will say, the US is favored to win. Just don’t let my wife hear you say that. Hopefully she’s not reading this... 

Noon Pacific, 3pm Eastern, on Fox.

If the US wins on Friday, I win the house bet and bragging rights. If Australia wins, I’ll never hear the end of it from a certain someone reading this issue…  See you next week.