Every time a team wins three uninterrupted titles and wants to commemorate that achievement in t-shirt form, Pat Riley gets paid. The NBA coaching great registered the trademark for “three-peat” and its less formal sibling, “3-peat,” in 1988, when his Los Angeles Lakers had won two NBA championships in a row and were gunning for a third. The Lakers ultimately lost in the finals, but Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls achieved the three-peat a few years later, in 1993 . Riley pocketed an estimated $300,000 from royalties when the NBA used “Three-peat” on subsequent Bulls championship merchandise. He also cashed in on the 1998 Bulls three-peat, as well as triple title runs by the New York Yankees and the Los Angeles Lakers. Riley is now president of the Miami Heat, who were recently crowned NBA champions. With any luck, Riley could be celebrating (and cashing in on) a three-peat of his own in a few years.
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