Peyton Manning (No. 1), Shaun White (No. 2) and Tiger Woods (No. 3) top
the Bloomberg Businessweek.com 2011 Power 100 ranking of the most
powerful professional athletes in the U.S. Football dominates list with 27 players ranked in the top 100.

To determine who the 100 most
powerful athletes are on- and off-the-field, Bloomberg Businessweek.com
teamed up with CSE, formerly known as Career Sports &
Entertainment, an integrated sports and entertainment company that
connects brands with fans; E-Poll Market Research; and Rick Horrow,
president of Horrow Sports Ventures and regular contributor to Bloomberg
Businessweek and Bloomberg TV, to create the 2011 Power 100 list.

The Power 100 rankings are based 50 percent on “on-field” performance using a variety of industry statistics and 50 percent on “off-field” measurements, such as endorsement deals, name awareness, appeal, influence, trustworthiness, and overall popularity. The most notable drops this year include controversial Tiger Woods dropping from No. 1 to No. 3 and LeBron James dropping from No. 2 to No. 11. Olympian Shaun White's (No. 2) emergence on the list had largely to do with the fact that he excels in both a summer and winter extreme sports and crosses over to mainstream marketing with various endorsement deals. The top female athlete on the list is Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn (No. 13).

In addition, this year's Power 100 rankings also emphasize the importance of team sports, with the NFL dominating the list with 27 players ranked in the top 100. NFL quarterbacks Peyton Manning (No. 1), Tom Brady (No. 5) and Drew Brees (No. 7) are all listed in the top 10. Major League Baseball came in second with the most athletes on the Power 100, with 23, followed by the NBA basketball (18), golf (7), motorsports (7), tennis (6), Olympics (5), hockey (3), soccer (2), boxing (1), cycling (1).

The top twenty are:

  1. Peyton Manning
  2. Shaun White
  3. Tiger Woods
  4. Phil Mickelson
  5. Tom Brady
  6. Shaquille O'Neal
  7. Drew Brees
  8. Lance Armstrong
  9. Albert Pujols
  10. Apolo Anton Ohno
  11. LeBron James
  12. Michael Phelps
  13. Lindsey Vonn   
  14. Kobe Bryant
  15. Roger Federer   
  16. Eli Manning            
  17. Serena Williams
  18. David Beckham
  19. Dwyane Wade    
  20. Lee Westwood