Note to business leaders everywhere: it’s easier to get out of a nearly $20 million hole if you are a transcendent football player.

Michael Vick, the former Atlanta Falcons quarterback who landed in jail on dog-fighting charges, found a new lease on life and a new $100 million deal in Philadelphia. With some good luck and better football play, Vick has turned around his finances. After filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July 2008 on debt of close to $20 million, he is now less than $400,000 away from being back in the black.

According to his latest bankruptcy filing in a Virginia court, Vick had 45 claims against him worth $18.97 million. The largest claims included $6.5 million owed to the Falcons to pay back part of his signing bonus and another $6 million to his former agent.

Vick also owed $2.5 million to the Royal Bank of Canada for defaulting on a real estate development loan and $1.1 million to Wachovia Bank on a loan he received to set up a wine shop and restaurant.

Vick has turned all of that around now. He has paid back in full all of the biggest claims and now only owes about $350,000 in unresolved claims to two final debtors.

Of course, the financial comeback was preceded by a football resurrection. After being released from jail in June 2009, Vick signed with the Philadelphia Eagles and spent a year on the bench. In 2010 he got his first chance to start and took advantage, leading the Eagles to the playoffs.

Last year Vick signed a new contract, worth a reported $100 million over six years, with $35 million in guaranteed money even if he gets injured or is cut. That deal obviously made Vick’s life a lot easier trying to pay off his debt, as did the numerous endorsement deals he signed once his image was slightly rehabilitated.

In 2011, Vick re-signed with Nike, the sports apparel maker that severed his contract in 2007. He also inked endorsement deals with shock-absorbing football pad-maker Unequal Sports, nutritional supplement company MusclePharm, and Core Synergy, which sells titanium wristbands.

It’s too bad most average people don’t have that kind of upside when they enter bankruptcy.

Football, Athlete, Virginia, Sports