NFL Holdout Problem Not Caused by Players Making Too Little

by Brian Phillips
(Dallas, TX )

From the tone of your article, you appear to really believe that pro football players are underpaid, and it is the fault of the owners. The article says pro football players can expect one big payday in their career. Not many people earn $350,000 per year as a salary. It will take the average working person 7 years or more before they will earn that much money. Many pro football players went to college not to learn or get an education, but to play professional football and get the “big payday.” Three years at the minimum salary and a player will have already earned over $ 1,000,000. That is a big payday.

Since when is a person’s salary based upon what people earn in another job. The salary of a baseball player or a basketball player does not give a professional football athlete the right to assume he is worth the same salary. Football players play 20 games or less a year, while baseball players play more than 160 games and basketball players play around 100 games per year. They entertain for many more games than a football player does. Perhaps they deserve more money because they bring in more revenue.

Let’s talk about free agency for a moment. The owner of a football team may invest 4 years in teaching and coaching a player to make him better. Why would an owner want to do that, when the net result is the player entering free agency forcing the “big payday?” The perfect scenario for a football player is to play hard for 4 years, turn free agent, get the big payday and retire after a total of 5 years work. HEY, can you say Brian Bosworth?

In conclusion, let me tell you what the net outcome of free agency is. I cannot afford the price of a ticket to the game. My cable bill goes up every year, and I have to pay extra for a sports package. The huge salaries from the “big payday” only hurt the sports fan. I do not mind a player making a little money; after all he does have a specialized talent. But getting paid more in one year than I will make in a lifetime seems a little ridiculous.

So I do not have any sympathy for a pro football player making a paltry $350,000 per year.