Out of all of the issues that are lingering in the world of sports, the one that has struck a chord with me this past week is: the value of the dollar in sports. In the last five years, specifically in all of the professional sports, pocketbooks for athletes have been inflated to astronomical figures.
A few players from each sport stick out in particular with blockbuster-like deals (despite the fact that unreal contracts are a very normal thing these days): Alex Rodriguez (breaking the money barrier in the MLB), David Beckham (MLS), Gilber Arenas (NBA). The list goes on, and unfortunately is growing on a daily basis. Yes, I do believe that professional athletes should be paid more than your average file clerk for the time, effort, conditioning, and entertainment that we as fans expect on a nightly basis; however, where is the cap? Is it weird to anyone else to have one man at the end of a bench that is making $20 million/year and then at the other end a person who is making $300K? Are these 'outstanding' players really bringing enough to the table to warrant such a salary? In my opinion, if you aren't brining a team guaranteed championships, you should not just be handed money. Understanding basic marketing in regards to sports, yes, having a top-tier player in your club brings more fans to the seats and in turn brings more money is sponsorships, merchandise, bla bla bla...
MY SOLUTION: Every player should be on a salary + comission basis of pay. Too many players bust their humps in college (or high school) to get their draft status up and to get on a good team - honorable efforts for sure. But when players, straight from the rookie year on, get paid these unreal amounts of money - sometimes the lifestyle takes over from the actual game. It's a shame, too, because it has almost become more enjoyable to watch college over pro, because college athletes do not get paid money, but instead play for school pride...and you can see a significant difference in play because of that. With a salary + philosophy players would have to continue to prove themselves on the court in order to 'earn' that paycheck.
I do understand that some players deserve to be paid more than others. I do understand for marketing reasons, players do get paid an extremely large sum of money, because of the business that they are in. Consiquently, the fans do no realize that this actually hurts us and hurts our economy as a whole. The more the teams have to dish out to bring in/maintain all-stars, the more tickets will cost, the more merchandise will cost, which turns into turns into the average joe not being able to enjoy a good game with the family, which leads into the building of new stadiums, higher taxes, which leads to people struggling to make ends meat, inflation (not natural inflation at that)...but it's alright, because when your franchise is happy - they won't leave your city (sorry Seattle...that sucks). Most people will never see millions in their lifetime, and yet we still have to work our 9-5 (sometimes two jobs) just to make it by on the minimum. How is that fair? Instead of making the rich - richer...we need to bring a sense equality back to the United States, because I don't know if you have noticed, but there isn't much of a middle class to speak of anymore.