Warning: I’m taking over sports-wonk talk for Eric today, who’s writing a story for the print version of FB. Unless you really—and I mean really—care about salary caps and the unions of professional leagues, quit reading now.
There’s been a lot of talk in sports circles about Gene Upshaw, the NFL’s Players Union’s big wig. Upshaw is apparently a lap dog for the owners, denying the retired players he is to represent their health benefits. Yesterday, former Cowboy’s fullback Daryl Johnston said roughly as much in a congressional hearing. But here’s the thing. Upshaw may not be such a bad rep.
Eric last week pointed me to Gregg Easterbrook’s column on ESPN.com. In it, Easterbrook reports the basics–in other words, the stuff the rest of the media have ignored. Wages are up 128 percent since 1993 in the NFL. Retired players at age 55 get a $5,600 pension per every year played. But the biggest coup of all is the league’s disability payments. It’s $224,000 per year for life. This is a big deal. Football is a violent sport and its participants can—rightly—claim that they can’t work due to the game’s toll. I could live with $224,000 a year. And Easterbrook shows that the NFL accepts more disability claims than Social Security. Consider that the league is about to add more money for the players to divvy up, $3.5 billion by Easterbrook’s count, and suddenly Johnston’s testimony yesterday, that the league needs to avoid a black eye, doesn’t have nearly the impact.
I missed a couple salient points from Easterbrook’s column. My fellow sports nerds should check it out for themselves.