By Gordon Forbes, USA TODAY
September 7, 2006
In his induction speech, John Madden swore the busts inside the Pro Football Hall of Fame chatted with each other in the middle of the night.
The old legends from a nickel-and-dime era must talk about money. They won't argue that they were better players. They already know that. They just happened to play in a time when the NFL was a second-string sport to the college game and sports television was just a crazy idea.
In retrospect, the staggering rise in player salaries has been the most significant change in the 87-year history of the pro game. The players are bigger and faster. And the 1977 rules changes made the NFL the land of milk and honey for quarterbacks and receivers. Yet, the busts of those legends will tell you the biggest change in the game involves salaries.
Credit former players executive director Ed Garvey and attorney Dick Berthelsen for the money tree. They finally won enough court fights to gain the right to obtain copies of each player contract.
"It was essential," Garvey said, "because not knowing what other players were getting, you had no bargaining leverage whatsoever. The word was out that Vince Lombardi had two sets of contracts." Garvey even recalled hearing that Forrest Gregg, an all-pro Packers tackle, had played for $19,000.
The players union distributed its first salary survey after the 1982 season. The numbers were shockers. St. Louis Cardinals quarterback Neil Lomax ($130,000) earned only $30,000 more than Joe Bostic, one of his guards. Many earned less than $40,000.
Everson Walls, a cornerback signed by Dallas in 1981 as a free agent, intercepted 18 passes in his first two years. His salaries were $32,000 and $37,000. After two Pro Bowls, the Cowboys offered him a modest raise that Walls rejected.
"Ronnie Lott and Lawrence Taylor used to kid me about my salary at the Pro Bowl," Walls said. "One night, Ron Springs and I had a couple of beers and came up with a plan. I didn't want to get fined, so I retired for five days."
The fuming Cowboys brought Walls back with a $125,000 signing bonus and a $120,000 base. When the nervy United States Football League launched a salary war, the Cowboys signed Walls to an annuity deal that guaranteed him $100,000 for 10 years.
Meanwhile, the NFL owners agreed to a historic free-agency/salary-cap system in which the players were guaranteed a percentage of gross revenue and were free to move after four years. Garvey had proposed the system for years.
"It was one of the greatest innovations for salaries in terms of labor peace," Garvey said. To keep their players, teams began offering signing bonuses right up there with CEO deals.
Today teams employ money crunchers known as capologists. And if they never touched a football, who cares — as long as they keep the team under the $102 million salary cap. Players last year earned 65.5% of DGR (defined gross revenue such as ticket sales; TV revenue, etc.). In 1973, teams paid players only 39.2% of gross income, an average of $2.452 million a team.
Agent Leigh Steinberg said there were two factors that held salaries down before the boom. "The revenue base was exponentially smaller," he said. "And there was no free agency."
Then the base exploded, with each new TV deal virtually doubling revenue. There were renegotiations and huge bonuses and tricky free-agent deals in which the capologists were magicians with the numbers. "Pro football became an established primacy, the No. 1 attraction in the United States," Steinberg said.
As the late George Young once said, "It was a great time to be a player." Yet, agent Peter Schaffer notes the owners prospered, too, with franchise values soaring past the billion-dollar mark. "Everyone associated with this fantastic sport recouped the benefits," he said.
So the game is draped in thick layers of money. It is the perfect sport for TV in terms of action, event spacing and time frame. Remarkably, there isn't a tiny clue that revenue will eventually level off.
The busts in Canton will tell you they played for the love of the game. Now they play for the love of the big money.
September 7, 2006
In his induction speech, John Madden swore the busts inside the Pro Football Hall of Fame chatted with each other in the middle of the night.
The old legends from a nickel-and-dime era must talk about money. They won't argue that they were better players. They already know that. They just happened to play in a time when the NFL was a second-string sport to the college game and sports television was just a crazy idea.
In retrospect, the staggering rise in player salaries has been the most significant change in the 87-year history of the pro game. The players are bigger and faster. And the 1977 rules changes made the NFL the land of milk and honey for quarterbacks and receivers. Yet, the busts of those legends will tell you the biggest change in the game involves salaries.
Credit former players executive director Ed Garvey and attorney Dick Berthelsen for the money tree. They finally won enough court fights to gain the right to obtain copies of each player contract.
"It was essential," Garvey said, "because not knowing what other players were getting, you had no bargaining leverage whatsoever. The word was out that Vince Lombardi had two sets of contracts." Garvey even recalled hearing that Forrest Gregg, an all-pro Packers tackle, had played for $19,000.
The players union distributed its first salary survey after the 1982 season. The numbers were shockers. St. Louis Cardinals quarterback Neil Lomax ($130,000) earned only $30,000 more than Joe Bostic, one of his guards. Many earned less than $40,000.
Everson Walls, a cornerback signed by Dallas in 1981 as a free agent, intercepted 18 passes in his first two years. His salaries were $32,000 and $37,000. After two Pro Bowls, the Cowboys offered him a modest raise that Walls rejected.
"Ronnie Lott and Lawrence Taylor used to kid me about my salary at the Pro Bowl," Walls said. "One night, Ron Springs and I had a couple of beers and came up with a plan. I didn't want to get fined, so I retired for five days."
The fuming Cowboys brought Walls back with a $125,000 signing bonus and a $120,000 base. When the nervy United States Football League launched a salary war, the Cowboys signed Walls to an annuity deal that guaranteed him $100,000 for 10 years.
Meanwhile, the NFL owners agreed to a historic free-agency/salary-cap system in which the players were guaranteed a percentage of gross revenue and were free to move after four years. Garvey had proposed the system for years.
"It was one of the greatest innovations for salaries in terms of labor peace," Garvey said. To keep their players, teams began offering signing bonuses right up there with CEO deals.
Today teams employ money crunchers known as capologists. And if they never touched a football, who cares — as long as they keep the team under the $102 million salary cap. Players last year earned 65.5% of DGR (defined gross revenue such as ticket sales; TV revenue, etc.). In 1973, teams paid players only 39.2% of gross income, an average of $2.452 million a team.
Agent Leigh Steinberg said there were two factors that held salaries down before the boom. "The revenue base was exponentially smaller," he said. "And there was no free agency."
Then the base exploded, with each new TV deal virtually doubling revenue. There were renegotiations and huge bonuses and tricky free-agent deals in which the capologists were magicians with the numbers. "Pro football became an established primacy, the No. 1 attraction in the United States," Steinberg said.
As the late George Young once said, "It was a great time to be a player." Yet, agent Peter Schaffer notes the owners prospered, too, with franchise values soaring past the billion-dollar mark. "Everyone associated with this fantastic sport recouped the benefits," he said.
So the game is draped in thick layers of money. It is the perfect sport for TV in terms of action, event spacing and time frame. Remarkably, there isn't a tiny clue that revenue will eventually level off.
The busts in Canton will tell you they played for the love of the game. Now they play for the love of the big money.
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