A Fine. Our society’s way of telling us we did something wrong. Parked on the wrong side of the street. Played our music too loud. Blocked our neighbor’s driveway with our Fiat.
When they come, they are inconvenient, and financially painful, and often stretch our thin budgets even further when food, gas, and housing prices are already doing the same thing.
But when an athlete gets fined $50,000 for allegedly faking an injury during an NFL game – the equivalent of an average person’s annual salary in 2022 - what are we to make of this?
This is exactly what happened with Cameron Jordan and Jessie Bates from the New Orleans Saints and Cincinnati Bengals respectively, during a recent Sunday NFL game.
What’s our takeaway? That they have more money than God? That the billions going to salaries each year needs to be redistributed somewhere to balance fan perception about what’s taking place?
Imagine shelling out 12% of your annual paycheck for the illegal use of a leaf blower on a Sunday morning. Or a $4500 citation for parking too close to a fire hydrant.
Never happen, right? Too draconian.
And yet these kinds of fines are everyday occurrences in major league sports.
On Thanksgiving Day four Dallas Cowboy players were collectively fined $27,094 for excessive celebration after scoring a touchdown. An oversized red Salvation Army kettle in the back of the endzone was also involved in the incident.
What passes for punishment or discipline in our sports leagues borders on the ridiculous.
Not because fines are inherently wrong or bad but because the dollar values of these fines are completely out of touch with the current economic picture for most people in the US and what the average fan has to contribute in order for these players to have the kinds of incomes that can withstand these hits.
$25,000 for saying the F-word or $15,000 for “illegal use” of the middle finger during an NBA game are commonplace.
Why are these fines so high? What are the leagues trying to accomplish by issuing fines and collecting millions of dollars each year that they then donate to charities?
Fines have a purpose. As painful as they are, there’s some logic to them. Make the offender pay $50 or $250 and they won’t do it again. Or so the theory goes. Anyone paying their 22nd parking fine knows the theory doesn’t always work.
But $25,000 for saying a bad word, is it reasonable?
Do the fines point even more to an existing inequity in overall value payments in America? $50,000 for a new 2022 Chevy that cost $39,000 – 12 months ago.
Paying $800,000 for a two-bedroom house in California that was valued at half that in 2016.
My first Mets game in 1968 cost me $3 for a ticket. It was a day game so plenty of seats to choose from. The average MLB ticket price back then was about $2.50.
Today a box seat at Dodgers stadium will cost $50-$200 each.
Today the average cost of a beer, hot dog, and pretzel to go with the box seats – is about $25-$35 more. In some ballparks in the US, a couple can expect to pay upwards of $200 for 3 hours of baseball.
In a nation of 335,000,000 people, less than 1/1000th of 1% will become an elite athlete capable of earning the kind of money that kids everywhere dream about.
With the average NBA salary today being over $8,000,000; the average MLB salary is over $4,000,000 and the average NFL salary is over $3,000,000.
But are these numbers reasonable? When Yankees fans give a resounding thumbs up to Aaron Judge winning a nine-year $360,000,000 contract, are they vicariously living the life of their favorite player or are they finding solace in the fact that at least someone is living the real American dream?
The average hourly wage in America has crept up slowly in the past two decades, with the minimum wage only recently hitting $15 per hour in some states and stubbornly kept lower in most. Keeping up with inflation would be a great thing for some workers – but for many, a second or third job is the new normal for making ends meet.
And yet, Americans like winners. They want to see success stories on the sports page and elsewhere. They still dream, albeit with more restrictions, that someday they too can hit the sports or entrepreneur lottery.
But what about today? When the NFL or NBA commissioner blithely hands out $10,000, $25,000, or $50,000 fines for infractions only relevant on the playing field or court – what does it say about their relative indifference to what the average fan makes of these dollar amounts?
That these players make so much money that they can afford to shell out a year’s salary for flipping a fan off or that the money has lost meaning?
In 2021 Trevor Bauer, a well-compensated LA Dodger pitcher was suspended for allegedly sexually abusing a woman on multiple occasions. Restraining orders were applied for. Suspensions followed with Bauer not pitching for the better part of two seasons. In the process losing over $30,000,000 in salary.
He was recently reinstated by an arbitrator. Will he pitch again? Does it matter?
Deshaun Watson, quarterback for the Houston Texans became embroiled in a seemingly endless series of legal actions filed by women claiming some form of sexual harassment. Result: no criminal charges, civil suits settled and Watson was awarded a $230,000,000 fully guaranteed contract after being traded to the Cleveland Browns.
Front offices around the league grumbled about the high price; reporters wrote their opinions about the ethics of such a trade, but at the end of the day, or more precisely at the end of an 11-game suspension, Watson is back on the playing field.
And major contracts continue to be signed as teams in all three leagues vie for free agents while awarding them with contracts lasting 7, 9, and even 13 years long and valued at $100-$200-$300 million.
And if we glance across the ocean and visit the payrolls of major soccer leagues throughout the UK and Europe, total compensation packages of over $100 million per year is becoming more frequent.
Let’s face it everyone would like to make that kind of money. Everyone can dream of all the things they can accomplish with that kind of revenue stream to play with.
But while all those dreams are being considered, the cost of everything relating to sports is going up. Tickets, food, beers, memorabilia, TV rights, and on and on.
Is it worth it?
Are we, the average fan, sports watcher, and diehard Green Bay Packers' ticketholder (as an example) responsible for this trend? For the ever-widening gap between elite athlete salaries and endorsements and the money available to pay teachers, police, and nurses or any of us working at average American jobs?
Watching an elite athlete play is awe-inspiring, it really is. But is it worth $ 1 million a week in salary?
Is watching Aaron Judge hit a home run worth $800,000 per – a pro-rated amount if he hits 50 dingers in 2023?
Maybe it is. Maybe with the stresses of the 21st century all around us, a bit of relaxation and vicarious thrills are worth the price. But if it isn’t – then something needs to change. With the team owners, players, and agents being brought to heel just a little.
Paying almost $100 per person for Disney World is bad enough, but do we need to pay the same when wanting to visit our own personal Field of Dreams and spend a day with the kids?
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The Greek
2023-01-02
Read recently the average cost for 4 people to attend a game at Fenway is $324,not counting food and Henry’s $16 beers
Mark Greene
2022-12-30
$3 for a Mets game in the 68?... we paid 50 cents to see the Phillies at the vet in 1971..and 50 cents for the ell(subway) to the vet.
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