New School vs. Old School
I recently had a conversation/debate with a friend about today’s generation of professional athletes. His argument was that the athletes today lack passion and are not as determined as the athletes of the past. He believes that an athlete not playing through “minor” injuries is a disgrace to past athletes who were willing to play through all types of pain to help their team win. While I agree with this, my argument is why should they? Let’s talk basketball for this particular case.
Basketball is not the game it once was. The NBA of yesteryear has witnessed a complete sea-change in the 21st century. The NBA is more popular than ever and Commissioner David Stern has placed a major emphasis on taking the game global. There are currently 60 international players that represent more than 28 countries in the league right now. More importantly, the NBA is a multinational business that has doubled in revenue in the past two decades from $400M in 1989 to over $4B in 2008.
In 1982 the average NBA salary was $275,000 vs. $5.6 million in 2008. In 2003 at age 18, LeBron James inked a 7-year $90 million shoe contract with Nike before playing his first NBA game. Kobe Bryant has a $45 million shoe contract with Nike and a contract worth $136 million with the Los Angeles Lakers. Contracts like this are familiar throughout the NBA.
With so much money tied to individual players it simply does not make sense for professional athletes to risk career ending injuries for a few games. In the 80’s and 90’s players would often play through injuries because they were looking to secure long-term contracts, or quite simply because they loved the game so much. Today, however basketball is more of a business and the players recognize that. This is not just their career but a source of providing for their families and players today just are not willing to jeopardize that.
If we’re being honest, the organizations are not willing to put a “franchise” player career at risk anymore either. Take the Orlando Magic, the newest of the league’s elite teams, has earned this position largely by committing more than $40 million, about two-thirds of the team’s entire payroll, to its four top players. If a team wants to be a contender for a Championship then they need to invest money in players.
Teams that want to build themselves into contenders generally do so by spending large sums of money to acquire great players. After spending that much money it just doesn’t make sense for both parties to risk their long-term future for a sprained ankle.
