While taking advantage of the $6 soup-and-sandwich lunch combo at a local restaurant earlier this month, I nearly choked on the sandwich portion of my lunch as I skimmed through a small item in the Sports Briefs section of a metro newspaper.
Ilya Kovalchuk, a forward for the Atlanta Thrashers' National Hockey League team, is set to become an unrestricted free agent July 1. For those of you who don't follow sports, it means he can either choose to stay with the Thrashers, or bolt Hot-lanta (Snow-lanta these days) and find a new suitor after July 1. (Usually, it's the franchise that is willing to pony up enough coin to employ said free agent's unique skill sets.)
Kovalchuk insisted he didn't care about his contract situation, and I certainly have to take him at his word because he turned his nose up at $100 million. That's right. Kovalchuk, a native or Russia, recently said nyet to Atlanta's final contract extension offer -- 12-years, $101 million.
To put this sum in perspective, it is only $63 million shy of the 2009 Gross Domestic Product of the Republic of Palau, a small island nation east of the Philippines.
With Kovalchuk -- one of the league's premier players -- preparing to pack his bags after July 1, the Thrashers wouldn't have received any sort of compensation in the form of players, draft picks or cash. So they traded him to the New Jersey Devils recently for two players and a first-round draft pick.
Such scenarios have become the norm in the world of pro sports. Many factors nowadays -- free agency, an athlete's agent, salary caps, guaranteed contracts, incentive-laden contracts, signing bonuses -- tend to dictate who shows up on the Scoreboard page under "Transactions." In the National Basketball Association, for instance, it's not uncommon to hear about players being traded not so much for the value they might bring to their new team, but because the players' salaries come close to matching up. (Thus, a team can plug their new player into the old player's slot and not be concerned about how it affects its salary cap.)
I don't begrudge pro athletes for wanting to cash in on a big payday. Usually, their careers are short-lived (the average NFL career, for example, is 3 1/2 years). And as much as we like to chastise athletes for bolting our favorite teams ("Where's the loyalty?" we ask), those of us in the working world are essentially free agents, too. If you feel you're not being justly compensated, you are under no obligation to stick with the company for which you labor (unless you signed a contract). You have the choice of clicking on your favorite online job board and shopping for a new company and a better salary. And if you get what you want, you'll jump ship.
Nor do I necessarily fault an athlete's agent. Sure, there are a few agents whom I'd place under the category of bottom-feeding dirtballs. But I'm sure most agents and their staffs work hard in what has to be a cut-throat environment to get the player they represent the best deal possible in the marketplace. And when it comes down to it, you and I essentially determine what the market value is for these athletes because we pay the ticket prices, tune into TV and radio broadcasts, and likely purchase whatever products the sponsors of these broadcasts happen to be peddling.
These points notwithstanding, when an athlete turns down an offer in the financial stratosphere that Kovalchuk just brushed aside -- this after saying he wanted to remain with Atlanta "for life" -- I can't help but scratch my head and wonder what goes through their skulls. Do they ever turn on the news and realize how good they've got it? Does hundreds of thousands of dollars start looking like pocket change after a while? In Kovalchuk's case, how much will it take to pacify him if $101 million doesn't do the trick?
It'll be interesting to see how much more Kovalchuk will rake in when he signs with another team this summer, and what he'll say when he's formally introduced by his new team at a press conference. He'll likely discuss how much he wants to win, and how signing with his new club gives him the best chance to capture a Stanley Cup, hockey's ultimate prize. (His old team currently has a winning record, but if the season ended today, Atlanta would not make the playoffs.)
Talking about winning always makes for good sound bites. But, really, is there any athlete, Pop Warner or professional, who doesn't want to win? However, if Kovalchuk starts talking about "security for my family" or "feeding my family," or feeds us the old "it wasn't about the money" line, we know better.
It's about the money. It's always about the money. Since $101 million wasn't enough, what else could it be except the money?
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