Position Essay

Professional Sports Contracts:
Pro sports today are a growing form of entertainment, and therefore the athletes should get paid accordingly, just like Hollywood movie stars. Movies stars also provide a form of entertainment, and get paid quite well for it. In today’s society there is a growing demand for pro sports and thusly pro athletes have seen a sharp increase in salary due to the multi billion dollar TV contracts, endorsements and sponsorships, and 24 hour media coverage.
However some members of society believe athletes are financially compensated way too much. They claim that our hard earned money and time could be spent elsewhere; with your family etc. According to critics of sports, there is no reason why a person should get paid millions of dollars to play a “sport,” because sports do not positively benefit society whatsoever. The sharp increase in player salaries, which has deeply disturbed critics, is totally societal. . The key element in all of these is that the common man supports it weather he or she likes it or not through watching TV ads and buying the products.
Sponsorships and endorsements are a large reason for higher paychecks for athletes. It helps individual sport athletes more than athletes on team sports. For the individual players, the endorsements are the bulk of their income. Tiger Woods for example made $12 million in winnings and $75 million in endorsements. Other sports like tennis and auto racing also rely on sponsorships because they don’t know when their next payday is going to come. If you consistently finish in the lower half of the field, you are not going to survive in the industry very long. Sponsorships that can be seen on cars or what type of clothes you where can keep you in the game for an extended period of time.
The expanding media coverage of pro sports can be directly correlated with the rise in player salaries. The three major channels (NBC, CBS, ABC) have invested billions of dollars in various sports, ranging from golf to baseball to hockey. Cable TV is another big reason for the media coverage. ESPN is a huge reason why. ESPN was the first all sports network. It covers the widest variety of sports which helps smaller sports come to the national forefront. A person can be caught up with the day in sports by watching it for as little as 5 minutes. TV contracts tie in with pro sports contracts because the larger the TV contract, the more money and owner will receive from the league. This allows the owners and general managers to pay players a higher amount of money.
Professional athletes should get paid the amount they do because as long as people are willing to support for it, why not? The media gets on their case for making too much money; however if you turned it around and the media received the same amount there would be no complaints. Athletes are just another target of jealous citizens who instead of doing something constructive; complain about the successful. Some people just seem to have enough time on their hands to attack anything they don’t like, and that is quite saddening. Overall, pro contracts are on the rise. Despite what the critics think, they will probably continue to do so, because of both the hardcore fans support thru attending and also the unknowingly supportive fan who might not attend the games, but supports pro sports by purchasing advertised items and watching TV on a daily basis.