Over/Under (1.30)
Professional athletes have it all.
At least, that is the general consensus.
Multi-million dollar salaries in their wallet. Trophy wives by their side. Luxury cars in their driveway. Lil’ Wayne and T.I. on their speed-dial.Chartered jets on the runway. Houses with more bathrooms than illegitimate children.
Kids grow up wanting to be them. Women swoon over their every move. Grown men dedicate their spare time to their ‘fantasy.’ The best will never have a day job. In their lifetime, they will spend more time on TV then most spend on the toilet. They will make more in a week than the average citizen makes in a year.[1] All this for playing a game most people have to pay to participate in.
It seems to good to be true.
That’s because it is.
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Brett Favre once said he doesn’t get paid to play football. That sounds funny coming from someone who has started roughly 3,478 consecutive games at quarterback. He claimed that he gets paid for the 30 hours a week he spends in the film room. He earns his paycheck by taking ice baths after two-a-day practices. His salary is based on the mandatory press conferences, interviews, and public appearances. For him, playing football is fun. Being a pro athlete is not.
For many reasons, I wouldn’t want to be in Brett’s Wranglers. I have a hard time empathizing with someone who is going to rip the hearts out of every Vikings fan in exactly 79 days. But he has a point.
Being a professional athlete is not, as the kids say, all that.[2]
Exhibit A
The world’s most common fear is common speaking. Personally I am afraid of snakes, but most people are terrified of the limelight. They dread giving a 6-minute presentation in front of 22 students and an absent-minded professor. Every single NBA athlete is required to be available for a minimum of 30 minutes after every game, practice, and public appearance for questions. Every NFL team hosts mid-week press conferences where players must answer the same question 20 different times. The ever-expanding world of media connections means that fans have insider access to player’s lives almost 24/7. Youtube. ESPN. NBATV. Blogs. HBO’s Hard Knocks. Twitter. League/Team/Fan/Player websites. This doesn’t even scratch the surface of everything out there that somehow makes this newsworthy.
Exhibit B
On December 25th, 99.9% of North Americans will take a break from their jobs, studies, and/or responsibilities to celebrate the birth of our Lord. LeBron James will be enjoying Christmas by sharing a hotel room with this guy. Your younger sister will wake you up at 6 am. He’ll be woken up at 6 am by an automated recording. You’ll be opening presents. He’ll be lifting weights. You’ll drive to the local hill to go sledding. He’ll be driven to the airport for a 2 am cross continent flight. Feliz Navidad.
Exhibit C
I haven’t bought a true textbook since my freshman year.[3] But the last one I bought was roughly 300 pages and 42% white space. In 2007 the Washington Redskins playbook was more than 700 pages and contained more than 1800 plays. Every single player was expected to have every single piece of information memorized. During the regular season, the average professional athlete puts in 60+ hour workweeks. Our definition of work may differ, but I seriously doubt that anyone would willingly choose to watch video of every snap Tony Romo has taken in his career, unless maybe you are a NYG fan.[4] Keep this in mind when you are studying for your ENGL 103 exam.
Exhibit D
For the majority of the calendar year, a professional athlete can receive a phone call from his agent at any time. He’s told that he is expected to be at the practice ability in 8 hours. Normally not a big deal, except the practice facility belongs to another team located across the country; he’s been traded. He has to pack up everything he owns, leave everyone he knows, and move to Oakland. Oh, and by the way, he is expected to perform, and perform well in his first game.
Exhibit E
The expectations and pressure that professional athletes face on a daily basis are beyond the limits of the average person. How would you respond to something like this at your job? What would you do if 100,000 people booed loudly while you worked, cursed your every move, and otherwise hated your presence?[5] Or if there was a Facebook group like this about you?
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It would be easy to call these unfair comparisons.
Critics will be quick to point out that they are not professional athletes. They deal with fax machines, not fastballs. Their kids go to school with bullies, not Brangelina’s kids. They have a Camry, not a chauffeur. And most importantly, they don’t get paid millions of dollars to play a game.
That’s precisely the point.
In many ways, professional athletes live in a different world than the rest of us. It can be very challenging to find strong similarities between us. The best, and maybe only, parallel that can be made is that professional athletes are still normal people. They eat, sleep, make mistakes, have affairs, get arrested, get married, have kids, and secretly enjoy listening to Michael Bolton. They are normal people. Sometimes they enjoy their job. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they should be admired. Other times they should not.
But one thing they should never be is elevated to a position they do not deserve.
And for that, being a professional athlete is overrated.
Other Overrated Things:
- Dancing
- Diets
- Alaska
- Birthdays
- High School Proms
- Saving the environment
- Crime television shows
- Attendance
- Coffee
- Graduating
[2] I think now would be an appropriate time to mention that I have always wanted to be a professional athlete and probably always will.
[3] Another benefit of a Liberal Arts education. My courses require literature. Books, yes. Textbooks, no.
[4] Champ Bailey watches 20+ hours of opposing quarterbacks every week. In his spare time. Apparently it pays off.
[5] That’s what it is like for Toronto players. At home games.