why do footballers get paid so much?

[otispunkmeyer]

what brought about todays culture of £100,000+ a week salaries?

frank lampard...wants like £140,000 off chelsea...a week. a week!

how can it be justified to get given that much, before endorsments.

i mean what turn up to training for a few hours every day and play 2 maybe 3 90min football games. big whoop. the next thing is, theres some high earning players who just dont put any soul into the game....you get the feeling they are simply there for the money.

now i dont blame them, if someones willing to pay £40-50k a week for mediocrity then thats their choice but its a bit of a slap in the face to the punters who pay through the nose.

what footballers do is no different, infact its probably less, than what a full time athlete like a decathlete, triathlete or a swimmer does ( i know about swimming, i am one....the top guys train over 4-5 hours a day, every day, some long distance swimmers muster over 100,000m a week)

then they (the footy players) have the cheek to be what i like to call "choclatiers"...i.e. namby pamby wimps that go down on the slightest breath of the opposing team.

i suppose you could also say the same of basket ball players, and american football players too. though there is a real risk in american football that you'll end up in a wheel chair.

you could also say F1 drivers get paid too much....look at ralf for example, $25milion is it? in the most well funded F1 team on the grid..and hes a bag of shit. but the big thing for F1 drivers is...no matter how good the safety there is a good chance you could die. so theres great risk there. football doesnt have that.

so what brought on this culture of paying ludicrous amounts of money to footballers/basket ballers etc when you could comfortably call half of them worthless slackers.

[bartboy9891]

Sports stars get paid a lot because a lot of people watch them play. If no one watched football (either one), then the people playing wouldn't get paid anything at all. It works the same way for the entire entertainment industry.

[zaybxcwd12]

I am with Bart on this one, so long as pple are stupid enough to pay £50+ for a shirt that costs probably a couple of quid to make then they can command obscene amounts of money. So long as pple are prepared to pay hundreds to watch them for 1hr and a 1/2 once a week 6 months in the yr then knock them selfs out the players, management are not the stupid ones. If memory serves me right there was uproar a number of yrs ago when the chairman of NUFC ridiculed the fans for how much they spent on the team indicating they where idiots.

Me I hate football, never seen a game. Could not care less who wins or looses. Proud to say that the soccer/football "Industry" (which all it is now a business not about the game) does not profit from me.

[vRS]

Some footballers get paid a lot, some don't. I can almost guess that Rangers top players, Adam, Boyd, McGregor and Ferguson don't get £100,00 a week. Id say at most they may get in the region of £15,000 to maybe £30,000 a week.

Unlike most players they'd rather play for their team than play for the money.

[chaos386]

Originally Posted by otispunkmeyer

so what brought on this culture of paying ludicrous amounts of money to footballers/basket ballers etc when you could comfortably call half of them worthless slackers.

There's a massive amount of competition to become a professional footballer or basketball player, so I disagree that you could call half of them slackers.

[Lilleput]

Like Chaos mentioned, i think alot of it is because of the huge competition to become a pro football player, if everyone wanted to work as a Truck driver but they only needed x amount those people would get payed alot too.

[nomix]

It's called capitalism.

Demand is met by supply.

People love football, they watch it. That equals money for the broadcasters, and money for the teams. Then there's competition amongst them to get the best players. This means that the teams have to come up with big deals for the players.

Bob's your uncle.

[chaos386]

Originally Posted by Lilleput

Like Chaos mentioned, i think alot of it is because of the huge competition to become a pro football player, if everyone wanted to work as a Truck driver but they only needed x amount those people would get payed alot too.

Actually, I was just saying the competition is high because of the high salaries, and that because of the high competition, it's not exactly a piece of cake to become a top-paid footballer. Like zaybxcwd12 said, the reason they get paid so much is because there's so much money involved.

[watto]

I know that in Australia our footballers (this is AFL now, not football football) the highest paid player's salaries are only around $1m(AUD of course). I say 'only' because that's nothing compared to what NBA and footballers get.. Their other income is outside their club salary in terms of cars, sponsorship deals, TV contracts etc etc.

They egt paid so much because they're good at what they do and because they're playing a high profile sport that people pay to watch.

[essentialatom]

There's also a big element of the economic principle of scarcity, particularly with the best players in the world. Players as good as Henry, Ronaldinho and Zidane (to name but three) are hard to come by, so they get massive transfer fees and massive wages, in the same way that when oil becomes scarce it shoots up in price. Of course, the individual fees and figures don't rely exactly on this principle but it's a good guideline. And when you factor in marketability of a certain player and the other various facets of what makes a transfer/contract deal, you're getting into millions and millions of pounds - and the club obviously wants that cash. So the player can afford to go, "No, I want x amount of money for playing for you", because the club will gladly pay out, knowing that they're getting it back many times over.

Then you get Chelsea, who just offer everyone stupid amounts of money because they can.

Put simply - football is fucking MASSIVE.

[fbc]

As others have said - their pay reflects their market value. They get paid so much because of the income they bring to the club.

[Firecat]

I'd rather see the players get paid high salaries than have the clubs or whatever other organization keep all the money.

[toma_alimosh]

Originally Posted by fbc

As others have said - their pay reflects their market value. They get paid so much because of the income they bring to the club.

That's exactly right.

They get paid according to how much income they can bring to the club. Even if they are lazy asses and even if they suck, if they are famous and have an established fan base, that's what will bring their salaries up.

That's why you have horrible players getting paid as much as they do: they're recognizable faces, and as long as there are fans that stick with their favoured teams, they're going to want to see the players stick with their favourite team.

This equals value, and thus money. So they can be as terrible as they can be, if the fans want them there, all they gotta do is show up. That makes the club money and part of that goes into their pockets. Of course, you can't be a footballer who can't play football at least decently, so they train... even if very little.

Think about it from a music industry perspective. Do you think Britney Spears became rich because she's a good pop singer? Hell no. She made a whole lot of money because the made a name for herself in the newspapers early in her career. It's because of the scandalous "I'm a ditsy teen, won't you come and sleep with me" routine that she got a whole lot of publicity. And most teens didn't buy the album because they liked the music, they bought the album because it was "hot", it was the thing of the moment, the trend. Some of them because they liked this explosion in being sexualy active at a very young age, some of them did it to piss off their parents, but a whole lot did it because everybody else was listening to it.

That's what I like to call the social band-wagon illusion: People believing that something is good just because a lot of people admire it. But that's just admiring the popularity that those people get, rather than admiring the people themselves. That applies to everything in the entertainment business and a lot of others, like politics and such. We all make decisions based on the majority's opinion all the time, we just don't realize how stupid that is.

If you want to be popular, the thing you need to know is how to control the masses, and after that, you're there ... and probably there to stay.
There was on thing that Albert Einstein said that stuck with me: "The sum of the IQ scores of everyone on Earth is a constant." And I get reminded of this fact every day.

[bone]

http://www.liv.ac.uk/footballindustry/bosman.html

it's all the fault off jean-marc bosman

before, you could only change from football club when you were end of contract AND your new club was willing to pay a transfer sum. bosman was at end of contract at luik, and wanted to move to dunkerque, but the latter didn't want to pay the way to high transfer sum luik asked, so he went to the EU caus "as a European Union citizen, he possessed the right to "freedom of movement" within the European Union if he wished to find work"

he got it's right, so this means that now teams don't have to pay transfer soms if the player is end of contract, that also means that more teams could express their interest in a specific player, so more negotiation, longer contracts (teams want their players to go while they're still on contract, caus then the new team still has to pay transfer fee) and higher wages...

again, it's belgiums fault

[Slycer]

A car or even a couple of new cars each week. Ahh....Must be fun.

[Spazatao]

Originally Posted by fbc

As others have said - their pay reflects their market value. They get paid so much because of the income they bring to the club.

Perfect. There's just another thing I'd like to add. A footballer starts playing in big clubs about 20 years old, then it shows it can be on the principal team, starts making success and then goes to a huge club in Europe (that's more or less what happens with Brazilian footballers). There, it'll be paid a stupid amount of money and what fbc said will happen. BUT, on his early 30's he'll be experiencing the beginning of the end of his career. Usually, I guess you guys will agree, footballers' careers will last 15 years. And what next? Sure, those that are smart like Leonardo at Milan, might go to the political, administrative and/or diplomatic sector of clubs or, in the case of Dunga, become a coach and keep earning good money from football. But, most of them don't do this and, that money is what makes them safe to think of what to do after the end... of course, one wouldn't need THAT amount of money and the age problem doesn't justify it. It just complements the whole situation.

BTW- For those of you that might remember Romário, ex-PSV and ex-Barcelona and 1994 World Cup Champion and the player with more goals at that edition, he just scored 1000 goals, at the age of 41 years old, playing for one major club here at Rio.

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally Posted by vRS

Some footballers get paid a lot, some don't. I can almost guess that Rangers top players, Adam, Boyd, McGregor and Ferguson don't get £100,00 a week. Id say at most they may get in the region of £15,000 to maybe £30,000 a week.

Unlike most players they'd rather play for their team than play for the money.

this is what im talking about really

you have guys on low wages (relatively) who play their hearts out. then you got the big guns like henry who exhibit real flair at the game. but then you have an almost abundance of over hyped dross in the middle that get paid far too much for what they do.

im not complaining here, im just wanting to know why.

i can admire david beckham and his wife, i mean he comes across as a dumb fuck but he clearly isnt, hes the most marketable man england has and he knows it he deserves what he gets because he knows how to exploit. i thought it was quite funny today though, he let gordon ramsay keep some lambs in his back garden and a big cat came and ate them in the nite lol

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally Posted by Spazatao

Perfect. There's just another thing I'd like to add. A footballer starts playing in big clubs about 20 years old, then it shows it can be on the principal team, starts making success and then goes to a huge club in Europe (that's more or less what happens with Brazilian footballers). There, it'll be paid a stupid amount of money and what fbc said will happen. BUT, on his early 30's he'll be experiencing the beginning of the end of his career. Usually, I guess you guys will agree, footballers' careers will last 15 years. And what next? Sure, those that are smart like Leonardo at Milan, might go to the political, administrative and/or diplomatic sector of clubs or, in the case of Dunga, become a coach and keep earning good money from football. But, most of them don't do this and, that money is what makes them safe to think of what to do after the end... of course, one wouldn't need THAT amount of money and the age problem doesn't justify it. It just complements the whole situation.

BTW- For those of you that might remember Romário, ex-PSV and ex-Barcelona and 1994 World Cup Champion and the player with more goals at that edition, he just scored 1000 goals, at the age of 41 years old, playing for one major club here at Rio.

oh i see, kinda like live fast die young

they earn huge sums, over a short period.

granted most people will never earn in their life time what a top footy star will earn in a few years but it kinda evens things out.

i read earlier that footy wages will soon top a billion! WOW

the really sad thing is though, theres a program on and its trying to get footballers to give a single days wages to a fund set up for our ailing nursing staff (who are over worked and underpaid significantly because the NHS and gov havent got a fucking clue)

basically the fund is just to help out those nurses in need.

now i was suprised by what i read. chelsea by far the richest club didnt give a penny. man u only produced 2-3 guys willing as well....its pretty embarrasing to see someone on over £100k a week not be willing to give only a days wages away. it is their money and they are not obliged of course, but because its good cause with lots of publicity it does single them out as tight wads and of course the media is all over that like a rash.

btw i think it was watford or fulham or both, where the whole squad....as in all 30 odd players donated money, how cool are those guys

[AnGuRuSO]

Originally Posted by bartboy9891

Sports stars get paid a lot because a lot of people watch them play. If no one watched football (either one), then the people playing wouldn't get paid anything at all. It works the same way for the entire entertainment industry.

He's right, winning wimbledon gets you one million pounds, winning the Australian lawn bowl championship gets you five thousand pounds.

[No Boss]

Because they suck. All of them. Musicians, sports stars, actors... that all suck. Suck.

Fuck.

/Just started a new job and I hate it after one day.
//Disgruntled.
///"I swear one day it's just gonna be *click*....*machine gun noises*."