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For as long as pro athletes have been enriched to the point of royalty, there has been a fan dilemma. The instinct is to rebel -- to refuse to pay triple-figure ticket prices and double figures for beer just to finance the nine-figure athlete. Yet the market is the market, the money is there, it would only go back into the designer wallets of the owners anyway and, well, it’s vital to pay heavily for players in order to have a better chance to win.
So the debate has swirled, and it will, perhaps with no end.
But how’s this for a Great Compromise? Fans (and columnists, and talk show hosts and other hair-trigger critics) can agree to acknowledge that certain athletes will deserve a certain fee, and then accept that as a cost of doing sports business -- but only until that point when an obscenely well-compensated athlete implies that his bosses are cheap.
Put another way: Once an athlete accepts a so-called max contract -- one of those jobs that immediately demands a headline -- then he is prohibited from worrying out loud where else an organization is spending its money.
Put even another way: Hey, Donovan McNabb ..keep it down, will ya’?
Of all people -- of allllll people -- who shouldn’t criticize the way the Eagles invest in personnel, it’s McNabb. But there was the self-commissioned Eagles’ ship captain yapping in the Daily Times this week that, "It’s somewhat frustrating at times when you’re seeing other players that possibly could help you out joining other teams -- especially in your division."
He’s frustrated?
Heeeeeee’s frustrated?
The Eagles have done nothing but canonize McNabb since the moment they rejected the famous Mike Ditka offer of a day’s worth selections and instead chose the Syracuse quarterback as the second overall player in the 1999 draft. They re-did his contract and made him a $112,000,000 man. They imported Terrell Owens when McNabb was campaigning for Terrell Owens. They ran Owens off when Owens began to irritate McNabb.
Where does the quarterback get the cheek to question anything that organization does?
Depending upon the analysis of the salary cap at any given moment, it’s possible to interpret that the Eagles tend toward frugal in personnel matters. But once a player takes a $112,000,000 bite from his company’s personnel-funding pie, he has no right to come back for seconds
- To the Eagles’ credit -- and providing the first tremor of a new era where all is not tailored for McNabb -- was the addition of Jeff Garcia as a backup quarterback.
No longer of Pro Bowl skill and perhaps down to his last opportunity to re-achieve any pro football success, Garcia nonetheless is a capable professional quarterback. And now he is there and available -- available to give McNabb pain in the sports-hernia area the first time No. 5 throws three consecutive incomplete passes.
Since McNabb will be coming off a season-ending injury, and because Mike McMahon helped show why a fresh reliever is a must for a playoff-minded team, the addition of Garcia was as courageous as it was inspired. The Eagles are aware of McNabb’s sensitivities. And they have to know the history of pro football in Philadelphia, where the most popular player on the planet traditionally has been the backup quarterback. But they hired Garcia anyway.
Maybe -- just maybe -- that means the days of protecting McNabb at any cost are over in an organization that is 0-since-1960 and would like that slump to end.
LINK
So the debate has swirled, and it will, perhaps with no end.
But how’s this for a Great Compromise? Fans (and columnists, and talk show hosts and other hair-trigger critics) can agree to acknowledge that certain athletes will deserve a certain fee, and then accept that as a cost of doing sports business -- but only until that point when an obscenely well-compensated athlete implies that his bosses are cheap.
Put another way: Once an athlete accepts a so-called max contract -- one of those jobs that immediately demands a headline -- then he is prohibited from worrying out loud where else an organization is spending its money.
Put even another way: Hey, Donovan McNabb ..keep it down, will ya’?
Of all people -- of allllll people -- who shouldn’t criticize the way the Eagles invest in personnel, it’s McNabb. But there was the self-commissioned Eagles’ ship captain yapping in the Daily Times this week that, "It’s somewhat frustrating at times when you’re seeing other players that possibly could help you out joining other teams -- especially in your division."
He’s frustrated?
Heeeeeee’s frustrated?
The Eagles have done nothing but canonize McNabb since the moment they rejected the famous Mike Ditka offer of a day’s worth selections and instead chose the Syracuse quarterback as the second overall player in the 1999 draft. They re-did his contract and made him a $112,000,000 man. They imported Terrell Owens when McNabb was campaigning for Terrell Owens. They ran Owens off when Owens began to irritate McNabb.
Where does the quarterback get the cheek to question anything that organization does?
Depending upon the analysis of the salary cap at any given moment, it’s possible to interpret that the Eagles tend toward frugal in personnel matters. But once a player takes a $112,000,000 bite from his company’s personnel-funding pie, he has no right to come back for seconds
- To the Eagles’ credit -- and providing the first tremor of a new era where all is not tailored for McNabb -- was the addition of Jeff Garcia as a backup quarterback.
No longer of Pro Bowl skill and perhaps down to his last opportunity to re-achieve any pro football success, Garcia nonetheless is a capable professional quarterback. And now he is there and available -- available to give McNabb pain in the sports-hernia area the first time No. 5 throws three consecutive incomplete passes.
Since McNabb will be coming off a season-ending injury, and because Mike McMahon helped show why a fresh reliever is a must for a playoff-minded team, the addition of Garcia was as courageous as it was inspired. The Eagles are aware of McNabb’s sensitivities. And they have to know the history of pro football in Philadelphia, where the most popular player on the planet traditionally has been the backup quarterback. But they hired Garcia anyway.
Maybe -- just maybe -- that means the days of protecting McNabb at any cost are over in an organization that is 0-since-1960 and would like that slump to end.
LINK
