Thursday, May 22, 2003

Money For Nothing And Your Shoes For Free It was announced today that Nike has signed high school basketball player, LeBron James, to a $90 million contract to endorse Nike products.  Not $900,000.  Hell, not even $9 million.  Ninety million dollars and he's played exactly the same amount of minutes in the NBA as I have:  zero. Of course he's skipping college and going right to the pros. By comparison, Tiger Woods, winner of every major golf tournament on the planet, signed a contract with Nike worth $100 million -- after he'd proven that he was the best player ever. Here are further comparisons from this article: When Jordan signed his first contract with Nike in 1984, it was for $2.5 million over five years. Shaquille O'Neal received $3 million from Reebok in 1992. Four years later, 17-year-old Kobe Bryant skipped college and got $5 million from Adidas. Reebok signed Allen Iverson to a $50 million lifetime deal in 1996, and Tracy McGrady, another player who went to the NBA straight from high school, signed a six-year, $12 million contract with Adidas in 1997. Just look at those numbers!  And now LeBron James is getting paid way more than those all-stars for beating up on a bunch of high school baskeball players.  He's never played against men in an NBA game.  He's never even played in a college game.  There's no way to know for sure how good he'll be at the professional level, yet Nike sees fit, along with quite a few other people, to crown him the next king of basketball. It's sickening.  If he'd played a couple of years in the NBA and made everyone forget Michael Jordan ever laced up a set of sneakers, then fine.  Let him take all the money that Nike can shovel in his direction.  But LeBron James has only made people forget the other teenagers on his high school team, and all this will do is encourage a lot of other kids that basketball is all-important and discourage them from any thoughts of college and a much more realistic future.  And you know what?  I don't blame LeBron.  If someone offered me that kind of money, I'd take it, too.  I blame Nike for blowing the whole concept of earning your money way out of proportion, and I hope (and I do mean hope) that this obscene deal blows up in Nike's face.  6:40:42 PM     |

© Copyright 2005 Alex L. Mauldin.