A lot of times greed is often used to describe the sports world especially at the professional level. “The owners of sports teams at a professional level are saying that we make plenty of money we just want to make more.” (John Feinstein cbssportsradio.radio.com) However, professional athletes make so much money specifically in baseball, basketball, hockey and soccer once awhile some will burn out, have bad injuries or retire from their respective sport early. I feel professional athletes should play for the love of sport and not because of the tremendous amounts of money they can make. Greed is an issue in the sports world because it seems like money plays too much importance instead of the actual sport.
Is there a blame or not. It’s pro sport fans who are supporting some of this extreme greed. Professional owners simply raise the prices of tickets almost constantly. However, there are always fans buying the high-priced ticket to watch their favorite professional athlete perform. Because prices for tickets at the professional level are impacted by inflation; this enables professional owners to provide multi-million dollar contracts to super star players in professional sports. A question comes to mind, do these super star athletes actually deserve hundreds of millions of dollars under contract because of their high-quality talent in their respective sport. As owner of a professional sports team what are your qualifications in giving a multi-million dollar contract to a super star athlete since it will be supported be the fans buying the game ticket.
Greed in professional sports impacts the professional athletes motivation constantly. Sports is a prime example of what greed can do to a person who is passionate about something they enjoy in their personal lives. Andrew Luck, retired quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts, was booed miserably by the colt’s fans when he decided to suddenly walk from the sport of professional football. To me this an example of greed towards pro football fans.
I mentioned earlier how sports fans supported greed. The booing of Andrew Luck by his fans was a sign of greed as they wanted him to play out his entire contract. The fans emphasized the contract since Luck was earning a big million-dollar contract from the Colts. Sports fans feel they have the right to boo because players such as Luck, quarterback, needs to play out the contract. In addition, quarterbacks in the NFL are the most important position on the field. The fans do have a point, but they don’t really have the control of Andrew Luck’s decision-making in retiring early in his football career at the age of 29.
Basically, there are many aspects of greed in the world of professional sports. They are the fans, owners and of course players. There is extreme greed with sports fans since they are the ones buying high priced game day tickets and betting on the games on a weekly basis. Generally, I don’t really see ending of greed since there is so much money being made while influencing so many people involved in the sport.
