 |
| |
|
 |
 |
|||||||||||
|
Sports' dire straits Athlete endorsement contracts are money for nothingPosted: Monday May 26, 2003 11:19 AM
There was a time during my childhood when the only sneakers I would wear were Pumas. It wasn't because they were necessarily the most comfortable or even the best-looking shoes (although I still love that trademark racing stripe along the sides). The reason was simple: Walt Frazier wore Pumas, so I wore Pumas. Frazier was a star guard for the New York Knicks during the 1960s and '70s, and I was convinced he was the coolest man in the world, the black James Bond. So I understand the desire to imitate celebrity athletes, particularly on the part of young people. Everyone wants to be more like his or her heroes, even if it's only in some superficial way, such as wearing the same shoes or hairstyle. Advertisers have been taking advantage of this basic human instinct for generations by hiring the famous to pitch their products. This has led to the rise of the endorsement contract for athletes, which ranks with the designated hitter and AstroTurf among the worst developments in sports in the last 50 years. High school basketball sensation LeBron James surely wouldn't agree with that, not after signing a reported seven-year, $90 million-plus endorsement deal with Nike last week. But endorsement contracts have been known to lead to all sorts of problems. They can create jealousy. Remember when Jerry Rice complained publicly that he wasn't getting the kind of attention from Madison Avenue that teammate Joe Montana was? They can throw a team's power structure out of whack. How is James' coach supposed to exert any authority over him when the teenager is making almost 10 times more from Nike than he is from his NBA contract? They can force players to go to absurd lengths to fulfill their obligations to a company. At the 1992 Olympics Michael Jordan draped an American flag over his shoulder during the gold medal ceremony, not because he was feeling patriotic but because as a Nike endorser he felt compelled to cover the Reebok logo on the U.S. team warm-up suit he was wearing. Beyond all that, endorsement contracts are, in a way, money for nothing. At least the huge salaries that players pull down from their teams are payment, perhaps overpayment, for performance. Endorsement deals are essentially payment for personality, a reward for having the right image, appealing to the desired demographic. Not even the endorsement deal Jordan agreed to upon turning pro was as lucrative as the one James signed. The contract means James is financially set for life even if he turns out to be a colossal bust in the NBA. This raises a great many questions, including, What becomes of a man's character when he becomes so rich so young? And, How will James ever again make a new friend who he can be certain isn't more interested in his bank account than his friendship? But those are questions James will have to worry about. Maybe the rest of us would be better off concerning ourselves with these: Have we gone too far with our hero worship when Nike can be confident that we'll shell out far more than the $90 million it invested in James in order to buy all things LeBron? Do we really buy a soft drink just because Kobe Bryant does, or says he does? Are we really more likely to buy a certain make of car because Tiger Woods drives one in commercials? It's easy to wring our hands over James' future and shake our heads disapprovingly at a company's willingness to give a teenager $90 million just to sell us on a product. But we should at least take off our Marshall Faulk replica jerseys and our Tracy McGrady sneakers while we do so.
Sports Illustrated senior writer Phil Taylor writes about a Hot Button topic every Monday on SI.com.
|
|
|||||||||
|
|||||||||||
