Pro athletes and pay
After my two fantasy football drafts at the weekend, I’m finding myself paying a lot more attention to the fall sports season. So I was interested to see this short story in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal.
Apparently, it takes the average American almost four years to earn $100,000. But for NBA superstar LeBron James, all it takes is 21 minutes of playing time in an NBA game. Tiger Woods? Just 11 holes on the links. The New York Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez earns $100,000 for every six pitches he sees at the plate. More from the story:
Ben Roethlisberger of the Pittsburgh Steelers may have him beat. If you include his signing bonus, Mr. Roethlisberger brought in 100 grand for every 3.6 snaps he took in 2008 (many of which were hand-offs). But at least he helped his team win a Super Bowl.
–Paul
University athletics hiding behind privacy rules, paper finds
The Columbus Dispatch in Ohio had a very interesting story on Sunday about the uneven disclosure of public records by athletic departments at the country’s largest universities.
Here’s an excerpt:
Across the country, many major-college athletic departments keep their NCAA troubles secret behind a thick veil of black ink or Wite-Out.
Alabama.Cincinnati. Florida. Florida State. Ohio State. Oklahoma. Oregon State. Utah. They all censor information in the name of student privacy, invoking a 35-year-old federal law whose author says it has been twisted and misused by the universities.
Former U.S. Sen. James L. Buckley said it’s time for Congress to rein in the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which he crafted to keep academic records from public view.
A six-month Dispatch investigation found that FERPA, as it’s commonly called, is a law with many conflicting interpretations. And that makes it virtually impossible to decipher what is going on inside a $5 billion college-sports world that is funded by fans, donors, alumni, television networks and, at most schools, taxpayers.
The paper also includes a searchable database on its Web site so you can look up NCAA violations, university information and their responsiveness to records requests by the Dispatch.
ESPN’s bloggers picked up the story, too. Here’s the take from their Big 12 blogger.
–Paul
Metro OKC football stadium map
Just in time for Friday Night Lights, my colleagues over in Sports have created a nifty little Google map of the high school football stadiums in the metro Oklahoma City area.
You can find the link to it at our Your Right to Know page under the Maps section.
The map also has all the high schools in the metro area and their fall football schedules. Take a look and let us know what you think.
–Paul
