> The Olympics are truly not about money for the athletes. And indeed, they cannot be.
> The rest of the athletes are there because they love the competition. And there's nothing wrong with that! It's truly a win-win that hundreds of athletes are living out their dreams by competing for a gold medal in canoeing or archery or what-have-you, and that somebody will even be watching them do it.
This line of argument is what enables corporations, advertisers and governments to exploit athletes and the tax-payers of host countries to the tune of billions every year. Same as how the NCAA exploits college athletics.
> ((This is also why NBA players earn by far the highest salaries among U.S. athletes - basketball allows for much more player/fan connection than any other major sport.))
NBA players aren't on that list because their contracts are limited to 5 years, and to a maximum salary.
And the truly elite players sign short contracts, because the max salary goes up over time.
Mean NBA salary is ~$6M, compared to ~$4M for MLB - despite league revenue per player being roughly equal.
> The highest salaries among U.S. athletes are earned by baseball players, and it's not even close
If you sort by average per year it isn't quite as clear cut as that. Excluding the first 3 outliers (2 Ferrari F1 drivers and Floyd Mayweather) the next 10 highest paid athletes per year are split roughly 50-50 baseball and basketball.
There are more baseball players on the list in total than basketball players, but I'd argue it is because there are ~750 total MBA players and only ~450 NBA players.
I think you probably have to account for the relative sizes of basketball arenas and baseball stadiums (>2x) reducing the overall ticket revenue for NBA. TV rights might be comparable among the major sports, but revenue share breaks down on the number of seats and that can't be compensated by ticket prices (NBA avg: ~1.2x MLB).
> The rest of the athletes are there because they love the competition. And there's nothing wrong with that! It's truly a win-win that hundreds of athletes are living out their dreams by competing for a gold medal in canoeing or archery or what-have-you, and that somebody will even be watching them do it.
This line of argument is what enables corporations, advertisers and governments to exploit athletes and the tax-payers of host countries to the tune of billions every year. Same as how the NCAA exploits college athletics.
> ((This is also why NBA players earn by far the highest salaries among U.S. athletes - basketball allows for much more player/fan connection than any other major sport.))
The highest salaries among U.S. athletes are earned by baseball players, and it's not even close: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_sports_contrac...