I want to see athletes from whatever team succeed as much as the next guy/gal. And if they can get mega-bucks, by all means go for it. Though often times, players in many sports are dumber than bricks in real life, and would be lucky to get a menial job at minimum wage anywhere else in the marketplace.
Which brings me to one Le'Veon Bell, former running back of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He just got a full-spread story in Sports Illustrated penned by one Jenny Vrentas, who appears to be an idol worshiper of the highest order. But SI scribes are like that. Everybody's the greatest at something, and no criticism allowed. They live in their own politically correct cocoon.
No such limitations here. It is what it is, and sometimes it's just stupidity rearing it's moronic head.
Which brings me back to Le'Veon Bell. Football fans know he sat out the entire 2018 season because he refused to accept the "franchise tag" the Steelers were going to put on him. Thing is, the very definition of the franchise tag dictates a player will be paid the average of the top five other players around the league at the same position. Which is exactly what Bell was. A top-fiver. Good, even really good, but NOT eye-popping great. Nobody's going to mention Bell in the same sentence with folks like Jim Brown, OJ Simpson, Walter Payton, Barry Sanders, and those of that class. It should also be noted that when Bell sat out, his replacement, one James Conner, stepped in and the Steelers never lost a beat in their running game. Conner was every bit as good as Bell. When THAT happens, the O-line is definitely worthy of praise for their blocking and opening holes, but they never get any.
But let's just look at the simple numbers of it all.
By turning down the franchise tag, Bell lost $14.5 million bucks. Flush. Gone. I'll get back to that.
Back in the summer of 2017, the Steelers also offered him a five year deal worth $12 million a year. I'm pretty sure that comes out to $60 million total. He also turned that down. Bear that in mind as well.
Just recently, he signed a four year deal with the NY Jets worth roughly $52 million, or about $13 million a year.
Even assuming he stays healthy, ya never know, he will have made far less money at the conclusion of the current contract than he would have under the one Pittsburgh offered him a while back.
How dumb is that?
And now he'll be playing for the woeful Jets. At least in Pittsburgh the Steelers were always contenders. Playoffs every year, and a proud and fabled history over the years to boot.
The Jets haven't been any good since the days of Joe Willy Namath, back when the Viet Nam war was raging. How long ago was that? And they're going to stink it up for next few years as well.
So Bell went from a winning franchise to a sad-sack outfit, for less money in the long run. It's reminisce of Golden Tate leaving a Super Bowl winning team in the beautiful city of Seattle -- to come to an historic bottom-feeding team like the Lions in the crime-ridden dregs of Detroit.
How colossally stupid is that?
And the Jets get a prima donna player who has a history of drug related offenses. If he's not smoking weed, he's skipping drug tests. Both will get a guy in trouble with the league.
Evidently, the stupid thing is contagious.
Or put another way -- monkey see, monkey do.
Yep, Bell and gullible scribes like Vrentas can claim a "win", but a hard objective look at the reality of it all suggests quite the opposite.
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