pay the (sher)man! WE talk slaps, shams and SALARIES WITH SEATTLE CORNER RICHARD sherman, THE NFL’S TOP bargain. by Eddie Matz
MAG: Last season you
Paycheck Double-Check MONEY ISSUE
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made $511,000. But according to our numbers, your play was worth $19.8 million to the Seahawks. That makes you the most underpaid player in the NFL. How’s that feel? SHERMAN: Aw, man, that’s cool, but I just need to keep playing like a beast. That’s a lot of money, though. It’d be more exciting if it was real, but the money will come. MAG: If you actually made $19.8 million, what would you spend it on? SHERMAN: I’d give a nice chunk to my high school and the city of Compton to improve the academic experience there. I keep hearing how great Tahiti is, so I’d take my mom and dad, my aunt, my cousin and my brother there. No wife yet. Waiting on my
$19.8 million deal for that. MAG: Why did you last until the fifth round of the 2011 draft? SHERMAN: Because the draft is a sham. How many guys do you see go in the first round who don’t amount to much? They did well in college, but everybody does well in college, or else you wouldn’t have the chance to go to the NFL. Playing corner in college for only a year and a half or two years had something to do with it. I should’ve gone higher. MAG: What are the odds that you report to camp on time this year? SHERMAN: One hundred percent. Under the CBA, we can’t negotiate anyway. So it’d be kind of stupid if I didn’t report. MAG: After the RedskinsSeahawks playoff game, what exactly did you say to Trent Williams that made him slap you? SHERMAN: I didn’t say anything. During the game, we had a little conversation going, but I hadn’t talked to him since like the first or second
WHAT DO A-ROD, PAUL GEORGE, THE THUNDER AND
RICHARD SHERMAN
HAVE IN COMMON? OUR SALARY SURVEY SAYS THEIR CONTRACTS JUST DON’T ADD UP.
quarter. He started going back and forth with my teammate Chris Clemons, and I said, “Go back to your huddle.” When the game ended, I went to Kedric Golston, who’d been quoted calling me a cheater, and said, “It’s all good, great game, have a great offseason.” Then Williams comes up to me and goes, “I’m gonna punch you in the face.” And he hit me. MAG: What’s your best trash-talk? SHERMAN: I like to tell people they have hands like feet when they drop an easy pass. And after a guy drops a pass, that’s the best time to put a little bug in his head. MAG: Who or what can shut you up? SHERMAN: My mom. She’ll just tell me, “Boy, you better shut your damn mouth,” and I do. If my mom was playing wide receiver, she’d be able to shut me up. MAG: You were suspended four games for violating the league’s PED policy but won your appeal on the grounds that the NFL breached protocol by using a second collection cup after the first had a leak. But the question remains: Did you take Adderall? SHERMAN: Nope. Didn’t take it at all. The question only remains for people who want the question to remain. MAG: Seattle has had five players suspended for PED violations since 2011. Do the Seahawks have a PED problem? SHERMAN: It does seem that way. It is what it is.
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fine print …
SURPLUS VALUE =
To pinpoint the most overpaid and underpaid in sports, we started with each player’s Actual Salary.* Then Neil Paine of Sports-Reference calculated a Fair Salary for each—what he should have been paid based on his performance from the most recently completed season. (To do so, Paine used a formula incorporating Goals Versus Threshold for the NHL, Win Shares Above Replacement for the NBA, WAR for MLB and Approximate Value Above Replacement for the NFL.**) He then determined each player’s Surplus Value by subtracting his Actual Salary from his Fair Salary.
FAIR SALARY – ACTUAL SALARY OR CAP HIT
*Base salaries for MLB and NBA players, cap hits for NFL and NHL players. For exact equations used to compute Fair Salaries and for a full list of ** Actual Salaries, go to ESPN.com/moneyissue.
Example: The Thunder’s roster had a cumulative surplus value of $44.9M, which, when divided by the 12 active roster slots, computes to $3.7M Surplus Value Per Player, the best in sports.
Example: Richard Sherman, the NFL’s most underpaid player, had a cap hit of $511K in 2012, but based on performance, he should have been paid $19.8M, giving him a Surplus Value of $19.3M. To compare teams across sports, we then calculated a Surplus Value Per Player by dividing each team’s cumulative Surplus Value by the number of players allowed on its game-day roster.
SURPLUS VALUE PER PLAYER =
CUMULATIVE SURPLUS VALUE / GAME-DAY ROSTER SPOTS (MLB: 25, NBA: 12, NFL: 46, NHL: 20)
nfl: best and worst
Dwight Freeney needed to be an All-Pro to earn his NFL-high $19 million cap hit in 2012. Instead, he turned in a year worthy of a $2.9 million salary—only slightly better than Jake Locker. Yes, that Jake Locker. Top FIVE
Bottom FIVE
NFL players, SURPLUS VALUE $20M $0
$0 -$20M
$19.3M
$18.5M
$16.9M
$15.9M
$13.6M
Richard Sherman
J.J. Watt
Geno Atkins
Cameron Wake
Robert Griffin III
Dwight Freeney
Larry Fitzgerald
Chris Long
Carl Nicks
Darren McFadden
-$16.1M
-$16M
-$14.5M
-$13.2M
-$11.6M
NFL TEAMS, CUMULATIVE SV $100M
$92.1M
$80.9M
$80M
$49.8M
$60M
$49.7M $35.1M
$40M $20M $0
$0
New England
Seattle
Denver
Atlanta
Cincinnati
Kansas City
Jacksonville
Tennessee
NY Jets
Philadelphia
Gorgeous George The Pacers’ recent playoff run showed the nation what Indiana fans already knew: Paul George is one of the game’s best two-way players. According to Paine, George was worth $14.1M this season on a rookie-scale salary of $2.6 million—good for the NBA’s sixth-highest SV. “He’s a playmaker on either end of the court,” says one NBA exec. “He’s like Scottie Pippen.” Indeed, with George on the floor, the Pacers posted a championship-caliber net rating of plus-7. When he was on the bench, it dropped to minus-1.7. The only bad news for Indiana: George won’t come so cheap after next year, when he’ll be eligible for free agency and likely receive the NBA max. —Jordan Brenner
Paul George 3.8% George Hill 12.0%
Danny Granger 19.6%
Lance Stephenson 1.3%
Pacers payroll breakdown
David West 15.0%
Total: $66.6M
Tyler Hansbrough 4.6% Orlando Johnson 0.8%
Roy Hibbert 20.6% Gerald Green 5.3% Miles Plumlee 1.6%
D.J. Augustin 5.3% Sam Young 1.1% Jeff Pendergraph 2.3% Ben Hansbrough 0.7%
Ian Mahinmi 6.0%
-$20M -$40M -$60M
-$61.5M
-$80M
-$53.7M
-$45.8M
IT’S NOT PERSONAL
-$41.1M
In precisely four years, Bill Belichick will cut Tom Brady loose. How do we know? Because according to our projections, the QB’s SV will turn negative during the 2016 season.
-$100M
-$106.2M
Spending Spreely
With NBA free agency approaching, we did GMs a solid by getting the statheads at Basketball-Reference to project remaining Fair Salaries (how much a player will be worth) for 10 free agents. Mario Chalmers more valuable than Dwight Howard? You can thank us later, Lakers.
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REMAINING career Fair salarIES
$105.3 Million
Chris Paul
$70.1 Million
$56.3 Million
$53.4 Million
$49.2 Million
Tyreke Evans
Al Jefferson
Mario Chalmers
Dwight Howard
$22.5 Million $34.9 Million
$33.8 Million
$32.7 Million
Josh Smith
Nate Robinson
Monta Ellis
Andrew Bynum
$15.5 Million
Manu Ginobili
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MONEY ISSUE
The $222 Million Sucking Sound
He’s the poster boy for contracts that no player, save for a steroidal Roy Hobbs, could ever live up to. To gauge the depths of Alex Rodriguez’s disappointing-ness, we plotted his career—and projected—SV. Spoiler alert! It’s very not good. A-Rod’s contracts 1994-2000 (total SURPLUS VALUE: +$34M) $10M
2001-07 (total SURPLUS VALUE: -$49M) 2008-12 (total SURPLUS VALUE: -$103M) 2013-17 (PROJECTED SURPLUS VALUE: -$104M)
$0
A-Rod opts out. Yankees sign him to 10-year, $275M deal.
A-Rod signs 10-year, $252M contract with Rangers. Let the overvaluation begin!
-$10M
-$20M Surplus value ’94
’95
’96
’97
’98
’99
’00
’01
’02
’03
’04
’05
’06
’07
The NFL’s Great ReBalancing Act
’08
’09
’10
’11
’12
’13
’14
’15
’16
’17
MLB: best and worst We all know Mike Trout is a bargain, with MVP-caliber stats for “look what I found in the dollar bin” prices. But even more remarkable than his surplus being 48% higher than league No. 2 Buster Posey’s? Trout’s Fair Salary—what he was worth—was almost $9 million more than that of actual 2012 MVP Miguel Cabrera. Take that, Triple Crown.
Before the 2011 CBA shrank rookie wages, newbies like Sam Bradford were gettin’ paid—too much: Cap hits of NFL top-10 picks from 2008 to 2010 exceeded actual value by $4.2 million per player in 2012. But the post-CBA top-10 picks outperformed cap hits by $1.7 million each. Below, a chart to make NFL owners weep happy little tears of gold. —Scott T. Miller
Top FIVE -$80M
-$60M
-$40M
-$20M
$0
$20M
$40M
bottom FIVE $60M
MLB players, SURPLUS VALUE, 2012 season
Johan Santana -$23.7M
Mike Trout $27M
Alex Rodriguez -$22.9M
AvG. 2012 surplus pre-CBA avG. 2012 surplus post-CBA
Buster Posey $18.1M
Ryan Howard -$22.3M
$10M
$5M
$0
Andrew McCutchen $17.9M
Tim Lincecum -$21.6M
Chris Sale $14.5M
Michael Young -$20.5M
Jason Heyward $14.2M
Spelling “OKC” With Very Few K’s
It’s little surprise that the small-market Thunder have five of the NBA’s top 50 players in SV. Efficiency, on the floor and on the balance sheet, colors their every decision. What might surprise some are the names of two of those players: Thabo Sefolosha, master of lockdown D; and Nick Collison, practitioner of spine-crunching screens. “GM Sam Presti finds value by finding perfect players for the roles you want in place,” says one Eastern Conference exec. “When you’re in the right place, it’s easier to produce.” —Jordan Brenner Surplus value league rank
MLB teAms, CUMULATIVE SV, 2012 season
Pick # 1
Oakland $70.3M
Philadelphia -$80M
-$5M
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Tampa Bay $64.5M
Miami -$75.1M Boston -$62.9M
Washington $42.6M Cincinnati $39.8M
NY Yankees -$52.2M
-$80M
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-$60M
-$40M
-$20M
$0
$20M
$40M
$14.9M 3rd
Serge Ibaka $13M 5th
Thabo Sefolosha $7.4M 23rd
Nick Collison
$6.1M 34th
Atlanta $31.9M
Chicago Cubs -$34.5M
Kevin Durant
Russell Westbrook $60M
$5.2M 48th
FROM TOP: MIKE STOBE/GETTY IMAGES; MARK J. TERRILL/AP IMAGES; TOM DIPACE
MONEY ISSUE
Denver
Washington, D.C.
Boston
$184,517
$76,856
$166,348
ALL MAPPED OUT
Which major sports city houses the shrewdest GMs? To scratch that sabermetric itch, we tallied Surplus Value Per Player per team of the 13 U.S. cities with four or more pro squads. DC, ironically, is getting top bang for its budget. Philly is bleeding cash like Rocky Balboa.
Chicago
Minneapolis
Bay Area
$16,268
-$148,253
TOP BOTTOMFEEDERS
Detroit -$75,657
$51,087
NYC/NJ
Los Angeles
-$41,254
$6,961
Phoenix
Dallas
-$76,247
-$27,558
Philadelphia -$354,728 Miami -$227,923
positive surplus value
Negative surplus value
NBA: BEST AND WORST
-$40M
-$20M
$0
$20M
$40M
NBA players, SURPLUS VALUE
We’ve all heard the estimates—that LeBron James is worth $100 million per year to a franchise once you account for his marketing heft. Maybe more. But what about his on-court value alone? This season he accumulated a higher Surplus Value than the rest of the Heat … combined. Talk about the Big One. Top FIVE
Brandon Roy -$20.7M
LeBron James $15.2M
Gilbert Arenas -$19.5M
James Harden $15M
Andrew Bynum -$15.7M
Kevin Durant $14.9M
Derrick Rose -$15.5M
Stephen Curry $14M
cumulative bench war, past five seasons
25
Serge Ibaka $13M
Amar’e Stoudemire -$14.4M
Bottom FIVE
The Moneyball OBP edge dried up in the early aughts. Maximizing defensive value is so 2010. So where can today’s MLB exec find untapped value? No further than his bench—the end of his bench—according to A’s director of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi. “It’s managing the roster from the bottom,” Zaidi said at the 2013 MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. “Whether it’s a backup catcher or the ninth or 10th bullpen arm, optimizing those positions, for us, is an important part of building a competitive team.” To find which teams are mimicking the A’s, we crunched the WAR for every team’s bench (roster spots 20 to 25) over the past five seasons. Not surprisingly, those plucky Reds, driven by starting-caliber backup catcher Ryan Hanigan and a solid pen, amassed the highest total WAR (27). The woeful Mariners had a dreadful minus-8.9 bench WAR. Or consider the Yankees, sixth in bench WAR (5.3) last season. Without that back-line production, the 2012 AL East title goes to the O’s. Heavens to Boog! —Dan Szymborski
20
NBA TEAMS, CUMULATIVE SV
Oklahoma City $44.9M
Orlando -$44.4M
LA Clippers $29.3M
Charlotte -$40.1M
15
10
San Antonio $28.9M
LA Lakers -$23.1M
5
Denver $28M WAR 0
Memphis $27.4M
Br
Brooklyn -$17.3M
Re ds ew e Ca rs rd in a Ra ls ng W ers hi te So x
Minnesota -$20.1M
-$40M
MIKE EHRMANN/GETTY IMAGES
-$20M
$0
$20M
$40M
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Smart Money
MONEY ISSUE
We ranked each team by SV per player. Why? Because we can, that’s why. Takeaway: The NHL’s hard cap helps its GMs avoid massively overpaying (or underpaying) players. The other three leagues, not so much.
NHL: BEST AND WORST
Sergei Bobrovsky’s $1.75 million cap hit ranked 365th in the NHL, but based on his 30.4 Goals Versus Threshold, the Columbus Blue Jackets goaltender deserved to be the NHL’s highest-paid player ($12.25 million). He’ll be a restricted free agent after this season. That sound you hear is Bobrovsky’s agent pining for a new deal. Top FIVE
NHL players, SURPLUS VALUE $20M
$10.5M
$0
bottom FIVE
$7.6M
$6.6M
$6.6M
$6.5M
Sergei Bobrovsky
Tuukka Rask
Antti Niemi
Derek Stepan
Braden Holtby
Miikka Kiprusoff
Ilya Bryzgalov
Scott Clemmensen
Jason Spezza
Dany Heatley
-$6.9M
-$5.7M
-$5.6M
-$5.5M
$0
-$11.2M
-$20M
NHL TEAMS, CUMULATIVE SV
$22.3M
$17.9M
$20M
$0
$14.7M
$13.9M
$11.7M
Chicago
NY Islanders
Pittsburgh
Anaheim
St. Louis
Florida
Calgary
Minnesota
Colorado
Buffalo
-$15.9M
-$15.7M
-$14M
$0
-$20M
-$20.1M -$29.2M
Check Cashers
Maybe it’s not fair to single out the highest-paid player in each league, like the NHL’s Alex Ovechkin, just ’cause they earned the most money. But hey, these guys have pocketed a combined $736 million over the collective 56 years of their careers. So, you know, cry us a river. Actual salary or cap hit fair salary
Alex Rodriguez
MLB
Dwight Freeney
NFL
Alex Ovechkin
NHL
Kobe Bryant
NBA
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$29M $6.1M $19M $2.9M $9.5M $8.5M $27.8M $17.9M
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LEAGUE nba
mlb
rank, TEAM 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59
nhl
nfl
SV/PLAYer
Oklahoma City thunder $3.7M Oakland Athletics $2.8m Tampa Bay Rays $2.6m Los Angeles Clippers $2.4m San Antonio Spurs $2.4m Denver nuggets $2.3m Memphis grizzlies $2.3m Houston Rockets $2.3m New England patriots $2.0m Indiana pacers $1.9m Seattle seahawks $1.8m Washington nationals $1.7m Cincinnati reds $1.6m Atlanta braves $1.3m Baltimore orioles $1.2m New York knicks $1.2m Chicago blackhawks $1.1m Kansas City royals $1.1m Denver broncos $1.1m Atlanta falcons $1.1m Arizona diamondbacks $930K San Diego padres $920k Miami heat $900k New York islanders $900k Seattle mariners $860k Cincinnati bengals $760k San Francisco 49ers $760k Houston texans $760k Pittsburgh penguins $740k Anaheim ducks $690k Chicago bears $640k Atlanta hawks $630k Pittsburgh pirates $620k St. Louis blues $590k Washington redskins $580k Los Angeles kings $550k Baltimore ravens $540k Columbus blue jackets $510k Montreal canadiens $500k Toronto maple leafs $500k New York giants $490k Boston bruins $480k Ottawa senators $450k Green Bay packers $420k Houston astros $380k Washington capitals $380k Indianapolis colts $310k Golden state warriors $280k Pittsburgh steelers $280k Colorado rockies $260k New York rangers $240k St. Louis cardinals $200k Utah jazz $180k Phoenix coyotes $140k Detroit red wings $130k Milwaukee brewers $110k Milwaukee bucks $110k Texas rangers $82k Tampa Bay lightning $15k
60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122
Miami dolphins -$10k Dallas cowboys -$30k Chicago white sox -$30k New Orleans pelicans -$70k San Diego chargers -$90k Washington wizards -$90k New Orleans Saints -$100k Dallas Stars -$120k Minnesota Vikings -$120k San Jose SHARKS -$170k Toronto Blue Jays -$220k WinnIpeg Jets -$250k Detroit Lions -$250k New Jersey Devils -$270k Portland Trail blazers -$290k Sacramento Kings -$320k Tampa Bay Buccaneers -$340k Edmonton oilers -$360k Vancouver canucks -$370k Detroit tigers -$410k Los Angeles dodgers -$410k Nashville predators -$440k Carolina panthers -$460k Cleveland browns -$460k Chicago bulls -$490k Oakland raiders -$520k Cleveland indians -$540k San Francisco giants -$540k Boston celtics -$590k Carolina hurricanes -$590k Philadelphia flyers -$620k Los Angeles angels -$640k Buffalo sabres -$700k Buffalo bills -$710k Minnesota twins -$790k Colorado avalanche -$790k Minnesota wild -$790k St. Louis rams -$790k Dallas mavericks -$820k Arizona cardinals -$880k Philadelphia eagles -$890k New York mets -$900k New York jets -$1.0m Calgary flames -$1.0m Detroit pistons -$1.0m Philadelphia 76ers -$1.0m Toronto raptors -$1.1m Tennessee titans -$1.1m Cleveland cavaliers -$1.3m Jacksonville jaguars -$1.3m Chicago cubs -$1.4m Phoenix suns -$1.4m Brooklyn nets -$1.4m Florida panthers -$1.5m Minnesota timberwolves -$1.7m Los Angeles lakers -$1.9m New York yankees -$2.1m Kansas City chiefs -$2.3m Boston red sox -$2.5m Miami Marlins -$3.0m Philadelphia phillies -$3.2m Charlotte bobcats -$3.3m Orlando magic -$3.7m
SUSAN WALSH/AP IMAGES