Once the cheering stops: The life of a retired pro-athlete

We all like to think that after a pro athlete retires they live a glamorous and easy life. Not only do we LIKE to think this, but most of us really assume that somebody good enough to make it to the professional level will make the big bucks and live off their pro earnings the rest of their life. The reality is that most pro athletes are flat broke within 5 years of their retirement.
The life of most retired pro athletes isn't the prettiest. Many of them continue their high spending habits and risky financial investments. Many of them have trouble finding their niche and redefining themselves outside the context of football. And they have a greater chance of living in poverty than similarly aged, college-educated people.

Players face many challenges in their transition to the retired life. They are no longer bringing in big bucks so they have to think more long term about savings and about budgeting. Players think they are shoo-ins for TV and broadcasting jobs and don't realize the skill and training required to succeed in that job. Retired players don't always fully comprehend that they don't have access to their pensions until they're 45 and they can't touch their 401(k) until they're 59 and a half. They have a couple million in their bank following retirement and they don't see that the math doesn't work out when they're spending twenty or thirty or forty thousand dollars a month.

A big reason athletes struggle so much is that they are coddled and enabled by their peers and family all their life. They're told how great they are and they often don't have to deal with real world consequences because their privilege as a gifted athlete often precludes them from actual punishment or consequence. Because of this, and not really through the fault of the athlete, they attain a glorified and unrealistic image of themselves, and they view themselves as invincible. When they finally retire, all of that vanishes in an instant and they are suddenly smashed in the face with the realization that they were a commodity, used for their ability.

Various pro leagues have started to offer their current and former athletes programs and services aiming to improve their life after sport. The NFL has a player engagement division which tries to ease the transition for its players by holding boot camps and "mini-MBA" programs and advising them. The NBA assigns former players to each team as "ambassadors" to guide them in the pro and retired life. But either these programs are not utilized by enough players or they aren't of good enough quality because money is still a huge issue for players after retirement.

I remember hearing these types of stories many years ago because my father was a fan of the Intellectual Assassin, Ron Mix. Every kid player had dreams of becoming pro and most of us come to the realization eventually that we won't become pro and make millions; I distinctly remember feeling great comfort in the misfortunes of retired athletes: maybe it wouldn't have been worth it.

Sport, Politics and the Olympics

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In 1931, Berlin, Germany won the bid to host the 1936 Olympics. Although the Nazis hadn't yet come to power in '31 and they had no influence on the decision when it was made, they saw the '36 Olympics as a platform to show the rest of the world the power and efficiency of the Nazi Regime. They also used it to further subjugate jews and blacks, who, until the public outcry was too much, were not allowed to participate in the games.

After they decided it best not to exclude jews and blacks from participation, they shifted to appear to the other Olympic countries as a tolerant and peaceful Germany. There was a proposed boycott of the Games from several countries, but ultimately the US and other western countries did not boycott it. Many saw this as a mistake that may have allowed Germany's and Hitler's acceleration and culmination of persecution of minorities through WWII and the Holocaust.

One of the five political uses of sport which were evident in the "Nazi Olympics" was the use of sport as a vehicle for propaganda. Germany used the Games to instill in the German people a nationalistic sense of pride and solidarity with the Nazis and their ideals. It helped to define "Nazi" as both the self and as intrinsically good, while trying to show the the other was everybody not Aryan and "pure". They also carried out a huge festival trying to show the world that Nazi ideals were favorable and not to be feared. The fact that Germans won 23 more medals than Americans and 4 times as many as everybody else was proof, for the propagandists, that Germans were superior.

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We like to think that sport should be devoid of any political interference but that is simply not true. As the reading points out, policies have been passed to exempt athletes from antitrust laws, there are special tax laws for owners of pro teams, home game blackouts have been televised despite owners, Congress decides who selects and trains Olympians, and Congress also exempts college sports from taxes. Another way sports is politicized is how the President often has sports champions at the White House. Every year the Superbowl and Stanley Cup champs visit the white house because the President wants to be seen as a normal and average guy. These teams are used as a political gambit to boost approval. Obama alone has held 35 receptions for champions.

London Calling: The Globalization of the NFL

In the past few years since the NFL started shipping one of its games overseas to London, conversations considering the possibility of making London home to an NFL team have been steadily increasing. It’s understandable: there are many European fans of American Football whom the NFL sees as a potential customer base. More customers correlates to more money, and the NFL is driven by money. And London is a prime area for establishing a concentrated fanbase. It is a dense city that’s not too hard to get to from other countries. There’s an NFL-ready stadium and an infrastructure already in place.

From 1991 to 2007, NFL Europe was the main way American Football was exposed to European audiences. The NFL eventually decided instead to hold a small number of regular season games in Europe rather than run an entire league. Now called the International Series, a couple regular season NFL games are played in London per year.

The crowd at these international games doesn’t usually support one of the two teams playing, but rather consists of hardcore European NFL fans who came from outside the country to watch an NFL game. Fans of all the teams come to watch because it only happens a couple of times a year. Will all these fans show up for a London team week in and week out? Probably not because of the huge associated expense.

If a team does move to London full time, it’s imported to look at some issues that might not be immediately apparent. For instance, laws are very different in the UK. Would players be willing to play in London if their pay was taxed more than in the US? Also, every American player in London would need a work visa. Players with criminal convictions would likely be denied that visa. There are also labor laws in play. The EU has free movement and competition laws that may selectively apply, and they also have no age restriction on sports, whereas the NFL does.

If the NFL wants to expand to Europe there are going to be many hurdles on the path. As long as they can achieve it without alienating their American fanbase while establishing a consistent, core European fanbase, they will succeed.

Sources:

Barnwell, Bill. "London Calling."  Grantland Aug 2013

Dosh, Kristi. "NFL Team in London Raises Legal Issues." ESPN 25 Sep 2013

Sociogenesis of Ultimate (Frisbee)

In 1938 at a beach in Santa Montica, CA, Fred Morrison and his wife were offered 25 cents for a pie tin that they were throwing to each other. The pie this tin previously housed cost the couple 5 cents, and, seeing ought but dollar signs, they decided to resell the tins for a profit of 20 cents and a pie (not bad). Eventually Morrison formed a company and registered a trademark by which to call these flying discs: Frisbee. Flying discs have since become a household toy and everybody knows what a Frisbee is.

It wasn't until 1968, however, that the game called Ultimate was created in Maplewood, NJ. Two students of Columbia High School, Joel Silver and Jared Kass, decided to make a game centered around the flight of the Frisbee so they devised some rules similar to football. A point was scored when a player possesses the disc in the opposition's end zone and there was a kickoff to start each possession. Nobody could run with the disc and they were allowed only to pivot on one foot. A team lost possession if they let the disc touch the ground or if a pass was intercepted by the other team.

The game was originally only played by students of Columbia High School. Eventually, a nearby high school started playing, and the first interscholastic game occurred in 1970. By '72, the high schoolers had taken their game to their respective colleges resulting in intercollegiate competitions between Rutgers and Princeton. The game spread across the US and internationally from the mid-70's onward.

The rules originally created by Silver and Kass have remained largely intact. They are general rules: don't run with the disc, possess the disc in the end zone for a point, don't drop the disc. Various organizations have specified certain dimensions such as disc size and weight, field length and width, end zone length, number of players and substitutions.

There was never any uniform for Ultimate. Originally a back yard game, the first game was likely played in the manner of Shirts v.s. Skins. Today, teams generally wear track shorts and matching shirts, but a team can show up in any type of clothing, provided it doesn't confer any unfair advantages.

An event of note for Ultimate is when Wham-O, owner of the Frisbee trademark, released the 80 Mold in 1977. Previously, the available frisbees were flimsy and light, but this new frisbee weighed 165 grams and was sturdier. It was embraced by the Ultimate community and set today's standard for discs.

sources:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Ultimate_field.svg
http://www.zume-games.com/sites/www.zume-games.com/files/dizk-tough-soft-touch-great-grip-flying-disc-3.jpg
http://ultimatefrisbeeinfo.com/ultimate_frisbee_history
http://www.usaultimate.org/archives/default.aspx

Sport in the US

There are many sports played and watched in the US, but not all are played and watched equally. The three biggest in the US are "-ball" sports: football, baseball, and basketball. These three sports have the largest fanbases, most advertising, highest salaries, and greatest media attention, and, accordingly, bring in the most amount of money. Like most other sports, these three are very similar in spirit. They value winning and fierce competition, they value rivalry and story lines, and they value big personalities.
On game day there is excitement and suspense. Almost as valued as the games themselves are the pregame rituals and parties fans hold. Tailgating, barbecuing, hot wings, burgers and beer. Baggo, touch football, whiffle ball, various sport video games, twenty one. Whether they are at home or at their stadium's parking lot or a bar nearby, everybody likes to prepare for the game in some way. Almost as if the game is ceremonial and the rituals are sacramental preparations, fans treat game day like the sabbath of their religion with their team's victory just a cherry on top. The value of tradition can be reinforced through game day rituals and neighbors with little to talk about can find common fround in their local teams.
In the US, different people measure success in different ways. Many people say a successful athlete is one who makes a lot of money. True, an athlete's sport is their profession and if salary depends on performance than how much money they make should be a good way to measure success. Another measure of success in the US is championship wins. Earning the title of the best in a season is what every player and team strives for each year--it's about those precious metals. Even another way to to measure success is purely by stats. People want to set records and break them, they want to have the highest amount of one stat, or the highest average of all stats. But all these measures can are loosely related in that a successful athlete will usually excel in all those measures. How much a player os paid depends on success, or expected success, which is asserted from how well they've previously done (or their stats).
But what all these measures ultimately depend on is whether or not the player is actually skilled. An extremely skilled player can "bust" and never achieve success, but rarely does an unskilled player achieve greatness. Many people use those measures of success to decide whether a player is good or not without looking at the actual play of the athlete, and that can be unjust to those who despite their great skill never won the big game.

The Sport Ethic

The sport ethic is a value system. It's the criteria which qualify somebody as a "true athlete" or not. There are four beliefs which are commonly thought of to be central to the sport ethic; they are defining factors as to whether somebody identifies, by others and by themselves, as an athlete. It makes clear that sport isn't only about fun, winning or friendship. The four beliefs can extend beyond sports and encourage rigorous personal development in any field.
The first belief is that personal sacrifices must be made for The Game. People with a strong sport ethic put their sport above other interests and make sacrifices to keep it there. They put the needs of their team and sport above their personal needs consistently. The second belief concerns the desire to be distinct--to be recognized for one's performance and to be rewarded or it. With perfection being to highest possible route to distinction, a person striving for distinction tries to climb the pyramid, to push themselves and, in result, push others. The third belief is that risks and pain are completely necessary for sport and that both must be accepted, even welcomed. Integral to sport is challenge, and to bow in the face of challenge is to lose. Athletes in the face of fear, pain or pressure must show courage by standing strong and persevering. The fourth belief can drive a game's development: looking for the greatest of possibilities while rejecting any limits set by others or oneself. This belief is about overcoming one's beliefs about how good they could become and finding new limits (and breaking them)
It's easy to see why most athletes conform to this belief system. While it is very useful and strategic to have these beliefs in sport, this value system is a basic framework around which one can live their life. This system is basic and yet the results it yields can be gratifying and profound. There are some athletes, however, who overconform to these beliefs which can lead to deviance and negative behavior. The authors suggest two reasons for this: the experience of playing in their game can be so exhilarating that their motivation to continue playing is extreme, and the prospect of sponsorship drives them to embody what sponsors look for (hint: sport ethic).
I personally subscribe to the belief that there is no gain without any pain. I don't find any resulting motivation from this belief, however, to pursue painful endeavors with the aim of benefiting; rather I cope with situations I am already in by viewing the hardship or pains as necessary, or even as perfect opportunities to come out on top, a better person. When I exercise, I don't start initially with the thought of going until I can go no more, for this would defuse any motivation preemptively. I rather begin on an easy workout and just do what I can. Then, when I approach breaking point, thoughts about the pain and breaking through it, creep in and drive me further. I try to apply this approach in many aspects of my life, and so far it has been fairly successful.