Asante Samuel... unappreciated?

Asante Samuel... unappreciated?

[NFL] Asante Samuel... unappreciated?

If you follow any North American sports you'd be familiar with the amount of money the athletes receive for playing the game they love. However with the massive influx of money into the game over the last ten to twenty years there can be little doubt that players no longer play just for the love of the game.

Case in point New England Patriots Cornerback Asante Samuel who has rejected his team's decision to designate him as their 'franchise player' and thus receive the average salary of the top 5 earners at that position in the NFL. So essentially if the Top 5 players earned $25 million combined then Samuel would be entitled to a 1 year contract at $5 million. That's obviously some great coin but for Samuel he's not happy with being undervalued and frankly - unappreciated by the team that drafted him and developed him into one of the top cornerbacks in the league. Sure the kid has the ability to perform but so do a lot of players who last barely a season in the NFL and find themselves chewed up and spat back out of the league because of a lack of professional development by their teams and a bad attitude.

So now Samuel, who has been offered the paltry sum of $7.8 million to return, has decided in his infinite wisdom to reject the offer because quite frankly his increased per week wage of $458,824* (up from about $42,500 last season) simply isn't enough to respect his standing in the game... or some dribble to that effect.

Just as well he's playing for the love of the game...

Figures sourced from Peter King's outstanding Monday Morning Quaterback Column: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/peter_king/06/11/mmqb/3.html

* Based on 17 week regular season.