Overcompensation

Roger Goodell's compensation for 2014 was recently released. As usual, it's astonishing. The NFL commissioner received $34.1 million in 2014. It broke down like this:

Base salary: $3.5 million
Bonus: $26.5 million (a figure determined in 2013)
Pension and other deferred payments: $3.7 million
"other reportable compensation: $273,000

It's truly astonishing. That overcompensation was actually down a bit from the previous two years.

2013: $35 million
2012: $44.1 million
2011: $29.4 million

The 2011 total is a little interesting as that was the offseason of the lockout. That was the stretch of time in which Goodell ceremoniously, and with much publicity, accepted a salary of a single buck. It looks like he more than made up for those hard times. In his nine years as commissioner Goodell has made an average of $20 million a year and a total of $180.5 million. That's the very definition of overcompensation.

Goodell has hacked up just about everything that he's touched the last two years. And his compensation has increased! If an NFL player screwed up as much as Goodell has screwed up he'd find himself suspended, fined, perhaps even on the outside of the league entirely. In short, a player, coach, or even an owner would be punished in some form. Goodell is rewarded. It's simply astonishing.

The reason that Roger Goodell is still commissioner, and overcompensated, is that the 32 NFL owners love every single one of the 13 billion dollars that comes their way each year. Forbes even went so far as to suggest that Goodell might be underpaid. In an article cleverly titled Roger Goodell Might Actually Be Underpaid, contributor Alex Reimer compared what other sports commissioners earned relative to the annual revenue of their respective sports leagues. Goodell comes up roses in the comparisons. This angle might be an accurate one if you completely ignore the fact that no commissioner has done more to harm their league than Goodell. It also ignores the fact that the commissioner doesn't bring in all of those billions. The runaway success that is the National Football League brings in all of that money. It's the play on the field and all of the excitement that surrounds it. I wouldn't say that any monkey could run the league but perhaps a very clever one with excellent meet-and-greet skills could handle the job. The only thing that could slow the NFL's ever growing popularity is if the fans lose faith in the league. And Goodell is creeping real close to doing just that. Everything that comes out of 345 Park Avenue should be handled with skepticism. And that's not good.

Roger Goodell has to start earning his ridiculous compensation.

This year will be the last year in which the public will be privy to Goodell's annual earnings. Last April he said that the league would give up its tax-exempt status. The NFL has qualified as a 501(c)(6) nonprofit since 1942. In his statement he stated that the reason for this was that the tax-exempt status was "mischaracterized repeatedly". He's not wrong. A league raking in loads of money being considered a non-profit ruffled some feathers but what the ruffled people failed to understand was that the individual teams are paying the taxes on that money. Personally, I think that the league giving up the tax-exempt status had nothing to do with how others characterized that status. I think that it was so that they would no longer have to deal with the storm that hits with the annual reveal of Roger Goodell's overcompensation.