No offense or judgement meant to anyone if that’s your thing (to each their own). That’s just how I see pretty much all professional sports - the super bowl is just the poster child for it.
This is UnpopularOpinion, not UnpopularFacts.
It’s a pretty popular opinion on this platform
There’s a reason I’m not watching it right now.
Not really an unpopular opinion is it…
Yeah, even my friends who were really into sports barely watch any anymore, the superbowl generally being the first they stopped watching. Number one complaint? It’s more ads than game now.
See to me and my family the ads are one of the best part, not because we want to buy any of the crap or support the companies, but some of the ads are legitimately funny, and often some new movie or show trailer is shown as well which interests us if it’s something appealing.
i definitely know which insurance company not to patronize now.
So says everyone who watches the superbowl but isn’t big into football. See also the half-time show watchers. The people I am talking about are there for the sport.
Yeah I’m not big interested football, I only played until college, play fantasy football every season for almost two decades, once had a blog about my team, but sure I’m not that big into football at all. /s
I don’t understand why you have to make assumptions about me based on your personal biases? Especially when you’re wrong. Also not sure why people can’t just enjoy non-football things while watching football.
Not liking the commercials or the halftime show doesn’t make you more of a fan than somebody else, it just makes you sound like an elitist douche buzzkill, let people like things without being a prick about it.
I haven’t watched a single superbowl, so I don’t care about whatever elitism you read into that. I also have never met a single person who feels that the commercials are an important part of the entertainment who are really into football. First time for everything. Assuming you didn’t just make up shit to back an argument, you decided to have with someone about their elitism, around a subject they don’t care enough about to have elitist, or gatekeeping, sentiments about.
Maybe what I said came off in a different tone to you than it did for me.
I mean you’re judging me based on finding a little bit of entertainment from commercials during a game, how else am I supposed to take it? Also don’t turn this around on me, you’re being the judgemental prick here about something dumb AF.
Also a pretty weird stance to take considering how you’re saying you’re not a fan, like who are you to judge my fandom especially when apparently you are not a fan?
Again, this all goes back to how about not being a judgemental prick and letting people enjoy what they enjoy?
Wasn’t a judgemental statement as far as I am concerned. Unless you think someone assuming you don’t prioritize the sport of the game you are watching because of your statement on the commercials is somehow a judgement on your character. I was bringing up that the people I know who stopped are there for the football, not the extras.
I’ve noticed over the last few years of watching football that they don’t even care about missing actual action anymore. It used to be “Here’s something cool that happened, let’s take a break”.
Now it’s “Welcome back from the break, here’s what happened while you were consuming ads, and it’s time for another break”
Yes, this and the crazy stupid region, provider, service restriction nonsense, the, often large, mark-ups for sports packages, and the fact that cable was the only place you could get most games, for so long, when so few of the people my age even had cable anymore.
Heh, we’ll see, I guess. I fully expected a flurry of downvotes right out of the gate, but I’m also thinking the timing may be skewing the results a bit.
It’s just funny because this was up yesterday from in here
Trust me, this is not that. lol. I honest to gods thought I was going to get ripped a new one for daring to say anything bad about the Superbowl.
Around here? Doubtful.
Fair point. That’s on me. I was treating it as “General Unpopular Opinion” and not “Unpopular Opinion on Lemmy”. I agree there is a difference. lol
Two facts:
- I’m about to head out to a Super Bowl party.
- I agree with you.
Nothing wrong with that. SB parties are fun, and I usually never turn them down (even if I don’t even know/care who’s playing).
Except this one where I did turn down an invite so I could stay home, drink in peace, and binge watch Succession (just started season 2).
Lol. I never used to really participate in superbowl get togethers. But this year I was invited with my wife to her friends gathering. I guess it depends on how much you buy into it or if it’s just a way to hang out with friends.
It’s an excuse
Players aren’t even that rich
The superstars are, but most of the players are destroying their bodies for 2-3 year careers.
N ot F or L ong
Even the players seem to embrace this as a motto around the NFL.
The career span of an NFL player is crazy short, and you’re one hundred percent right, these guys are often permanently damaged from decades playing football just to get to the NFL.
A shocking amount of them don’t know how to manage that amount of money either. Most end up broke within 10 years, most are destitute by retirement. Many get caught up in the lifestyle, blow the money never thinking about once they’re done, and then their careers end all of a sudden without any fanfare.
First thing I’d do if I were hired? Talk to an accountant.
Whenever I get signed for anything over 50k I’m talking to an accountant, or banker at the very least.
If someone gave me millions at 22 I would also mismanage it.
but I also get to eat too much food and have “an excuse”
Veing an adult will blow your mind.
Most of my friends and co-workers are all married, so I totally get “the excuse” being a thing to look forward to. One of the perks of bachelor life is just doing what I want, and I really hate to give that up one day.
Yup. Made a spread of delicious appetizers for dinner - dips, finger foods, veggies and fruit. I’m not even watching the superbowl and yet I felt obliged to pig out.
I’d argue that it also leads to an enormous amount of food being tossed out and wasted. Granted the only reason that’s in mind is because I’m going to be going dumpster diving lately to try and capitalize.
Oh, for sure. Pretty much any event or holiday gathering always seems to generate a lot of food waste. At least holiday dinners tend to turn into leftovers rather than garbage (at least in my experience).
I just think the sport is really neat.
The ads are pretty overkill even compared to what I see here in Europe during the soccer world cup, and yeah athletes are paid ridiculous amounts, but at the end of the day it’s a lot of fun to watch, at least for me. It’s a battle of both wits and raw athleticism between people pushing the limits of what the human body can do. That’s super cool, and all the story lines that arise or crumble from the competition are immensely entertaining to follow.
When you get down to it capitalism tarnishes everything anyway, a lot of entertainment media is very much just vehicles to sell even more shit, but they can still be enjoyable in and of themselves.
How do they do ads during the world cup when the game doesn’t stop?
American football continuously stops allowing for seemingly infinite advertisements.
That’s definitely part of it yeah, soccer is more continuous, so they can’t cram ads in like they can with football. There’s still a lot of it, but it’s not as crazy. American football is openly about ads as much as it is about the sport, it’s pretty nuts.
They put ads all over the stadium, ads on the score bug on TV, the commentators will sneak in product placement during the game, the jerseys themselves have ads on them. They find ways.
I always joked I might be able to get into [insert sport here] if I could buy it on BluRay and watch it 6 months later and not have to sit through the ads and breaks. lol
I think there’s some NFL pass things that allow you to do that, actually, where you can watch everything whenever. A lot of them aren’t accessible from Europe sadly, but if you’re American there’s plenty of options for you.
There’s also sports anime lol
That’s how I got introduced to American football, watching and reading Eyeshield 21, and it got me interested in seeing the real thing. Sports anime are pretty cool since they present you with a curated narrative with lots of ups and downs, and they’re usually a lot harder to predict than traditional shounens, since losing doesn’t doom the universe or something. They’re genuinely a nice entry point to sports in my opinion, at least if you enjoy anime already.The NFL plus subscription lets you access either the entire broadcast without commercials, an alternate version that’s cut from snap to tackle (and is available pretty quick at least in the playoffs; I watched some late games in the morning before work), or the coaches film (that’s slightly slower).
Overseas it’s different, but last I was aware it was better and included live feeds in addition to everything else.
Greatest argument for it is that it’s an incredible display and even celebration of some truly awe inspiring and extreme feats that human bodies are capable of. I’ve never been able to get into favorite teams or anything, but every time I’m around somewhere a good football team/game is on, dang if I don’t see some incredible things.
The players on the field have more in common than us than the billionaires who own the teams. Don’t confuse them for the actual rich class. Over an average NFL career most players make less money than most people will over their career, and they leave football with severely damaged bodies and minds.
They are workers just like us, many of them go on to live in poverty, just like us. The players aren’t your enemy, the owners are.
Something about Dallas Cowboys owner being in a crowd protesting integration.
Dude…Travis Kelce owned most of Cholula at one point.
Wrong:
TLDR: Average is 2.8 million per year.
What’s the difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars?
It’s a billion dollars.
You’ve still got way more in common with the players than the owners.
i have more in common with the homeless guy on the corner than the football players tho
I said to another comment as of 2015 80% of retired players went bankrupt
They might even be that homeless guy on the corner.
I don’t feel bad for people mismanaging their millions when people are struggling to live day to day.
I don’t either, I’m just saying they are too a victim of society, not the benefactors
They still make enough in a year on average that they do it one year and retire.
Do you think someone can retire at 25 with 2.8 million dollars? They’d have about 40k a year to live on, so I guess it’d be technically possible as long as they didn’t mind moving back in with their parents, waiting for them to die and hoping the house wasn’t worth enough to cause a big tax bill that year.
I’d be hard to retire (in the classical sense) at 60 with 2.8 million.
Ever heard of… Investing your money?
A very conservative rate of return on investments would be 5% per year. With $2.8M, 5% is $140,000/year. So, someone with $2.8M invested would, conservatively, earn $149K per year without touching the principal.
Rate of return and dividends are not the same thing. Dividend payouts are usually closer to 2-2.5% for an index fund loke the S&P500. At those rates, you’d nees closer to $5 mil/$100k of desired annual income. For the regular stocks, in order to get that money, you’d have to actually sell shares, which means your earning potential off the stock decreases over time (in addition to the buying power of that money decreasing over time as well). It takes about $11 today to buy what would cost $1 in 1960…if we assume a linear trajectory for inflation, that $100k you’d pull in from that $5m would be worth less than $10k by the time our hypothetical athlete reached 75. While I can’t see into the future, i don’t imagine there will be many job opportunities for a 75 year old who’s been out of the job market for 50 years and $10k/year probably won’t even be enough to feed themselves.
Interesting. I didn’t realize that dividend rates are so much lower than rate of return. Why are they so much lower? Does that mean that your money is only growing at 2-2.5% in an index fund or does that mean that your investment is growing at the same time as you are taking out a portion of your returns as a dividend?
I’m just starting to learn about investing as I try to shift some of my savings towards long-term investments. I think I need to find a fee-based financial planner to get me pointed in the right direction.
You are correct and definitely using a conservative estimate, like you said. ETF/index funds have an average return of 7-10 percent according to a quick search. These are often considered one of the safest investments you can possibly make, too.
Returns aren’t dividends. You can only capitalize those returns by selling your shares, which decreases the rate at which your portfolio grows and incurs additional tax liability.
What about the rest of that article, which said the median was 860k?
They would have to risk more than 3 years of damage to even get the 40k
Construction workers have to risk 40 years of damage to get the same amount of money.
40k is if you’re dumb enough to keep an that money in the chequing account
Maybe the construction workers deserve more money?
Edit: It is also worth mentioning that if the median salary is 860k, and the minimum salary is 870k at one year, what are your chances for making that 3 years in comparison to making 40 as a construction worker?
No, I don’t.
What’s the difference between 50k a year and 2.8M a year? About 2.8M.
Did you read the rest? The median (which means half makes less, and half makes more is 860k.
That means if they get the crap beaten out of them, and save every single penny and don’t pay takes, they would have 3.4 million.
As of 2015 80% went bankrupt
I don’t do odds that bad.
A lot of them go bankrupt because they’ve never had money before and someone hands them three million dollars. They’re rich and famous overnight, with no financial planning experience, and they party like… well they party like the ballers they are. Football and basketball players waste so much money that the word “baller” is synonymous with someone who throws a lot of money around.
But make no mistake, if someone handed you or I three million dollars, we could invest it and retire for the rest of our lives. They make a lot of money, and a lot of money all at once is worth a hell of a lot more than a lot of money spread out over a lifetime. But a lot of them make really poor financial choices too, because they’re just kids.
They aren’t getting that amount at once.
They get big fat paychecks when they sign their contracts. Lower paid players aren’t getting $3M all at once, but they get tens of thousands of dollars all at once, and it keeps coming every week. Even the lowest paid rookie players who only get the $750,000 rookie base salary get it over 17 weeks. That’s $44,117.64 every week for 17 weeks. That’s a fuck ton of money all at once, especially for a kid who has never had any.
For reference:
NFL Veteran Minimum Salary
The minimum salary for NFL players with one year of experience is $870,000. It increases with each year:
Rookie: $750,000 1 Year: $870,000 2 Years: $940,000 3 Years: $1.01 million 4-6 Years: $1.08 million 7+ Years: $1.65 millionAnd if the median is 860k, how many are making the salary of one year veterancy? Less than half?
Partial years, LOTS of rookies on backup teams making partial wages maybe.
Average doesn’t work so great here with those QBs at the top making $50m a year, bud
The QB is still a player on the field.
Surprisingly one of the quarterbacks playing tonight had a salary under a million. Though I expect that won’t be the case for him next season after making it to the Super Bowl.
Yeah, at first I thought they were saying it evened out considering most people’s careers are longer than an NFL player’s, but even just 1 year as an NFL player nets more money than I’ll ever earn in my life. Several lose it all, but that’s from spending it on hookers and blow, not because they’re forced to live paycheck to paycheck.
First. You still have more in common with players than owners.
Second what’s the average career length of an NFL player. Last I checked it was 2.5 years, may have changed. That’s 7 million over a career. Over a 50 year career, which most of us work, that’s about 116. Clearly upper middle class, but not rich.
Many athletes leave the game and work labor jobs like the rest of us.
Not saying they didn’t have a front loaded ahead start and also not saying they don’t have an upper middle class average. All I am saying is…the owners are your real enemy. We have more in common with the players than we do with the owners. The players are not your enemy.
I’ve zero interest, but I was forced by my wife to bust out the digital antenna and make it happen. She’s only watching for taylor swift and the commercials though.
I’m not into sports and I have no plans to watch the Superb Owl today, but I do have a big appreciation for humans being awesome, and for that I can usually appreciate watching even if I don’t care who wins.
Watching a 300lb man accelerate like a freight train or someone jump several feet into the air, twist over backwards, catch a ball and land where they meant to is definitely something I enjoy, because they do work their asses off to get that good and I can appreciate anybody’s passion at that level.
That said, totally agree on the money side, it taints so many things (looking at you IOC).
I’m not into sports and I have no plans to watch the Superb Owl today
That’s really too bad because there’s been some hot competition between two teams going on over in !superbowl@lemmy.world and you could have been enjoying it!
Freight trains don’t accelerate well at all. They carry momentum well, which is what the linebackers send into the receiving team.
but I do have a big appreciation for humans being awesome, and for that I can usually appreciate watching even if I don’t care who wins.
Agreed. I just wish it were possible to observe that kind of spectacle without every sense being exploited to sell me crap I don’t need. lol.
I dislike so many “normal” things simply because they’re so over-commercialized. Sports, Christmas, Olympics, most of the internet now, etc. The old joke “well, just go live in the woods then” is starting to sound pretty appealing.
Downvoted because I agree (this is !unpopularopinion@lemmy.world)
Fair enough, lol. But I should point out that it’s Unpopular Opinion and not “Unpopular Opinion on Lemmy”
It’s fun.
At least it brought us the Puppy Bowl. Which is also full of ads, but hey, puppies.
