Categories
Contract Negotiation NFL Teams Sports Agents

Will The Colts/Chargers Success Hurt Agents?

Last week I wrote a post titled, Will The Yankees Success Hurt Agents?. The post received a lot of hits and I received a lot of personal e-mails to further discuss the matter. Within the article, I mentioned SBR’s note on how the Yankees’ team may be the worst Return on Investment in the history of team sports. Return on Investment should not mean as much in leagues controlled by a salary cap…right?

That may not be the case. This year, the San Diego Chargers and Indianapolis Colts look like early favorites to win the AFC Championship and there is a good chance that we see one of the two teams in the Super Bowl. Their payrolls are $65,472,365 (Colts) and $70,719,178 (Chargers). Both teams are having great success while the Oakland Raiders – spending $89,442,910 – might as well forfeit the rest of their season and start rebuilding for next year [NFL Teams with Best ROI for 2006].

While the difference in pay between the Colts and Raiders ($23,970,545) is not nearly as large as the difference between the Yankees and Tigers (~$115,700,000), the fact that the grand spending of money in professional sports with salary caps has a small correlation to success (if any at all) means that Sports Agents could see commission cuts in the future in sports other than baseball.

The one interesting point that SBR makes; however, is that owners in the NFL make great profits, and that the Atlanta Falcons with their league leading $109 million payroll still manage to make a healthy profit. By maintaining a payroll close to the top of the league’s salary cap, a team can keep its fans happy by saying that it is trying its absolute hardest (by spending as much money as possible) to increase its winning percentage. Attendance at games would not suffer as much during losing seasons and profits for owners should remain at high levels.

So maybe owners will not decide to cut their payrolls and mimic the success of the Chargers and Colts. But if teams decide to do so, expect a decrease in the average salary of football agents.

p.s. – After writing Part I of a 3 part series analyzing Rick Karcher’s newest article: Solving Problems in the Player Representation Business: Unions Should be the “Exclusive” Representatives of the Players, my domain’s server was rebooted, and the post was deleted. Of course, I failed to make a backup copy of the post, but I will get to analyzing Mr. Karcher’s article sometime in the future and will make sure to not skip over the portion that was covered and lost.

[tags]san diego chargers, indianapolis colts, sports agents, sports agent, salary cap, payroll[/tags]

By Darren Heitner

Darren Adam Heitner, Esq., is a preeminent sports attorney and the founder of Heitner Legal, P.L.L.C., a Fort Lauderdale-based law firm specializing in sports law, contract negotiations, intellectual property, and arbitration. He earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Florida Levin College of Law in 2010 and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, magna cum laude, from the University of Florida in 2007, where he was named Valedictorian of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Admitted to practice in the state bars of Florida, New York, and the District of Columbia, as well as multiple federal courts, Darren also serves as a certified arbitrator with the American Arbitration Association.

As an adjunct professor, Darren imparts his expertise through teaching Sports Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) at the University of Miami School of Law in the Entertainment, Arts, and Sports Law LL.M. program. His scholarly contributions include authoring several books published by the American Bar Association, such as How to Play the Game: What Every Sports Attorney Needs to Know, and numerous articles in prominent publications like Forbes, Inc. Magazine, and Above the Law. His thought leadership in NIL has earned him recognition as one of the foremost experts by The Wall Street Journal, USA TODAY, and On3, and he has been lauded as a “power player in NIL deals” by Action Network and a “top sports trademark attorney” by Sportico.

Darren’s passion for sports law led him to establish Sports Agent Blog on December 31, 2005, initially titled “I Want To Be A Sports Agent.” The platform, created as a New Year’s resolution, has grown into a cornerstone of the sports agency community, offering in-depth analysis of industry trends, legal disputes, and agent-player dynamics. His commitment to the field is further evidenced by his representation of numerous athletes and sports agents, as well as his prior role as an Adjunct Professor at Indiana University Bloomington, where he developed and taught a course on Sport Agency Management from 2011 to 2014.

Darren’s contributions have been recognized with prestigious honors, including the University of Florida’s 40 Under 40 Award, the University of Florida Levin College of Law’s Outstanding Young Alumnus Award, and designation as the best lawyer in Fort Lauderdale by Fort Lauderdale Magazine. He remains an active voice in the sports law community, sharing insights through his weekly NIL newsletter and his X posts, engaging a broad audience on legal developments in sports.