PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA - DECEMBER 03: Brock Purdy #13 of the San Francisco 49ers throws a pass ... [+]
Brock Purdy is the quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers making less than $1 million per year, $870,000 to be exact. On Sunday, Purdy led the 49ers to a lopsided 42-19 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles, completing 19-of-23 passes for 314 yards with four touchdowns. Purdy’s 49ers are currently regarded as the hottest team in the NFL after drubbing the 10-2 Eagles. Over the season so far, Purdy has completed 70.1% of his passes for 3,185 yards with 25 touchdowns and only 6 interceptions. He leads the NFL in completion percentage, yards per catch, and most importantly the No.1 QB rating of 116.1.
His competition in the 49ers match up with the Philadelphia Eagles was Jalen Hurts, quarterback for the Eagles, who is making $55 million per year. That is 57 ½ times what Purdy is making. Top quarterbacks in the NFL like Hurts, Joe Burrow, Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson are currently making over $50 million per year. Even Daniel Jones of the New York Giants is making $47.5M per year.
Purdy is outperforming all of them this year by a lot. He has for the first time entered the MVP conversation, although Richard Sherman said weeks ago that if Purdy were a top draft pick he would already be a face of the league and MVP candidate.
People should be up in arms over this disparity in compensation particularly when the life of an NFL quarterback is 4.8 years. Compare this to corporate America where CEO compensation is always at the top of the food chain and the average tenure of a corporate CEO is 7.2 years and the median is 4.8 years. There is simply no other example of a 57 ½ times difference in compensation between CEOs in the same industry.
Let’s put this in perspective. The quarterback is like the CEO of the team and required to make a play or decision on every offensive play. Much like a CEO in corporate America, a quarterback can’t do it alone, but he is the single most important player on the team and is called upon to lead the team to victory as corporate CEOs are called upon to lead their company to profits and become #1 in their industry.
Since sports is a form of entertainment, a good comparison is CEO compensation in the Entertainment industry and the compensation structure is strikingly similar. While CEO’s like David Zaslav and Bob Iger have received well over $100 million in a single year of total compensation, each is currently slated this year to receive roughly $30 million in compensation and Ted Saradon at Netflix
I have suggested a simple solution when it comes to paying QBs, the highest paid and most important position on an NFL team. Give the player a guarantee based upon potential, such as draft position, and then immediately adjust the compensation based upon the players performance on the field. Since Purdy was the last player picked in the draft he was akin to someone starting in the mail room. His compensation was fair at the time his deal was done.
However, once he worked his way up to CEO, particularly one leading his company (team) to the top of his industry, his compensation should be immediately adjusted to the level of similar CEOs in his industry. In the case of a football QB, that compensation is in the $50 million a year range. It’s time for the NFL to make this change. We’ll call it the Brock Purdy rule.
