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With His $52,000,000 Salary, Lamar Jackson Has Trumped NBA’s Highest Annual Earner Stephen Curry By a Huge Margin

Shubham Bhargav
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Lamar Jackson, Stephen Curry

Lamar Jackson is truly one of a kind. After all, not many quarterbacks can boast about unanimously wining league MVP honors at 23 years of age. Given how astoundingly good his credentials were, the Ravens were expected to either let him go, or make him the highest paid QB in the competition. Thankfully, they chose the second option. However, as one can expect, Lamar’s $52 Million annual contract value has well and truly disrupted the market, with shockwaves being felt by other Sporting leagues as well.

Jackson’s $260 Million 5-year deal, not only made him the highest earning footballer, but also allowed him to storm past players who are the highest in their respective Sport. MLB’s Max Scherzer, and Justin Verlander, who take home around $43.3 Million each for one season, have been trumped by Jackson by almost $10 Million. In fact, what has actually left fans tremendously surprised, is the fact that NBA’s highest annual salary taker Stephen Curry, is also trailing by millions, if we compare his annual salary to that of the Ravens’ QB.

Stephen Curry has been well & truly trumped by Lamar Jackson in the “highest annual salary” race

Steph, who is known to be one the finest shooters in NBA history, started his stint with the Golden State Warriors in 2009 and is going strong sporting the Warrior blue ever since. The 2x NBA MVP and 4x title winner, who is even regarded as one of the biggest stars ever to grace the basketball court, is currently drawing $48 Million as annual salary.

On the other hand, NFL’s Lamar Jackson, who started his stint at the highest level almost a decade after Steph, is set to take home $52 Million in a year, despite not winning a single championship title till now. The $4 Million gap in salaries seems quite large if we take the above stated factors into account.

However, in Lamar’s case, it was actually Deshaun Watson who indirectly played a massive role in skyrocketing annual salary packages of star QBs in the competition. Despite being involved in a number of s*xual harassment cases, despite the fact that he was set to face a long-term suspension from the NFL, he was still given a whopping $230 Million full-guaranteed contract by the Cleveland Browns.

Many experts called it a huge mistake committed by the Browns which ended up costing several other franchises as well, who then faced pressure from their own players regarding bigger contracts. While Watson did agree to restructure his contract in order to free up cap space, the damage was already done. However, on the flip side, many fans also opine that Deshaun’s deal opened the gates for other QBs who deserved more dollars but were being underpaid by their teams.

Athletes from other leagues might get influenced by the crazy salary hikes in NFL

The pay difference between NFL’s highest earning athlete and NHL’s highest earner is also massive. As reported by Will who covers the New York Rangers, NHL’s highest annual earner Nathan MacKinnon takes home only $12.6 Million per year, which is less than 25% of what the Ravens are set to give Lamar.

While these stats might seem a bit baffling, one of the major reasons behind the pay difference is the amount of money the leagues are brining in. As per New York Times, Disney pays around $400 Million to the NHL annually in exchange for broadcasting several league games.

On the other hand, Amazon pays $1 Billion per year to the NFL in exchange for exclusively broadcasting just the Thursday Night Football matchups. Moreover, while NFL’s most valuable team, the Dallas Cowboys, are valued at $8 Billion, NHL’s most economically strong unit, the Rangers, are valued around $2.2 Billion.

Despite all this, Sports fans are speculating that just because the NFL stars are getting unprecedented salary raises, athletes representing teams in other leagues like NHL, NBA and MLB might also end up asking for a bit more guaranteed money in the near future.

About the author

Shubham Bhargav

Shubham Bhargav

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Shubham is the NFL division head at the Sports Rush. He can write and talk about NFL all day without breaking a sweat. A Communications post-graduate with 4+ years of experience in Sports Journalism, Shubham can be tough to stop once he starts talking about the nuances of his favorite sport. He enjoys movies, likes trekking, adores re-watching unorthodox plays and wants to interview Patrick Mahomes at least once in his life.

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