NFL Players Earn More in a Day than You Earn in a Year

Our society seems generally content with elite professional athletes earning millions more than the average worker. If an athlete can get paid to play adult recess at a high level, good for them. Who wouldn’t want to make loads of money to throw a ball or shoot a puck?

(Photo Credit: Jeffrey Beall/Flickr)

Athletes in America’s most profitable sport, football, have recently returned to work for training camp. Though the National Football League makes more money ($9 billion a year) than any other professional league in the country, its players make, on average, less than National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball players.

The average NFL player salary is $1.75 million compared to $5.2 million for basketball players and $2.5 million for baseball players, according to Statistic Brain. NFL teams don’t pay less because they are cheap, they just have more employees to pay. Football organizations have over 50 players to pay, while MLB teams have 25 players on their active rosters and NBA squads have 12.

The NFL players at the top of the league’s pay scale are doing just fine. Here is a list of the top 10 paid NFL players and how much they are making a year, a day and a hour, according to Yahoo.

• No. 10 Mario Williams, $16 million a year, $135,500 a day, $5,600 a hour.
• No. 9 Larry Fitzgerald, $16.1 million a year, $135,600 a day, $5,650 a hour.
• No. 8 Calvin Johnson, $16.2 million a year, $136,100 a day, 5,670 a hour.
• No. 7 Eli Manning, $16.25 million a year, $136,600 a day, $5,700 a hour.
• No. 6 Tony Romo, $18 million a year, $151,000 a day, $6,300 a hour.
• No. 5 Peyton Manning, $19.2 million a year, 161,300 a day, $6,700 a hour.
• No. 4 Drew Brees, $20 million a year, $168,100 a day, $7,000 a hour.
• No. 3 Joe Flacco, $20.1 million a year, $168,900 a day, $7,050 a hour.
• No. 2 Matt Ryan, $20.75 million a year, $174,400 a day, $7,300 a hour.
• No. 1 Aaron Rodgers, $22 million a year, $184,900 a day, $7,700 a hour.

So is the average salary in your profession more than how much the top paid NFL players make in a day? Find out with PayScale’s Salary Report.

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