Country, cricket or just dollars? There's still a generation that firmly believes cricket must be played for the pride of the country, not for money. In fact some of them feel IPL cricketers are overpaid and that’s hastening retirement in cricket. I suggest let us take an honest look at the numbers in comparison to other international sports. 78.5 million dollars was spent so far in the IPL auction. The numbers saw a lot of jaws drop, but IPL is still a fair distance from becoming the highest paying sporting event. Lets draw a few comparisons with another international team sport like basketball. Currently basketball is the third highest paying team sport int the world. The average salary for an NBA player is $5m, compared to IPL's $565,000. The highest paid NBA player last season was Tracy McGrady who landed a whopping $23m contract compared to Gambhir who won $2.4m. NBA pays 10 times more for any player compared to the IPL. One might argue the US GDP is 10 times India's, but sporting events are not measured by GDP but by TRP. The average number of viewers for the NBA finals last year was 3.6m when compared to 8.34m viewers per day throughout the tournament. This puts the enormity of the IPL in perspective, so let us take note of the facts before we get carried away by the number of millionair cricketers. So if you think this is too much there is more to come folks. The rich did get richer…but what’s cricket got to do with this? So while many believe in the 80-20 rule, the IPLs 20-20 formula seems to work on a 50-20 rule, in other words 50% of the $78.5m was spent on 20% of the players. The top 20% won bids at an average cost of $1.5m per player. A mere $10m was spent on the remaining 50% at an average cost of $158,696, or 1/10 the cost of the top 28 players. So, not everyone gets rich at the IPL.What this also demonstrates is that not all franchisee owners were smart bidders. They overpaid for some and were left with a lot less for other valuable players. Since there is ai salary cap per team, bid price is an equation of the amount left in the kitty and not the intrinsic value per player. A few glaring instances are Irfan Pathan, who was paid $1.9m compared to Mike Hussey, ranked No.3 in the ODI rankings, was paid a measly $0.43m. Another instance is of misplaced investments was Ravindra Jadeja who doesn't even make the Indian playing 11 , fetched $950,000. Compare this with Daniel Vettori, one of the most economical one day bowlers ranked No.1 in ODIs and a useful lower order batsman, was sold for $550,000. So auctioning is a complex subject and I am no expert, but certainly think the minimum bid price must be fixed based on a performance based pricing to ensure it not just all business after all. Veterans ignored The once famed left hand legends, Lara and Ganguly, find no place in the IPL. I am left searching for clues to understand why Ganguly persists after making three poor shows in the IPL and almost crossing the age limit. Someone who was once the god of offside batting looked rather meek against the swashbuckling T20 players. Class is permanent but does not always translate to runs on the cricket field. Lara’s case is also understandable as no one has seen him bat since 2007 World Cup and to expect people to put their money on him might be premature. He might stand a chance if he can perform in the forthcoming English season and prove his mettle before he chooses to go under the hammer. While the West Indians don’t seem to care if Lara played in the IPL or not; the Bongs went bonkers, burnt effigies and staged protests. It was not until King Khan soothed their nerves by saying “There is no KKR without Dada”, no one heard him whisper “As a mentor”.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
IPL auction : Country, cricket, dollars and more drama
0 comments:
Post a Comment