Ronaldo’s A Big Earner

Go ahead and laugh at him, but no one is paying $100-mil for you

The soccer world, which is to say the entire world except for the United States, is buzzing today with news that English club Manchester United has accepted a record transfer offer for reigning World Player of the Year, Cristiano Ronaldo.  Spanish club Real Madrid paid $131-million for the right to negotiate a contract with the 24-year-old superstar.  That’s right, the transfer fee is a pay-off for Man U to release him.  Real Madrid still has to sign him and give him a salary.  Paying that much money for a 24-year-old is insane.  But, I guess Ronaldo doesn’t have two kids and isn’t addicted to meth.  Plus, he probably does the really dirty stuff. 

Can you imagine if professional sports in America operated this way?  If teams had to pay more money to owners than to the players themselves, small market teams would just be investment firms.  Buy low, sell high and if you win a few games, so be it.  On the other hand, the Expos likely would have been rich enough to stay in Canada and Barry Sanders might have escaped Detroit.   

Ronaldo was under contract with Manchester until 2012, but has been pushing for a move to Spain off and on for a year.  He joins Brazilian superstar, former highest paid player in the world and 2nd grade punchline, Kaka (Ed. Note: still funny) at Real Madrid.  AC Milan agreed to let Kaka go earlier this week.  I agreed to let Kaka go earlier this morning.  I told you it was still funny.

With the recent moves, Spanish La Liga now features, arguably, three of the best 5 players in the world, as Ronaldo and Kaka join Lionel Messi of Barcelona.  Imagine if the Barca star joined Real Madrid.  The Messi-Kaka combination would be quite formidable.  OK, it may be getting a little less funny. 

Madrid entered the off-season as soccer richest club based on revenue, earning more than $512-million.  Obviously, they’ve quickly made their money work for them, shelling out $223-million for two players.  If Ronaldo lives up to his name, it might all be worth it for a club that failed to win a single trophy this past season.  Real Madrid also needs Kaka to not live up to his name.  It’s funny again.

UPDATE: It turns out the loose association I played with the headline and first graf comparing Ronaldo to a whore was not far off.  He occasionally dresses like a man-whore and certainly fraternizes with notorious whores like Paris Hilton.  Real Madrid might be in crisis mode right now.   At the very least, they’ve probably called in an army of physicians to find out which STDs affect soccer ability and which do not.  I’m imagining they’ve put together a nice power point presentation with an outline of Paris Hilton and every disease it’s assumed she carries.  One by one, a disease is highlighted and either flies to the left under a banner that reads “OK For Soccer” or to the right where, instead of a banner, there’s just a picture of Tom Hanks from “Philadelphia”.  That would be an exciting presentation.

Incidentally, that banner picture is likely the way Ronaldo looked when he sobered up this morning and found himself under Paris Hilton.

Tags: Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, Lionel Messi, Manchester United, Real Madrid, soccer

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