Imrem: What a country this is for pro athletes
Only one thing can be said on this Fourth of July: What a country!
If you had any doubts, a holiday parade through the sports pages should relieve them.
Start with pro golfer Daniel Berger, who hit one shot in the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, withdrew with shoulder pain and collected $50,500 for his trouble.
Only in America!
Then check out NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who absorbed a 7 percent pay cut to "a mere" $31 million in 2015.
Man, I love this country!
But nothing screams "U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!" like the "N-B-A! N-B-A! N-B-A!"
As Lady Liberty sort of suggests, the league is raining newly minted TV dollars "on your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
The sports version of tired, poor and huddled masses, that is.
Sunday the Bulls came to terms with talented troublemaker Rajon Rondo for, now get this, $30 million over two years.
Last week the Grizzlies agreed to re-sign Mike Conley, good but not exactly Steph Curry great, for $153 million over five years.
On one coast the Knicks gave a broken-down Joakim Noah and on the other the Lakers gave an aging Luol Deng, two guys who should be playing in Bulls old-timers games, $72 million apiece over four years.
Gentlemen, that kind of cash will buy a heap of U.S. Savings Bonds.
Imagine if sports figures were unfortunate enough to merely cure cancer, end all wars as we know them or provide food for every living human on the planet.
That likely would earn them only a comfortable living and tip of the cap when they retired.
They probably still couldn't afford a regular-season ticket to watch their favorite NBA team, much less a seat for a single playoff game.
At one time, sports salaries were considered Monopoly money. Now, thanks to an infusion of fresh TV contracts, we're talking federal deficit money for a one-dimensional power forward.
This isn't just about pro basketball. How could it be when hard throwers in both baseball and football are paid as much as they are to play one or two games a week?
The argument in favor of NBA excess is that players are among the approximately 450 best at what they do in a world of seven billion people.
(Come to think of it, many many CEOs are in a similar income bracket, too, while some of their employees beg for $15 an hour.)
The only thing that matters is that sports fans will pay exorbitant prices for game tickets, TV packages and official team merchandise.
I can only fantasize that newspapers generated the revenues that sports do. Maybe a copy editor would be given a five-year, $153 million contract; an obit writer a four-year $72 million deal; and a sports columnist … well, he or she still wouldn't be worth diddly.
Insert your occupation into this equation and imagine what it would be like for TV to inject a billion dollars into the industry.
It's called the American dream. It's ours in our sleep at night. It's a pro athlete's, league commissioner's and club owner's while awake during the day.
As the lyric goes, "God done shed his grace on thee … He crowned thy good, yes, he did in a brotherhood … From sea to shining sea."
OK, one more time on this Fourth of July: "U-S-A! N-B-A! U-S-A! N-B-A! U-S-A! N-B-A!"
mimrem@dailyherald.com