In professional sports, money often is one of the main signs of talent. The better you play, the more you make, to a certain extent. Cardinals QB Kyler Murray recently signed a huge contract extension, and he’s now making more money than Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes, but Mahomes won’t let that bother him. How could he?
“You want the salaries to keep going up, your players getting more and more,” Mahomes said. “When I saw my deal, I knew I was going to be pretty set for life, regardless of what the market kind of patterns. But you just keep playing. I mean, money is one thing, but when you get a Super Bowl ring in your career, I mean, that’s the kind of thing you look back upon.”
The man who signed a contract worth half of a billion isn’t fazed about other QBs making more money than him. He’s aware of how the sports industry works, and that paying the players that win you games is top priority. Regardless of who’s better than you on another team, if you’re the man for your team and the go-to-guy to win games and lead the team through the season, they will do what it takes, especially when you’re the signal-caller.
Murray, who just inked a five-year, $230.5M extension with the Cards, is also getting a guaranteed $104.33M signing bonus. This surpasses Mahomes’ 10-year, $450M contract, as the average pay of Murray’s five-year extension exceeds that of Mahomes by over a million a year.
This isn’t the first time the former Red Raider’s contract was eclipsed by another QB’s ambition and negotiation. Buffalo Bills QB Josh Allen received his six-year $258M deal, Deshaun Watson upon being traded to the Cleveland Browns received his fully guaranteed five-year $230M contract, and the Dallas Cowboys gave Dak Prescott a four-year, $160M contract last year as well.
Besides Josh Allen, who nearly beat Mahomes and the Chiefs in the divisional round last year, none of these other QBs are even in the ballpark range of Mahomes’ talent level. Yet they are all making on average more per year than Mahomes is.
This would be an issue for anybody with a ginormous ego, but Mahomes is not one of those individuals. In fact, he’s supportive of this trend of the next man getting paid.
Patrick Mahomes: My contract has me set for life, other QB contracts don't affect me. https://t.co/4ybtcarL70
— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) July 23, 2022
“I think especially the quarterback position, because the next guy or the top guy or any of these top-tier quarterbacks, they make such a difference in NFL games, that [contracts] are going to get passed up,” Mahomes explained. “And I mean, if you look at guys that signed last year to this year, they got passed up.”
In the future, Mahomes envisions the same happening for Bengals’ Joe Burrow, and Chargers’ Justin Herbert as far as getting higher contracts that place them amongst the top paid.
And everybody is waiting to see what kind of bag Baltimore Ravens dynamic QB Lamar Jackson secures. That contract will probably surpass Mahomes’ yearly salary as well.
Mahomes is one of the most successful and talented players in the league, and one of the highest-paid on and off the gridiron. He’s set for life with that last contract, and if he’s even half as good as he is now, there is still tons of money for Mahomes from the NFL in the future.
With that being said, how low is he willing to fall on the salary totem pole before he wants to talk terms?
