XFL quarterbacks will make 10 times the salary of their teammates
The XFL will hold its fairly unconventional draft next week, with games set to begin in February, after the Super Bowl.
On Friday, the upstart league sent a memo to agents detailing player salaries, and a source told Yahoo Sports that “franchise” quarterbacks will be earning significantly more than their teammates.
Bi-weekly pay, bonuses
Via the memo sent to agents, once players are drafted and retained by a team and sign their contract with the league, they become full-time XFL employees and will be paid on a bi-weekly basis from Dec. 4, 2019 to May 31, 2020, a total of 13 pay periods.
Base pay? $2,080 every two weeks, or $27,040.
Players will earn an additional $1,685 for each game they’re active - each of the league’s eight teams will have 52-player roster, but only 46 will be active for games - meaning a starter will make another $16,850.
And players also get bonuses for a win, $2,222 per win.
So if a player is a starter and is on a team that goes .500 over the 10-game regular season, he’ll earn $55,000.
There are also undisclosed bonuses for playoffs and championship game wins.
Quarterbacks will earn 10 times more
The memo sent to agents details pay for all players except top quarterbacks. In an effort to promote parity, each of the eight teams will be assigned its starting quarterback.
A source told Yahoo Sports that those players will earn more than the NFL rookie minimum - this year, that amount is $495,000.
Top quarterbacks in the NFL do earn more than other players, but is a quarterback 10 times more valuable to a team than any other player?
This is likely a way for the XFL to try to lure better-caliber quarterbacks to the league - former Pittsburgh Steelers backup Landry Jones was the first player to sign up.
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