We might be seeing the beginning of a super trend with the sports world and bitcoin. This past week, former Clemson stand-out Quarterback Trevor Lawrence, who has been widely considered by many experts to be one of the top Quarterback prospects in years, fulfilled all projections and went #1 overall to the Jacksonville Jaguars. This was clearly headline news, of course, but no surprise there. However, the news that came out about Trevor’s contract might be the real surprise to many. According to spun.com, Lawrence’s rookie contract will be a 4-year deal with a team fifth year option worth $36.79 Million dollar.
Included in his contract is a $24.12 signing bonus. The signing bonus here is the key. For those unfamiliar with sports and contracts, the numbers you hear about in the news in regards to sports contracts can be somewhat misleading. Most of the large contracts that make headlines, say player X signs a 5-year deal for $50M dollars, the $50M that makes headlines is typically the maximum amount the player can make, which is heavily incentivized by performance and is not fully guaranteed. The news rarely reports the full details of the contract. However, the signing bonus of a contract is fully guaranteed and generally paid upfront or over the course of the first year of the contract, regardless of performance. And according to Bitcoin.com, Mr. Lawrence asked for his whole entire signing bonus in cryptocurrency.
Different sources have reported the different basket of currencies in which he is accepting. Bitcoin.com and Bleacher Report, reported that the majority of his basket will be bitcoin, ethereum and some solano. Fee.org reported that he will be taking Bitcoin, Ethereum and doge. Regardless of the basket, it looks as if the two coins that are staples in his basket are Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Now, although this is a big move for the crypto community because Lawrence is such a high-profile player, he isn’t the first NFL player to take payment in bitcoin. Back in 2019, Carolina Panthers Offensive Tackle Russell Okung requested that half of his $13M salary be paid in Bitcoin. He originally tweeted about this on May 14, 2019 when Bitcoin was valued at just a shade under $8,000… $7,994.42 to be exact, according to coinmarketcap.com and on December 29, 2020, he followed up that original tweet with a tweet that said Paid In Bitcoin [same source as above], confirming that he was indeed paid in Bitcoin.
Now like we said, the nuances and details of each contract is different, but in general, players get paid per week over the course of the 17 game season. So by December of 2020, even though we don’t know exactly, we can presume that Okung dollar cost averaged his Bitcoin purchases over the course of the season, getting the current value of bitcoin per pay check over 17 weeks. So we really don’t know the exact amount of bitcoin he holds. But just an FYI, the football season starts in September and in September of 2020, Bitcoin was trading between 10-11k all month, so if he dollar cost averaged over the course of the season, in September, he was paid at 10-11k per coin. But anyway, let’s say, just to play with the numbers here, let’s say he got paid in a lump sum in Bitcoin for half his salary on December 29th, 2020. On December 29th, according to coinmarket.com, Bitcoin was valued at $27,362.44.
With Bitcoin valued at $57,000 as of this video, the half of his contract that he converted into Bitcoin would be worth more than his initial whole contract. And when Bitcoin was at $44k, Okung was rejoicing about how the market was doing. And stated that he isn’t f&C*g selling [link same as above]. So we can probably assume that he got a good amount of coins well below that $27k December 2020 price.
But nonetheless, there are other players who are opting to receive their payment in Bitcoin and with Okung being the first, and Lawrence being the highest profile to do so, we might be in the beginning of a trend that could rip through all of sports trading in their fiat payment for bitcoin.
Not only did Lawrence make a big statement with his decision to take his signing bonus in Cryptocurrency, but he also partnered with Blockfolio to accept his payment into his wallet. This has been reported to be a multi-year sponsorship deal with Blockfolio that will be paid directly to his wallet.
So what we might see moving forward, is high profile athletes converting their fiat into bitcoin and getting sponsorships with cryptocurrency companies. This is all very interesting and could be the beginning of a trend that could really propel the whole crypto space into the mainstream even quicker when you have high profile athletes sponsoring and taking payment in crypto.
Let us know what you think about this? Was this a good move by Trevor? Do you see this as the beginning of a trend that’s coming soon? Comment below. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this.
