Ronaldo The Man

I only saw Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldo play once - in a meaningless friendly against Glasgow Celtic in Philadelphia last year.  So I don't know much about him as a player beyond what I've read.

But an article in last week's Sports Illustrated tells you everything you need to know about Ronaldo the man.  Ronaldo was asked to donate a signed jersey and pair of boots to a fundraiser for a 10 month old Spanish boy suffering from cortical dysplasia, a brain disorder.  It would have been easy to do but the player went much further and paid the entire $83,000 cost of the surgery.

Here's hoping the youngster is cured and lives a long and happy life.  And here's hoping the fans see Ronaldo as much more than a great player.

The Unpaid Players

Owning a professional sports franchise may often be a license to print money in the United States, but apparently not in the rest of the world, at least in soccer.

As this article by Sam Borden in today's New York Times reports, teams around the world are regularly missing payroll.  It's not happening to the Manchester Uniteds of the world, but rather second and third division sides, although last fall players for Colón of the Argentinian First Division refused to take the field, claiming they had not been paid in seven months.

In Eastern Europe, a 2011 survey found that 41.1 percent of players had missed paychecks.

Reasons cited for this situation include corrupt executives and overspending, but it is also a case of the rich getting richer.  The famous clubs such as Barcelona can afford the big name players which leads to higher attendance, sponsorships and lucrative television deals.  Without these income sources, the poorer clubs cannot afford the top players, but without the top players they cannot earn the riches.