While all that Kobe Bryant-to-Beşiktaş Cola Turka talk may be long dead, the Los Angeles Lakers star could well be closer to playing in Europe than you think. After Bryant reportedly responded to offers from Virtus Bologna with “Let’s talk,” the club has organized a conference call for this evening with Bryant’s agent Rob Pelinka to discuss matters.
Italy-based Il Resto del Carlino has been following the story of Bologna’s wooing Kobe this week, and today the newspaper is reporting that the Italian club is offering some $3 million should Bryant sign with the Serie A club for the season.
And Virtus team president Claudio Sabatini has already publicly put forth perhaps the craziest offer BiE has yet seen during the NBA lockout mess, reportedly ready to pony up $500,000 plus $100,000 to charity should Kobe suit up for Bologna for the season opener against Virtus Roma – that’s right: One game, half a million bucks. Sabatini has also informally offered $1.95 million if Bryant stays with the club through October to play three games.
Finally, Il Resto is putting out a call to the public: If you have a decent argument for Bryant to play in Italy this season, offer your pro-European basketball propaganda to bolognaperbryant@virtus.it.
Bryant possibly playing in Italy has been a matter of speculation for some time, as the Laker spent a good amount of his childhood in the country while his father “Jellybean” played for four different Italian teams from 1984 to 1991.
Tags: Beşiktaş Cola Turka, Claudio Sabatini, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA lockout, Rob Pelinka, Virtus Bologna
Sabatini is well known for being an “alternative owner”…
The most interesting part of this proposal is about where Sabatini is going to rise up the moeny to pay Kobe…
He firstly asked the Municipality to share the cost, since having Kobe walking around in Bologna, will certainly bring around 1.5-3.5million Japanese visitor to grab a picture of him…
Then, since the “subscription campaing” is already closed, he told Virtus Fans that he will re-open again the box office for the seasonpass… but with a x10fold price.
But the latest one is the most ridiculous: he’s going to ask the owner of the clubs he’s going to play against to share the extraincome they will get.. since they will certainly sold out if Kobe will play. (Who’s willing to pay for increasing the possibility to lose a game?? mumble mumble…..).
The Italian team also said that Rob Pelinka answered to the proposal made by Virtus and that tonight there will be a conference call between the two parts.
Maybe in that occasion Sabatini will tell everybody that he will pay 1M to Kobe for having a “tagliatelle bolognese sauce” and a coffee??? ..we will see…
Ok.. anyway it doesn’t matter.. Kobe won’t come to Bologna.
Claudio Sabatini, owner of Virtus Bologna, spoke at SkySport24 about the conference call he had last night with Rob Pelinka, Kobe Bryant’s agent, saying that Lakers star is not interested in a short-term deal but just an annual contract with NBA out. Sabatini also added that he is waiting for an answer by Manu Ginobili’s agent Luciano Capicchioni.
All of the e-mails people are sending are here.
http://www.virtus.it/BolognaXKobe/BolognaXKobe.asp
ESPN says Virtus Bologna offered Kobe Bryant $6.7 million dollars before taxes.
That means that they offered him €2.85 million euros net income for one season (how the salaries are counted in Europe).
Apparently, Kobe isn’t commanding that much on the European market, considering that Nenad Krstic gets €3.0 million euros net a year, Ersan Ilyasova gets €2.7 million euros net a year, Juan Carlos Navarro gets €2.5 million euros net a year, Vassilis Spanoulis gets €2.4 million euros net a year…………..
lol Imagine a world where Kristic is making more than Kobe??!!! That might have to do with Kobe having an out-clause on the contract while Kristic and the others don’t. Also while in the NBA those players were role players or back-ups, they are probably the highest paid players in Euroleague so Kobe would still be one of the top paid players in that league . I know it sound small but a Euroleague team can’t afford to pay him over $20 million a year like in the Lakers so it’s better for Kobe to make $6.7 million than nothing. The crazy thing is some team is paying Kristic over $6.7 million. Dude couldn’t get off the bench in Boston last year!!
Also does anyone know how much D-Will is making?
Turkish rumours…
According to some Turkish sources, Deron Williams might get $200k per month after taxes with Besiktas. As reported by his European agent, Williams will have a chaffeur, the personal security and assistance 24/7.
Using euros as the currency, and using the NET income (AFTER taxes amounts)……..
So far (as of September 25th, 2011) the top 10 paid players in European professional club basketball for the 2011-12 season are:
Mehmet Okur – €3.5 million euros net income
Turk Telekom Ankara (Turkish League/EuroChallenge)
Deron Williams – €3.5 million euros net income
Besiktas Istanbul (Turkish League/Eurocuop)
Nenad Krstic – €3.0 million euros net income
CSKA Moscow (Russian League/Euroleague)
Rudy Fernandez – €3.0 million euros net income
Real Madrid (Spanish League/Euroleague)
Ersan Ilyasova – €2.7 million euros net income
Efes Istanbul (Turkish League/Euroleague)
Juan Carlos Navarro – €2.5 million euros net income
Barcelona Basket (Spanish League/Euroleague)
Vassilis Spanoulis – €2.4 million euros net income
Olympiacos Piraeus (Greek League/Euroleague)
Dimitris Diamantidis – €2.0 million euros net income
Panathinaikos Athens (Greek League/Euroleague)
Mike Batiste – €1.9 million euros net income
Panathinaikos Athens (Greek League/Euroleague)
Milos Teodosic – €1.9 million euros net income
CSKA Moscow (Russian League/Euroleague)
Now the key is to use the formula that NBA agents use for converting this into the equivalent salary in the NBA. They use 1.42 as a yearly average to convert to US$ dollars and then 2.0 to convert into gross income terms (BEFORE taxes), as NBA contracts are listed in gross terms. While European contracts are listed in the amount of money earned AFTER the taxes are already paid by the player, and the European clubs pay the tax processing and accounting fees for the players also.
This figures in that NBA players have an average of local taxes of all the 30 NBA cities deducted where they play the games at (yes even players that play in states with no state tax still pay the local tax of where they play the game)………….
they get federal taxes deducted, they have to pay their agent fees (most clubs in Europe pay the agents for the players), they have to pay their NBA union fees, and they have to pay their fees for the NBA retirement fund.
So, you take the net euros income and multiply by 1.42 for average yearly conversion into $US dollars and then by 2.0 to figure the net income difference as opposed to gross income contracts like in the NBA.
Then, you figure in the bonuses that European players get, that NBA players do not get. For example, house or apartment, car and/or driver, maids, expenses/utilities paid by the club etc. It varies from club to club what they get. But you figure that amount then into the conversion to NBA salary equivalent because NBA teams do not pay for houses and cars for their players. And if it was allowed, it would obviously be included in the salary.
The 2.0 multiplier is actually in most cases a conservative estimate, as in most cases, it is actually even higher than double in terms of the difference between gross and net income.
So, using the amounts that each player gets in these bonuses from these particular clubs for their houses, cars, etc. and then converting by the multipliers, and rounding the figures (that’s how NBA agents do it) we get the following as the top 10 NBA salary equivalents in European pro club basketball:
(keep in mind that this methodology that agents use to convert the European salaries into their NBA salary equivalents is actually a bit of a conservative estimate)
Deron Williams – $10.3 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Mehmet Okur – $10 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Nenad Krstic – $8.9 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Rudy Fernandez – $8.9 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Ersan Ilyasova – $8.1 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Juan Carlos Navarro – $7.5 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Vassilis Spanoulis – $7.2 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Dimitris Diamantidis – $6.1 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Mike Batiste – $5.8 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
Milos Teodosic – $5.8 million dollars per season NBA salary equivalent
No Kobe.. no party ?!? Why not…
http://www.diarioshow.com/notas/2011/09/26/69211-ginobili-todavia-no-rechace-la-propuesta-del-bologna.html
[...] Sabatini’s ambition, if not necessarily his grip on reality. For weeks, we were told about various outrageous deals advanced to Bryant to play for his Virtus Bologna: We heard about Kobe shopping for property in Italy, mysterious sponsors coming on board to help [...]