Millions For Muscles

July 15, 1997

There has been a confluence of recent events and an historic singularity that stimulated my thoughts about the astonishing rewards that society bestows on the star athlete.

This conjunction associates the baseball players in the Major Leagues’ All-Star Game, the notorious Tyson biting Holyfield’s ear twice, and the story of Maximin in the 7th Chapter of Volume I of Edward Gibbon’s (unabridged) THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

If a baseball player is a star, he can command millions of dollars a year. Albert Belle has an eleven million dollar contract for five (?) years. Similarly many others although for lesser millions. I believe the New York Yankees have a salary budget for players of sixty-nine million dollars this year. At the end of the season, there will be a number of players qualifying as “free agents”, who will move to another team for a raise in the millions of dollars.

I came across a bit of doggerel verse which seemed apropos:

“The Center Fielder:
In the shadow of DiMaggio he stands,
Eclipsed by Willie, Mickey and the Duker,
Who – despite his mediocrity – commands
more lucre.”

Mike Tyson’s purse in the Holyfield bout was thirty million dollars, or so it has been written. In being suspended for the outrageous “pay for chew” action in twice biting Holyfield’s ear and being fined 10% of his purse, Tyson must make do with about twenty-seven million. My sympathy is extremely difficult to locate. But then, boxing as a sport has never appealed to me – I have never attended a bout.

However much I am surprised by such dollar rewards for professional athletes, I make no judgment on the merits of such pay. The immense sums paid to some corporate CEOs seem more out of whack than the incomes of professional athletes. The economics of professional baseball and football are neither in my area of information nor my capacity for comprehension.

But in rewards for athletes, Maximin tops them all because his physical prowess made him a Roman Emperor about 1862 years ago.

According to Gibbon, about 230 C.E. Emperor Alexander Severus with his troops was in Thrace, returning from an expedition. Maximin was a young barbarian of giant stature who asked to compete for the wrestling prize in the contest being staged by the Praetorian Guard. In one afternoon, Maximin threw sixteen of the best wrestlers of the troops; the next morning he threw six more.

These feats were enough to secure Maximin attention from the Emperor. Then he was chosen to head the 4th Legion, which, under his stern leadership became the best disciplined of the whole army.

In 235 C.E. the troops proclaimed Maximin Emperor, and they hastened to murder Alexander Severus. (A frequent pattern of leadership change in those declining years of the Roman Empire).

Gibbon writes that Maximin was eight feet tall, could drink seven gallons of wine in a day; eat thirty to forty pounds of meat a day; could crumble stones in his hand and tear up small trees by the roots. Somewhat unbelievable, but Gibbon who frequently expresses some skepticism about the reliability of some of his ancient sources, does not do so in the case of Maximin.

Maximin had the wealth of the Empire at his hand – money and privileges even the highest paid quarterback or left-fielder would envy. But like so many of his predecessors and successors, Maximin was a cruel despot, executing thousands for supposed treasonous acts.

Thus, in 238 C.E. Maximin, along with his son, was abandoned by the Guard and murdered by the troops. His brief years as Roman Emperor reminded me of Shakespeare’s lines in MEASURE FOR MEASURE, (Act II, Sc. 2), where Isabella says to Angelo,

“O, it is excellent
To have a giant’s strength, but it is
Tyrannous
To use it like a giant.”