Preposterous Pay

If future historians ever try to pinpoint the time when sport pay scales turned preposterous, they may well pick last week. In three cities money was being tossed about like so much confetti:

> In Santos, Brazil, Soccer King Pele, 34, was huddling with the general manager of the New York Cosmos of the North American Soccer League to discuss an offer that Pele described as. "the sky, the earth and the stars." In cash terms that meant a $5 million to $6 million invitation to come out of retirement to play for the Cosmos for three years and give pro soccer in the U.S. instant credibility.

> In Tuscaloosa, Ala., while the country wallowed through another week of recession, Joe Namath pondered--and eventually rejected--a contract from the recently created Chicago Wind of the World Football League that promised to give him $500,000 a year for three years of play, a $500,000 bonus, plus $100,000 annually for his first 20 years of retirement. Apparently Namath decided working behind proven blockers on a solid franchise in publicity-conscious New York was worth more than the Wind's airy millions. If he remains as the Jets superstar quarterback, he will not be poverty stricken. Their offer: a $1 million, three-year contract.

> In Los Angeles, the W.F.L. fared better, signing Southern Cal's quicksilver running back Anthony Davis reportedly for an emperor's ransom: more than $100,000 a year for three years in the backfield of the Southern California Sun, nearly $175,000 for a fourth and fifth year, $45,000 annually for 20 years after he quits, and $30,000 in supplemental income (for public relations work) for the first five seasons with the Sun. Davis also got himself a small extra for joining the W.F.L. instead of the N.F.L.: a $38,000 Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow.

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