Upshaw is only part time 20 hrs a week

Nothing in the land of NFLPA Oz is ever as it seems to be.

An admiring sports writer in Hawaii wrote in an article in March 2006 about how NFLPA's Exec Director Gene Upshaw sitting by the hotel pool in his bathing suit filpped his lap top shut when it reached 5PM closing time in the NFLPA office in Washington DC. If he did that every day it would seem that he works a pretty standard 40 hour work week, but hold on that can’t be true unless he is paid $3 million a year for “part time” work. You see Upshaw and other NFLPA insiders spend 20 hours a week average working for the PAT fund. It says so right on the IRS form 990-PF.

Now I have to go back to paragraph 1. in my State of the League article and refigure the analysis of Upshaw’s $3 mil salary doubling all the amounts since he works 20 hrs a week times 52 weeks for the PAT. That is 1040 hours for the PAT and that leaves 1040 hours for being Executive Director of the NFLPA. That’s $3 mil a year for part time or approximately $3,000 an hour not just $1,500 an hour as I had previously calculated using the normal 2000 hour employment year.

In essence he makes $6 mil a year but donates $3 mil of that time to PAT, or, or... I’m not sure how that works.

Another red flag the PAT fund had an investment loss of over $310,000 in 2002 in Publicly Traded Securities? That doesn’t necessarily mean the stock markets as we know them just "Publicly Traded Securities." Wonder what happened there? I hope it wasn’t a victim of a Kirk Wright-IMA type hedge fund scam although Wright’s hedge fund scams were in full swing in 2002.

The PAT helped 44 people in 2002, some I recognize the names of as retired players. Most 80% I did not. I will never publish any of those names or repeat them unless they are some how related to the NFLPA or its insiders. In 36 instances a retirement benefit payment increase of $8,000 would have covered the amount needed by each person and they wouldn't have needed the PAT. I feel like those folks would much rather have received the money from their retirement plan that from the PAT.

The NFLPA's Audible claimed the PAT helped 650 retired NFL players; so far it looks like the PAT averages helping about 45 a year from the IRS 990-PF forms I have seen so far, the form 990's are available back to 1998 that would only cover 8 years. 8 times 45 = 360 maybe it goes back past 8 years. But for now it is just another red flag.