By Jonathan Nehring | Disclaimer

Earlier today, Paula Lavigne of ESPN's Outside the Linestook a closer look at the PGA Tour's nonprofit status. Specifically, she looked at many of the tournaments along the PGA Tour that claim they are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, these tournaments are eligible for tax deductibility of donations  to their tournaments, government and private grants and many other benefits. Those benefits are specific only to 501(c)(3) organizations and do not include the additional tax savings any normal nonprofits receive such as little to no income or sales tax on revenues received or expenses paid. 

Ms. Lavigne estimates allowing the PGA Tour and it's tournaments to operate as a nonprofit organization has allowed them to save nearly $200MM in taxes over the past 20 years. All while bringing in $700MM in profits! 

I encourage you to read her article as well as look at Outside the Line's graphic that takes an in depth view of each of the 25 PGA Tour tournaments that claim they are a charitable organization. This graphic compares the charitable giving amounts to the percentage of the revenues these tournaments receive. 
Additionally, as Ms. Lavigne mentions in her article, Senator Tom Coburn from Oklahoma is currently seeking to put a change to this area of the tax code. Whether Senator Coburn's bill will become law is still to be seen but it is an effort the Senator has spent much of his time in Congress unsuccessfully trying to pass. 

If that isn't enough of a to do list for you, Deadspin put out a small piece about this same topic and Outside the Line's report will air on ESPN2 this Sunday morning at 7am CST. 

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By Jonathan Nehring | Disclaimer

This morning, Robinson Cano and the Seattle Mariners agreed to the MLB's third largest net contract in it's history - a 10 year $240M deal. This is a large amount of money by anyone's standard but it is $70M less than what Cano had originally asked for. It appears all along that Cano wanted a team to reward him the same contract Alex Rodriguez was given in 2007 by the New York Yankees to the tune of $27.5M / year + potential for incentives. It would be shocking if Cano is discouraged by a $240M paycheck that doesn't match up to what he expected to receive BUT if that does occur Cano can rest a little easier - he will be a lot closer to ARod's salary than he thinks. 

An athlete must pay state income taxes in each state they play. The Mariners and the state of Washington are one of the three states that host an MLB team but do not have any state income tax. The Yankees and New York boast the second highest state income tax rate of MLB teams with at 8.82%. With Cano playing 42% of his games in a state that doesn't charge state income taxes instead of 43% of his games in a state that collects nearly 9% more of his salary - 

Much better than the $70M pay cut he thought he would be taking.

Some food for thought - $24M per year compared to his 9 year season average equates to Cano being paid $125,000 per hit or $1,000,000 per home run. Hit the batting cages kids.

Note: This contract is tied with Albert Pujols' third highest ever MLB contract when looking at gross income but because Pujols plays for the LA Angels which reside in a 13.3% tax rate of California, Cano will make $7.3M more than Pujols over the life of the deal.

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