Hall of Fame receiver Michael Irvin is not jealous of Davante Adams and Tyreek Hill for the enormous contracts they received this offseason.
“Not at all,” Irvin recently told The Post when asked about the massive paydays Adams and Hill received — deals worth about $30 million annually — with the Raiders and Dolphins, respectively.
“That’s the nature of this game. The salary cap is over $200 million now. When I was playing, it was $60-80 million, so the money in the league has grown exponentially. No, I’m not jealous about it. I’m happy about it.”
Long before joining the social media engagement and life-streaming platform TradeZing, which educates users about stocks, cryptocurrency, NFTs, and the Metaverse, the company’s newly minted investor and adviser had spent his entire NFL career with the Cowboys, who selected him 11th overall in 1988.
In 1995, Irvin signed what was then a gigantic NFL contract, five years totaling $15 million. The now-56-year-old remembers Drew Pearson, a Cowboys wideout from 1973 through 1983, exclaiming how much money it was, and responding that “I’m going to be saying that about other guys as we move forward and this league continues to grow.”
Irvin marveled how Adams and Hill had potential opportunities to take big-money deals in Green Bay and Kansas City but opted to go elsewhere, leaving behind “those quarterbacks.”
“You left Aaron Rodgers and Patrick Mahomes — I don’t know if I could’ve ever left Troy Aikman,” Irvin said — and you could hear him shaking his head through the phone. “I don’t think I could’ve done that.”
When asked whether or not the dynamics of living in Las Vegas or Miami may have factored into the receivers’ decisions, Irvin didn’t believe that should be a logical factor.
“You can still go live there in your house in the offseason, but I’m not leaving those quarterbacks,” he said. “Let’s see how this plays out. You’re making $30 million and you can have houses in two places. I think the most important thing is taking care of what’s on the football field.
“They had some great quarterbacks. I’m interested in seeing how it works out with Tua [Tagovailoa] and [Derek] Carr, but it’s surely not Mahomes and Rodgers. If you make that move, do you shorten the time you’re making $30 million a year because all of a sudden, you’re not making the same impact? This is a meritocracy. If you’re not putting up the numbers to support that $30 million, they’ll come for you, just like Dallas did with Amari Cooper and his $20 million. It would’ve been hard for me to make a business decision on leaving those quarterbacks.”
The Raiders have faith in Carr, Adams’ college teammate at Fresno State, as the organization agreed to a three-year, $121.5 million contract extension with the quarterback on Wednesday. Tagovailoa, meanwhile, is entering his third season with the Dolphins, and his first under new head coach Mike McDaniel.
Though Irvin — much like the rest of NFL fandom — will have to wait until September to see how the season unfolds, in the meantime he’s zoning in on his new business venture with TradeZing.
“This is the future right here, this space,” he said. “I heard so much about it. You hear about Bitcoin and crypto, and I said, ‘I need to know this as we move forward.’ I don’t know much, and I’m learning, but boy, if you miss this moment — there’s a lot of opportunity down the road. You have to get on board. This is the future.”
