How Much NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell Makes

The National Football League is a professional football league in America and one of the four major North American professional sports leagues. It’s the highest professional level of American football in the world. Apart from being the most popular sports leagues in the United States, the NFL sees highest average attendance of any professional sports leagues in the world. The Super Bowl itself is one of the biggest club sporting events in the world.

Naturally, the league must make a lot of money. And the Commissioner of the NFL must have a very high salary. While the league does not operate as a tax-exempt trade association anymore and therefore doesn’t need to publicly disclose the Commissioner’s compensation, we still have information of how much he makes according to a report.

According to Ken Belson of the New York Times, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell made nearly $128 million under a two-year period of 2019-20 and 2020-21. The report says that bonuses coming from completing a new labor deal and new TV contracts added more to the total. That’s $64 million per year in salary for Goodell.

One thing to note is that Goodell made that much during the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic caused billions of dollars in losses for the league. If not for the pandemic, it’s safe to assume he would have made much more than this already staggering amount.

Goodell serves as the face of the league who has to bear the brunt of the work. Whenever the league makes a decision that the public isn’t happy with, it’s Goodell who has to hear it. But it’s hard to feel too sympathetic for the man when he’s making 60 million a year.