Heather O’Reilly on Fox Business

Heather O’Reilly of the U.S. women’s World Cup team on coming in second place in the FIFA World Cup and how much money she lost in potential endorsements by not winning. Yes, this is Fox News. I wonder if they’re going to hack her cell phone after the show.

They sure cut to the chase though didn’t they. I guess this is Fox Business channel so they have every right, asking O’Reilly how she makes ends meet with such a paltry salary playing in the WPS.

The women anchor, sorry, don’t know her name, puts it like this: "No offense, you’re not riding the gravy train." To her credit, the classy O’Reilly smiles after the question and answer as best as she can.

I wonder if they asked Hopo Solo or Alex Morgan if they wanted to go on FOX? Did Heather O’Reilly get the short end of the stick and had to go on FOX instead of hitting the red carpet for the Entourage

premiere.

Jeff Kassouf of Sports Illustrated wrote a piece on the salaries of the women’s professional league and here are some of the details:

The average WPS player salary in 2010 was about $27,000, with U.S. Women’s national team players and top internationals earning around double that. To the average person, that sounds like a modest wage. In most cities it is barely livable. Yet players and team owners could be facing a standoff in this free agency period.

So, give or take, let’s say Heather O’Reilly is making about $60,000 a year. Not terrible, and then I’m sure she has some endorsement deals and also gets paid by the U.S. national team. In the end, that’s not to say she’s not living like a college student, but not far off either.

The Brazilian superstar on the other hand, she isn’t doing too badly at all, earning $500,000 per year playing in the WPS. I guess she’s on the gravy train as they would say on Fox Business channel.