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Rick Darlington made maybe 1/157th of that and his company succeeded 86 percent of the time.
Who would you rather invest in?
If you're a Washington politician, there's no question. You go with the guy who'll get you more votes.
In this case it's Wagoner. He's the head of General Motors, one of the companies lining up for a juicy slice of the $700 billion federal bailout pie.
Darlington is merely the football coach at Apopka High. He's not asking for handouts, but prep sports are getting hammered just like the auto, insurance, banking and seemingly every other industry.
The difference is high school sports has a long and proven record of producing people who contribute to society. Detroit has a long and proven record of producing Edsels, Chevettes and SUVs that get 14 feet to the gallon.
If the world made sense, politicians would be helping the business that makes lemonade, not lemons. That's not even on a remote consideration, but it should be.
The Florida State Legislature cut $332 million from the education budget in May. Depending on the sport and county, the effect has been mild to catastrophic.
Coaching, training and athletic director positions have been axed. Schedules have been cut, freshman teams eliminated and many varsity sports are facing extinction.
Meanwhile, Wall Street tanked and Washington rode to the rescue. The program was supposed to loan money to financial institutions. Now almost every distressed company is saying it deserves a break.
Frankly, if Washington wants to throw billions at a dying industry it should start with newspapers. At least Thomas Jefferson would be for preserving a free press, and I could use the job security.
Washington's largesse has instead gone to companies like insurance giant AIG. The first thing it did with its $85 billion was send executives on a luxury retreat costing $440,000. To be fair, only $23,000 of that went to spa charges.
"They're getting their pedicures and manicures and the American people are paying for that," Congressman Elijah Cummings said.
Now Ford, Chrysler and GM want $50 billion. As much as I'd hate to see the U.S. auto industry go bankrupt, has there ever been a more deserving fate?
If the Big Three were a basketball team, it would be the Washington Generals. Detroit has spent decades making inferior products, kissing up to unions and losing billions. Did you know GM is the world's largest buyer of Viagra?
It spent $17 million on erectile dysfunction in 2006 as part of its $5.6 billion health-care bill for employees. There are about 200,000 of them, meaning a $50 billion bailout would work out to $250,000 per employee.
The issue is too complex to fully air here. It's just infuriating to see so much money being thrown at proven losers while proven winners go begging.
Check that. Among the many lessons sports teaches are self-reliance and personal responsibility.
"Whatever you're dealt, you deal with," Darlington said.
High schools all over America are raising their own money. It goes to things like buying kids dinner at Golden Corral. Apopka players get the treat if they have a 3.0 or higher GPA.
More than half the team did last semester. For every story you read about academic fraud or thug players, there are dozens of successes you never hear about.
"Sports has so many good things," Darlington said.
It's a travesty that so many kids may never learn them. Maybe guys like Darlington should spend less time coaching and more time getting pedicures.
David Whitley can be reached at dwhitley@orlandosentinel.com.
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