You seem to think that millions of dollars are rounding errors. 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% of individuals in the world would probably disagree.
That's not what I said and you're being purposely opaque.
Since NFL athletes have to file in many of the states where they play road games, much less than 100% of their income is taxed in their home states - so up to 50% of their income is taxed as road games, which makes their home field irrelevant to those games. If you play for Tampa and have to play the Chargers, the Raiders and the 9'ers, you're paying Cal tax on those 3 games.
So of the 50% remaining, since State tax is deductible on Federal tax, 39.5% of the money paid to the state would have been paid to the feds regardless of where you live.
So a player making 10,000,000 pays the jock tax on half his games, leaving 5 million for his home stadium. If that state has an absurdly high state income tax of 10%, that's a half-million tax bill. but since that 500k would have otherwise been subject to federal taxes at the 39.5% rate, the net tax bill on a 10million salary is possibly (depends on states where you play and if jock tax applies) an extra 300+k.
Since a guy making that change probably will have a multi-million house, those states where there are no income taxes typically have brutal property taxes.
So yeah, you're a little better off staying out of high-tax states, just as you're better off financially buying a home in North Carolina over southern California.
I would have been better off moving to New Hampshire from Mass, since my money comes from out of state and I get paid on 1099...but then I would have had to live in NH and I prefer Mass. If a guy like Brady or Suh is even considering these little things, he's an idiot, because he will have all he wants for the rest of his life even when he gets nibbled around the edges by a couple % here or there.
