Financially, being an NFL owner is hard. You need a big bottom line, not to mention deep pockets to pay the players, too. You also have to pass muster with what Mike Florio of PFT calls “the Oligarchy,” which is one of the most unique collection of rich owners in sports.
As impressive as their resumes are, there’s one common problem these guys have. The savvy business sense they displayed in building their wealth tends to go out the window, and rather than just hiring good football people and getting out of their way, they insist on making bad decisions they had no business making in the first place. It happens to the best of them, but these four owners who have perfected it into a dysfunctional art form.
David Tepper, Carolina Panthers
You knew this guy would be at the top of the list, right? The Panthers owner has added a special kind of ineptitude to the role of runaway owner, especially when you consider how far over the decorum line he’s willing to go to make himself look like a fool. Throwing drinks and harassing business owners is seemingly nothing for him, and that comes on top of a foundation of firing coaches like doing it was an annual wardrobe update.
We’re still waiting for Mt. Tepper to explode this year, though. New coach Dave Canales hasn’t been able to fix Bryce Young, who looks like a bust. We know Tepper is somehow going to go off about this and do something goofy, the only question is when and where.
Jimmy Haslam, Cleveland Browns, did the worst deal in NFL history
Usually, bad decisions aren’t insurmountable—unless you’re the guy who traded for DeShaun Watson, knowing he had 20+ recent lawsuits for sexual assault on his record. And you were foolish enough to give him a $230 million deal with all of it guaranteed, which is now easily the worst contract in NFL history.
There’s no coming back from that kind of bad decision, especially given how quickly Watson’s physical skills and decision-making are deteriorating. The quarterback is making his future a lost cause, and the longer Haslam and the Browns wait on making the obvious call, the worse it makes them look.
Woody Johnson, New York Jets
The Jets have “elevated” bad decision making into an art form, but it’s rare to see owner Woody Johnson out in front of the decision process this visibly. Unfortunately, he almost has to be, because we’re dealing with Aaron Rodgers here.
Someone got head coach Robert Saleh fired this week, but we still have no real idea who it was. It might have been Rodgers, or it may have been Johnson. Or it could have been a combination of both, with others in the building getting honorable mention. Johnson is claiming sole responsibility and Rodgers is denying having a role, but no one would be surprised to learn down the road that Rodgers took a behind-the-back knife to his boss’s coaching career.
Shad Khan, Jacksonville Jaguars
The Jags owner had seemingly graduated from this group when he quickly pushed the “eject” button on the ill-advised Urban Meyer hiring and hired quarterback whisperer Doug Pederson to turn Trevor Lawrence into a top NFL quarterback.
One small problem: it hasn’t worked. Lawrence had regressed this year to the point where he’s a shell of his former self, and no one seems to know if this can be turned around. There’s been a lot of blaming and finger-pointing out of Jacksonville lately, which is usually a sure sign that a turnaround is a no-go.
But the writing’s more than on the wall now for Khan. It’s sitting in front of him, big as a billboard, in bold capital letters--Pederson needs to go. The coach has gone into the same passive-aggressive shell that got him fired in Philly when things started to south there, and while rehabilitating Lawrence’s decision making deserves on last stab, it’s more than clear that Pederson isn’t the guy who’s going to do that.