Their businesses should be toxic but league owners have no problems with them.
In December 2017, Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson fell on his sword and in doing so, probably spared National Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell some ridicule and embarrassment by announcing he was selling his Carolina Panthers business. The Panthers owner allegedly made suggestive sexual comments to women and used a racial slur while addressing an African American Panthers scout. Richardson paid accusers to make them go away. Richardson was fined $2.7 million by the league. But Richardson, who was 81-years-old at the time, put his business up for sale 12 hours after a Sports Illustrated report came out that detailed his problems. Richardson got David Tepper to give him two billion, two hundred and seventy million dollars for a business that cost him $150 million to get in 1993 as an NFL expansion team. In NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s mind and probably most of his 31 owners and the Green Bay Packers Board of Directors, there is no reason to cut loose Daniel Snyder, the owner of the Washington Football Team. There was a culture of sexual harassment uncovered taking place in Snyder’s business. A number of his employees were fired and through a leak of embarrassing emails, Las Vegas Raiders coach Jon Gruden resigned. But the NFL won’t release the findings of its investigation into Snyder’s business saying a 10-million dollar fine and less control over his business was good enough punishment.
Meanwhile, the Wirtz family is still running the Chicago Blackhawks. There seems to be no push to get rid of the Wirtz family after the release of findings of a probe that Chicago Blackhawks organization of the National Hockey League glossed over a charge of a May 2010 sexual assault. Three people have lost jobs but Rocky Wirtz is still there, a two-million-dollar fine is enough punishment. Snyder and Wirtz may be too powerful to be tossed out.
Evan Weiner’s books are available at iTunes – https://books.apple.com/us/author/evan-weiner/id595575191
