USA TODAY International Edition
NFL must cut Snyder ties for own good
For the NFL, Dan Snyder is like the bad boyfriend your friends and family all hate and who has no redeeming qualities whatsoever but who, for reasons unfathomable to anyone else, you simply can’t quit.
According to a story Tuesday by ESPN, the Washington Commanders owner is being investigated by federal authorities for alleged financial misconduct related to a $ 55 million loan he took out without the knowledge or approval of his then minority partners – a loan NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell had to approve. This follows a report Monday night by The Washington Post that Snyder is demanding the NFL and his fellow owners indemnify him against any and all legal liability if he sells the team.
That demand, The Post reported, has prompted owners to renew discussions about possibly, maybe, probably not but we really ought to consider ousting Snyder as Commanders owner.
“It just seems to get worse,” one source told The Post.
Well, yeah.
Snyder has been a constant source of embarrassment to the league for quite some time. There’s the multiple allegations of sexual misconduct, the determination of a toxic workplace and the payoff to a woman who said Snyder assaulted her. There was his decades- long refusal to change his team’s racist nickname.
There’s his inability to get a stadium done in a locale where there should be multiple options, costing the NFL and his fellow owners a bank vault’s worth of money. There are the investigations by both Congress and federal prosecutors. Shall I keep going?
Yet the NFL – Goodell in particular – has repeatedly closed ranks around Snyder and enabled his bad behavior. What was it that December report from the House Committee on Oversight and Reform said? “The NFL chose to … whitewash the misconduct it uncovered. Rather than seek real accountability, the NFL aligned its legal interests with Mr. Snyder’s ( and) failed to curtail his abusive tactics.”
And for what? Snyder isn’t Jerry Jones, who sees potential new revenue streams everywhere he looks. He isn’t Bob Kraft, who has helped broker the TV deals that have brought the league billions. He isn’t Art Rooney, who has continued his family’s tradition of being the league’s conscience.
Snyder brings nothing to the NFL. Except headaches.
The NFL should have cut Snyder loose long ago, and why Goodell and the owners haven’t will be one of the great mysteries of our time. But given he’s now put them all at risk, they have an opportunity to get rid of him.
If they can finally work up the courage to do so, that is.
According to ESPN, Snyder obtained the $ 55 million loan without informing the Commanders’ three minority partners or providing Bank of America with legally required paperwork showing he had. That, ESPN reported, could be construed as bank fraud.
Worse, the NFL is ensnared because the league must sign off on any new debt a team accrues and, ESPN reported, Goodell did. When the former partners brought their concerns to the NFL, Goodell sided with Snyder.
Now, it’s unlikely the former partners will sue the NFL or that federal prosecutors would go after the league. But NFL owners loathe the league being caught up in any kind of public messiness, especially when it could reveal even messier details about how they operate, and are likely willing to do just about anything to make this all go away.
Unlike with Beth Wilkinson and Mary Jo White’s investigations, however, the NFL can’t control what federal prosecutors do and say. Which means the NFL and owners have only one real option: Distance themselves from Snyder. Permanently.
Snyder will almost certainly threaten to sue and spill whatever, ahem, information he’s gathered about Goodell and his fellow owners over the years. While that would normally make Goodell and the NFL owners blanch, they have the upper hand in this case.
The NFL can release all the details from Wilkinson’s findings about the Commanders’ toxic culture. To be followed soon after by an exhaustive report on White’s investigation, which was prompted by a former team cheerleader telling members of Congress that Snyder had sexually harassed her.
If Snyder thinks he needs indemnity now, just wait until all the secrets in those cesspools are out in the open.
Snyder isn’t worth the trouble he causes for the NFL. Never has been. And if NFL owners don’t act now, they’re going to wind up going down right along with him.