As a Cowboy fan, it won't surprise me one bit when Synder revels that Jerry Jones is just as big of a POS as he is. Jerry Jones is Donald Trump with a football team.
The end of Dan Snyder owning the Washington Commanders?
- Thread starter JP4CY
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I think that is almost common knowledge at this point. But he has been instrumental in increasing the league's revenue that the other owners will protect him.
I don't want to make this political, but there are two funny/sad Trump and football stories.
In 1981, Donald Trump tried to buy the Baltimore Colts before they eventually moved to Indianapolis. The thing is, one cannot just buy an NFL team because you have the most money. The other NFL owners have to approve letting you into their exclusive club, and they collectively decided they didn't want to deal with Trump at league meetings or running his mouth in front of any camera and microphone in the same ZIP Code, so they turned him down. And as you imagine, Trump fumed at the slight and looked around for a path to revenge.
So he bought the New Jersey Generals of the USFL and forced the league, which potentially viable as a spring league, to move to the fall to directly challenge the NFL while suing the NFL on antitrust grounds. The suit failed and the league immediately collapsed. So Trump killed the USFL almost on his own. Kind of your typical Trump venture -- mostly a stunt that's a pretext for a lawsuit that never seems to end well.
In 2014, Trump tried to buy the Buffalo Bills after Ralph Wilson died and before Terry and Kim Peluga (the current owners) bought the team. Same story -- other owners didn't want to deal with Trump so they went with somebody else. Trump again fumed and, combined with the cancellation of The Apprentice for low ratings, he suddenly had lots of time on his hands in early 2015. We all know what happened next with him.
The USFL might be celebrating its 40th anniversary had the owners let him have the Colts. And a whole lot of things about the last decade would have been different if they let him have the Bills.
Yes, but Jerry is smart enough to stay out of politics. You can get away with being a POS in this country. Just don't flaunt it.
It's hard to say Trump won when the USFL folded due to the expenses of the lawsuit and moving the league season to the fall. They court found in their favor and estimated damages at $1. A pyrrhic victory if there ever was one.
The USFL was struggling quite a bit before Tr*** pushed to move it to the fall. The USFL likely wasn't going to make it a lot longer. He just sunk the boat faster. The San Antonio owner was telling players to hold off on cashing the game paychecks a few times.
Sure, saving "Redtails" for say the "Birmingham Redtails" if Alabama were to ever have an NFL would be neat, but I don't think that's going to happen. The Tuskegee Airmen aren't something of regional pride for Alabama or the Southeast, though. It is a story that all Americans should regard with pride. Naming a team from the national capital after them while simultaneously honoring all veterans of WWII with the nickname would have been incredibly classy... so of course Snyder misses the opportunity with the lame "Commanders."
This reminds me of the idea to rename the Montreal Expos as the Washington Grays after the old Negro League team. Instead we ended up with the acceptable but generic Washington Nationals. "Redwolves" wouldn't have been terrible, but I want to hold the "Wolves" name for Kansas City when they inevitably have to rebrand due to... well, reasons... and renaming themselves after KC Wolf would work fine for me.
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And now Washington has responded
It's getting good
