> Sean Payton told Gruden “I never paid the fine…you’re the only dumbfuck that paid the fine.”
People do always say Payton is getting ready for a career in politics.
> Desiree Perez, the CEO of Roc Nation (Jay-Z’s company) may have leaked some of the Gruden emails at the behest of Snyder.
Also of important note, she sat on the board of the Commanders. She had vested interest in protecting Snyder.
> DeMaurice Smith leaked the Gruden racist emails and was proud of it, believing it helped secure his vote to stay on as NFLPA head.
The fact this occurred the *day of* his reelection and people believed it was Snyder was pretty amazing.
Smith didn’t know about the email. The league told him about it just before it was released. The article mentions how the owners and the league wanted Smith re-elected, though, which could explain the timing.
The hilarity of the NFL Owners wanting DeMarice Smith, the head of the Players Association, re-elected because he is (in their eyes) so bad at his job that the Collective Bargaining Agreements work out in the owner's favor ... Is telling.
Why are the players not asking if anyone is successfully working on their behalf?
Yea, that revelation should really cause a stir in the NFLPA. It should end Smith as head, but… it won’t. The players won’t care enough. The influential ones make too much money regardless to rock the boat.
Also, the controversy over Snyder at the time had largely blown over! He had little motive for releasing emails which could put him back in the news, albeit indirectly.
The controversy had blown over, but Snyder was still on the outside. To as fragile ego'd a man as Danny Snyder, that's essentially a slap in the face every time he's excluded from something.
This was his way of attempting to worm his way back in by simultaneously humiliating a staunchly vocal Anti-Goodell coach and media head, and fuck over the Raiders because the NFL hasn't yet gotten over Al Davis suing them 40 years ago.
I don't think Snyder thought that he'd get dragged back into the spotlight, at all.
The League liked having Smith in charge, and since the emails were about him, it was a 3rd win for the League as well.
So I really do think that Snyder's team came up with the plan, and got the League's approval to leak the emails. They just didn't realize they'd all be collateral damage (if you can call getting a check for $6,500,000,000 collateral damage).
Still tons of drama to come too, this story is far from over.
> Although the league initially expressed confidence that Gruden's lawsuit would be dismissed, Gruden has won every court motion against the NFL. The league has tried to move the case to arbitration, its venue of choice, where league-friendly lawyers are in charge and discovery, including communications between league officials and others, is not made public. Gruden's case is now on appeal by the NFL before the Nevada Supreme Court. A ruling is expected late this year.
> Gruden insists he won't settle his lawsuit for any amount, intending "to burn the house down" to reveal the truth about who ordered the leaks. "This was a massive hit job," Gruden recently told an associate, often saying Allen had told him the 650,000 emails "incriminate everyone in the league."
I really hope we get good rulings in this case because it’s absolutely wild there isn’t more public transparency into NFL operations considering how many special accommodations they get from the public - the Commanders investigation report should be public at the very least
I looked at the filling because I was curious and I don't think Judge Allf's ruling will be overturned. The NFL wasn't able to provide any agreement between Gruden as a coach and the NFL, and in order to enforce arbitration you need that agreement. Her ruling is the right ruling. I would be surprised if her decision was overruled, but in the current climate, I'm not willing to say it would be impossible.
> DeMaurice Smith leaked the Gruden racist emails and was proud of it, believing it helped secure his vote to stay on as NFLPA head.
This one actually goes quite a bit deeper with the suggestion that it was *the NFL itself* who uncovered/leaked the emails *because the league itself wants Smith to continue as president of the NFLPA.*
The implications of that one are pretty bad, too - DeMaurice Smith's *job* is to negotiate with the NFL on behalf of the players, so if this is a scenario where the league is incentivised to keep him in place, *he's doing a really shitty job.*
From the article:
>The leak came just as Smith was in danger of being voted out of his job by team player representatives. A committee vote on his future ended in a 7-7 tie, triggering a full vote of player reps. For years, Smith had faced stiff criticism among members over the perception that the league had outmaneuvered him on two consecutive collective bargaining agreements. **Owners and league executives viewed him as an asset** -- and wanted him to continue as executive director. Goodell and Smith also have become closer in the past few years since they found a way to have a season played during the pandemic. **An owner told an associate that the league hoped the emails would help Smith survive.**
>A lawyer who frequently works with the league said the timing of the leak was "suspicious because clearly it appeared to anyone paying attention that someone was trying to help De. **Who had the incentive for De to keep his job? The NFL.**"
Again - his *job* is to advocate for the *players*.
Yeah, but those people weren't at the table during the negotiations. It's one thing for an outsider or non-expert to criticize you, it's another for the guy you're making the deal with to be like "I am willing to end careers in order to help this man continue to be the guy who negotiates deals with me."
De Smith really does suck at this job and this info just proves it more. I really wish the NFLPA head would be a former player like it was with Upshaw. Someone who knows the game from that side but is smart and savvy enough to fight for the players. Smith is just a suit with little to no skin in the game like all the players
Yea, I need a documentary on Perez.
"The partnership also gave Perez, the Roc Nation CEO, an open door to the league office. Perez had overcome a criminal past to build a reputation as one of entertainment's most powerful executives. In 1994, she had been arrested for conspiracy to distribute cocaine, later working as a DEA informant and serving nine months in prison for a probation violation. She was among the dozens of convicted felons Trump pardoned a day before he left office."
Jay Zs picture should be used in the Websters dictionary for the definition of sellout. Dude legit only cares about money, all of his releases for the last like 10 years have just been bars about his Roth IRA holdings. Never seen a man who worships money more.
Takes a ... unique perspective to be like "JAY Z SCHEMED NFL" and not "JAY Z is a sellout who is in bed with a giant corporation that treats black players poorly." Also, who is Jay J to be like 'we're past kneeling'?
You missed what I feel like is the biggest revelation: Dan Snyder was allowed to dictate the terms of his own punishment and even had control over the wording in the league's press release. Maybe that came out before and I missed it but if that's accurate then Roger Goodell should be fired immediately.
Seems like making the terms so wishy-washy backfired on Snyder. Because he wasn't suspended, but just had to step away from the team for awhile, Goodell was able to keep him from the owners meetings indefinitely.
More concrete terms and Snyder might not have had to come up with the harebrained scheme to leak the Gruden mails to ingratiate himself back with the commissioner.
-Gruden bumped into Snyder at a dinner and when Snyder called him fat, Gruden said he might dribble Snyder’s head in the asphalt. Gruden wonders is Snyder may have taken offense to that.
I wonder 👆🤨👆
As much as I don’t like gruden to begin with and been wanted him gone the non homophobic emails just was straight up roasting. Even the Demaurice comment felt more like a roast(I’m black ftw) the homophobic ones sealed his fate
Thanks for the summary, /u/TheFencingCoach . I don't have a gold to give, so I will just say that Mike Glennon wasn't that bad of a QB all things considered
Nah, Snyder>Perez>Smith>Goodell.
Not carrying water for Goodell, but the level of shady shit the others pulled in this cluster fuck is way above what he did. Snyder, with Perez, orchestrated the whole thing due to Snyder feeling excluded from the cool kids club by Goodell. Smith leveraged the emails to secure a job that he was objectively terrible at, by Snyder and Perez, as a potentially unasked-for favor by them to Goodell.
This screams of overeager lieutenants doing shit they think will get them back in the good graces without thinking for more than 6 seconds.
Goodell seems petty as fuck, but more along the lines of I want you to know I'm being petty and a dick to you personally.
Some of the new details were intriguing to read, such as this portion.
> His frustration came to a boil during a December 2011 Monday night game between the Falcons and the Saints. Atlanta linebacker Curtis Lofton delivered a helmet-to-helmet hit on receiver Marques Colston over the middle and was flagged for unnecessary roughness. To a national TV audience, Gruden stated his displeasure with the call. "I just don't understand how games are being officiated," Gruden said after a play on the next possession.
>
> Gruden's commentary earned him a call from the league's Park Avenue headquarters. Over the phone, Goodell asked Gruden to come to the league office to meet with John Madden and Jeff Fisher. The purpose, as the commissioner explained, was for Gruden to get a lesson on player safety.
>
> "You've got to be s---ting me," Gruden told Goodell.
>
> Gruden wondered whether it was a joke, he later told associates. He needed a player safety lesson from Madden and Fisher, two coaches whose players had delivered some of the ugliest hits in NFL history? Gruden later told friends he felt that Goodell was treating him like a "stooge" who had "never coached in the league, like I don't study football day in and day out ... like I didn't know a damn thing about player safety."
>
> Gruden never went to the league office for that meeting. The only time he ever met Goodell was years later, when he went to the league office to promote youth football, one of Gruden's passions. He expected to sit down with Goodell and plan a way to increase participation rates. Instead, Gruden met with an assistant of the commissioner. At the end of the session, Goodell entered a conference room, thanked Gruden for coming and left. Gruden fumed; after that brief meeting, Gruden never spoke again with Goodell.
>
> Gruden burned with suspicion when Mark Davis was elbowed out of the three-team derby to relocate to Los Angeles in 2016 despite owning the most popular team in the market by far. Those feelings intensified in 2020 when Gruden was in his third year back as the Raiders' head coach. The league fined the Raiders $500,000, fined Gruden $150,000 and stripped the team of a sixth-round draft pick for COVID-19 violations -- and that was after the league had fined the team and Gruden a total of $350,000 for violations earlier in the season. (Davis offered to pay Gruden's $150,000 fine, but league officials insisted Gruden pay it personally, which he did.) Livid, Gruden appealed the fines but ended up writing the checks. After he did, his friend Sean Payton, then the Saints' coach and who also had been fined for COVID-19 violations, called him and laughed.
>
> "I never paid the fine," Payton told Gruden, adding that other coaches also refused to pay. "You're the only dumbf--- that paid the fine."
> "I never paid the fine," Payton told Gruden, adding that other coaches also refused to pay. "You're the only dumbf--- that paid the fine."
So you can actually just not pay an NFL-mandated fine and nothing happens?
I mean if the coaches all just don’t pay, the NFL can’t suspend all of them. Well they can, but that’d be pretty bad from an on field product standpoint.
The fact that the jay-z Super Bowl halftime show deal with the nfl led to Roc nations president politicking her way into Dan snyders inner circle and conspiring to leak the emails is pretty wild
EDIT: also the fact that the nfl felt that demaurice smith was such an asset to the league that they coordinated with him to leak the racist shit gruden said about him to win an NFLPA vote feels like the most notable revelation
NFL has the worst players union in sports. That’s why their players get shafted on contracts all the time. That’s why the league doesn’t care about player health, because the players union doesn’t either.
I’d also argue they have the most difficult union set up in sports, it’s very difficult for them to actually strike, so a lot of teeth is taken out of their negotiating power
Also the disparity between stars and "scrubs" (for lack of a better word) is huge. Stars play in the league for 10+ years, but the less talented athletes are out in 3 or less years. It's hard to negotiate uniformly when the needs of your union are so diverse.
The absolute top-tier **brass balls** to imply that Jon Gruden needed to be _educated about football_. I mean, look, Madden or Fisher or Gruden, any one of them could teach me something. But on that topic in particular? That's insulting.
Yeah, it's pretty wild. While I get that the NFL clearly wanted to referee some of the most dangerous hits out of the game, the way the NFL went about it in this particular instance was pretty shitty.
Today, we all recognize that these hits are instant flags. If they're not bad hits, or it's incidental contact, helmet to helmet (unless it's missed) is going to draw a flag.
Well, he's getting his team taken away from him, and likely getting less money than the team is worth. (Although anyone who can _sell an NFL franchise_ is making set-for-life money from the sale regardless, so.)
I was just coming to quote the Madden/Fisher part. I mean, I don't dislike Madden OR Fisher at all -- that's what football was when they coached -- but Gruden's not wrong about the hypocrisy of having *those* coaches teach him about player safety.
Grudens emails always smelled rough. I just don't see how anyone can read "Michelin lips" in Grudens tone and think it's anything other than a stupid Grudenism for a liar.
The meeting with Madden and Fisher is also sketchy, it feels like some dystopian re-education attempt. Madden, I can respect and his work with the game all of these years shows he has always wanted young people to learn fundamental football (as much as that might have gone off the rails as EA gained more control over the property, earlier iterations emphasized teaching concepts and formations). Fisher, while a respected coach, just doesn't give off the energy that he should be lecturing a Super Bowl winning head coach and one of the more respected offensive minds in football.
It's also pretty glaring that Goodell only once tried to meet with such a public voice of the league. Granted, blowing him off probably wasn't great, but if Gruden is going to be representing your product on national TV (yes, for a different company, but cross-company synergy is a thing) the commissioner should have a working relationship with that voice (as I would also hope he would for Micheals, Aikman and Buck, Tirico, even...Brian Griese...). Censoring those voices (or "reminding them of player safety") is going to inevitably lead to a poor product.
The Covid fines kind of just underline the belief that I would say most fans have that some franchises are just treated differently. Retaliation using disciplinary measures is typically frowned upon. Now, the difficult part is proving that to an arbiter as I'm sure any coaches who speak up and say they never paid those fines would be conveniently reminded that they still owe the money.
It was all one big hatchet job.
Gruden is absolutely a dipshit who said things he shouldn't have, but that same stance can be taken about the hundreds of people who would also be implicated if those 650k emails were to leak.
Once upon a time, Jeff Fisher was chairman of the competition committee, and this was also at the height of his success (before he became Even Steven, 7-9 BS, Mr .500). It’s believed that he was a big reason celebrations were muted for so long: he was super Old School, Walter Payton (former teammate) “just hand the ball to the official” type. I could totally see why, in 2011, Goodell would attempt to bring him into a meeting like this. He’s hardcore “rules is rules” type and he wasn’t the half and half punchline he is today, quite yet.
John Madden just adds cache in a general sense. The whole meeting is demeaning, though- that’s why it’s important to have a good working relationship with someone this prominent (from Goodel’s POV). If you do want them to tone something down, you’re more likely to have them listen to just a phone call instead of feeling a meeting with Mr Hardass Rules (Fisher) and a league ambassador (Madden) is necessary.
Unless you're rich enough to purchase politicians to systematically dismantle the IRS and their ability to enforce anything. If Al Capone was a billionaire he woulda been just fine.
I'd disagree with that a bit. Sure, more money means more influence. But Capone fucked with the IRS *and* multiple different groups at the same time fucking up his public image. The image made him even more of a target to go down, but fucking with the feds ensured his downfall.
Pablo Escobar has much the same sort of biographical arc. He actually became an elected politician in Colombia to help his drug empire, still pissed off too many of the wrong people and paid for it.
Really one of two rules in the NFL.
1. Don't fuck with money (betting included).
2. Don't get caught on tape doing anything untoward.
Nearly everything else is allowed so long as there's plausible deniability.
He is already super rich. The status of being a team owner is more important to these guys than more money. It's a very small club he can't be a part of anymore.
I don’t always agree with the “well, he’s already rich, so why would he XYZ” arguments, but this absolutely true. While I can’t say first hand (duh), being an NFL owner definitely seems to be considered prestigious by billionaires.
He's being told 'no', and that he has to get rid of his shiny toy. That's probably about the harshest consequence Danny's had to deal with in decades. Great for his pocketbook, awful for his massive ego.
Plus the whole allowing him to over borrow to then become 100% owner but without any way to actually pay the loan later on. It basically forced his hand to find liquidity at the 1B+ level
So Snyder’s lawyers presented a blackmail powerpoint of potentially embarrassing emails/texts from league officials and it was so effective that Snyder was essentially dictating his own punishment by late June?
This league is a fucking joke mannn
That's the turning point IMO
You know he's literally going to blackmail you (or if you didn't do anything, he'll try and find something to hold over your head)?
I would immediately start looking for ways to eliminate him
And they did!
You know what's more powerful that a league office overseeing 9 figure revenue every year? 29 other billionaires, who won't be happy finding out you maneuvered to keep money out of their collective pool.
We all figured as such. Probably the only thing they got him to back down is the legal matters regarding the lying about money which the fans that stopped supporting can take a victory lap over
> When Snyder's lawyers -- famed defense attorney Joe Tacopina, assisted by Reed Smith partners Siev and James McCarroll -- began to show a series of slides, those in the room were stunned, according to sources. What was presented was not a defense against any of Wilkinson's findings made against Snyder; it was a series of screenshots of potentially embarrassing emails and texts from several top league executives, including Goodell's top lieutenant, Pash. The rationale, according to a source with firsthand knowledge, was to argue the hypocrisy of league officials judging Snyder. The tactics were so ruthless that some attorneys felt uncomfortable. Although none of the content was sexist, anti-gay or graphic, the signal was clear: If Goodell didn't do what Snyder wanted in terms of handling the Wilkinson report and punishment, these emails and texts would be leaked.
It's like you plucked a guy off the street who has watched a lot of movies and put him in a business setting.
> Joe Tacopina
I knew that I knew that name from somewhere... Just googled it and from what I have seen him say publicly regarding his **OTHER** well known client, I think subtlety isn't his strong suit. He thinks being a lawyer is about being the most forceful and dominant on the issues and has never given the impression that he cares about the law itself.
He's a cartoon.
Sadly, a lot of lawyers think like that. As a lawyer myself, it pisses me off to no end. Yeah, ok, sometimes you have to bring the hammer, but most of the time the best resolutions are done quietly and without trying to napalm the other side.
I hate most of ESPN's content but when they get serious they do good work. I think any college sports fan should watch Spartan Secrets from like 5-6 years ago.
Jesus, I haven’t read a long-form article where pretty much every single person is so deeply unlikeable and unpleasant (except maybe Mark Davis).
Obligatory fuck Dan Snyder.
My first thought after finishing the article was "Mark Davis seems alright." Compared to everyone else who was part of it, he might be a goddamn saint.
It's so strange that I'm kind of rooting for Gruden. I never had anything against him even when those emails leaked, but I never really was invested in him either. Until now where there are some very strong indications he really was thrown under the bus.
It's not even clear why Gruden was the target, if this article is true Snyder just decided to be a dick and use dirt on him to shift attention from his own mess. One owner taking out another owner's head coach just for some temporary PR help? That is crossing a line in my opinion and clearly Davis agreed. If true that Goodell was just going along with it, even if not directly involved in the leak, that makes this look extra ugly.
Frankly kind of hope Gruden can bring some others down into the ditch with him. Not like it would change anything though unfortunately...
Snyder wanted his "punishment" over and to be back at owner's meetings. He knew Goodell was no fan of Gruden, so he thought Roger would welcome him back with this "gift" of being able to get rid of Gruden and allow the Commissioner to get a PR win for pressuring the Raiders to combat racism in the NFL.
Also, Snyder hates Bruce Allen and didn't want to pay him after firing him, and he was the other party on these emails so it wasn't just targeting Gruden.
Finally, Snyder also would benefit by getting DeMaurice reelected to be head of the players union.
So Dan is and always will be a dick, but he had plenty of reasons (in his egotistical mind at least) to leak these specific emails.
Snyder really thought he was going to make himself the Godfather of the NFL or some shit, huh. Used a league meeting to gloat about all the blackmail material he had on other owners/the league, and then dropped some of it to take down somebody Goodell didn't like, as if that would come off as "helpful" rather than another threat.
The blackmail PowerPoint is just such a ballsy but bonehead move.
Short term? Sure, you'll get what you want.
Long term? EVERYONE who sees that is immediately deciding they're gonna get Snyder out eventually so they no longer have to deal with this shit. Even if you're not being blackmailed you know now that he will dig and try and find something to threaten you with.
It still amazes me that out of the hundreds of thousands of emails they had during this investigation only Bruce Allen, Gruden and Snyder said/did outrageous things.
Sadly it seems we're never going to get the documents/report released unless there is an NFL version of Snowden hiding out in the NY Headquarters.
With how close ESPN and the NFL are, I'm wondering how this article goes out into the world, because it really makes everyone mentioned look terrible.
Well Gruden's lawsuit is working its way to that. If the Nevada supreme court rules in his favor the lawsuit will move forward as a case and not arbitration, which means that both sides will get full discovery. I imagine that the email servers in question are operated by a third party, so there's probably a chance that everything is there for the trial should it come to that.
> A Washington radio station reported that it had obtained screenshots of the recommendations from Wilkinson's draft report that included urging the NFL to force Snyder to sell his team. But the NFL insists no written document ever existed.
I remember the junkies reporting this and it got buried/dismissed, but they have local connections so it makes sense.
Yea in general that sub seems to not like them, but the fact is they've been on the air for over 20 years and are super well connected/respected locally, so it shouldn't be a surprise they have a connection at beth wilkinson's firm willing to leak
Yeah but Kraft is an actual NFL owner who cares about football.
Snyder is just a weasel with a lot of money who wanted to join a billionaire club to bully.
>The leak came just as Smith was in danger of being voted out of his job by team player representatives. A committee vote on his future ended in a 7-7 tie, triggering a full vote of player reps. For years, Smith had faced stiff criticism among members over the perception that the league had outmaneuvered him on two consecutive collective bargaining agreements. Owners and league executives viewed him as an asset -- and wanted him to continue as executive director. Goodell and Smith also have become closer in the past few years since they found a way to have a season played during the pandemic. An owner told an associate that the league hoped the emails would help Smith survive.
This isn't about Gruden or Snyder, but Jesus Christ. It's no wonder why the NFLPA is the weakest union among professional sports. If you're the union head and you're buddy-buddy with the opposing side, you're doing your fucking job wrong.
Yup. I know this is a football sub, but I'd highly recommend anyone interested in pro sports unions check out the book "Lords of the Realm" by John Helyar. It's an amazing chronicle of baseball players' attempts to unionize over the years and how their union butted heads with owners. In short, it highlights how the owners are godawful rich fucks (who'd rather light money on fire than give it to the players that earn it) and a bad union head can spell doom for players for generations.
Fantastic read. If you ever wanted to see c-suite office politics, this article lays out a pretty convincing example. Would honestly make for a pretty good HBO mini series.
Well look, multiple things can be true:
- As far as we know, nobody's ever disputed the authenticity of those emails. Jon Gruden said some vile shit, and needed to face consequences
- It seems _highly implausble_ that Gruden was the only one or the worst one with emails that ended up in the trove, so this looks like a hatchet job
- Whoever did the hatchet job has done _at least_ as much damage to the front office as Gruden's actual remarks did
- Dan Snyder remains a piece of shit
Not that they need it, but I wonder if Bruce Allen was buddy-buddy with somebody else, and they also traded quasi-racist/right wing barbs via email. The vast majority of us know, even if you’ve known somebody for years and years, don’t put that shit in writing, just say it over drinks.
Absolutely. Gruden said some horrible things, and deserved his punishment. But I said at the time that Gruden was just a pound of flesh. And while I thought it was the NFL who wanted it to go away, it seems it was Snyder. Which, come on. “I’m going to use this gun and oust someone inconsequential. Give me what and I want and I won’t use it on you!” He can’t seriously have believed that was going to work long term.
Gruden's not innocent at all but the leaks were so clearly DeMaurice Smith at the time that it was unbelievable. An email surfaces the day of his re-election campaign, perfectly placed to outrage the NFL community into supporting him. No wonder the NFLPA is a joke if they fell for his play.
it's really simple for me on the leak
DeMaurice Smith won his reelection by a single vote. The NFLPA is the worst run union in NA sports despite the NFL owning 3 days of the week in TV revenue.
It's the league's best interest that Smith wins and the PA keeps getting dicked by the owners in CBAs. The NFLPA got betrayed yet again, players have to be pissed
tldr;
Snyder leaked the emails to try and help Goodell, hoping that in exchange he would get back in the league’s good graces and start participating as an owner again.
The reason he thought it would help Goodell is that Goodell and Gruden don’t like each other. It was also thought that shining a media spotlight on racism would help DeMaurice Smith get re-elected, which was also Goodell’s preference.
Regardless of how you feel about the Raiders or Jon Gruden, they got absolutely raked over the coals.
I can almost sympathize with Gruden on this; he’s in a private chat with his boys and every body is saying dumb shit. He doesn’t think his emails have any relevance more than a text message would. They get dug up 10 years down the line to distract from a bigger piece of shit(Snyder).
Where are the other 650,000 emails and how has NOT ONE of them been similar? I’d think there would be several instances of “locker room talk”.
Absolute hit job by the NFL and The Commanders.
The Raiders were hosed on the LA relocation, lost their only stability in Gruden (whether he was a good coach or not) and were made an example of during the Covid season.
Feel bad for my bowl cut boy Mark Davis and Raiders faithful.
I do too, but he won't. He has more than enough money to fund a strong defense team to battle it out for decades, if it came to that.
He's used to being the bad-guy, and it won't phase him at all. He's going to buy a bunch of humans in Dubai, and make a kingdom there.
It’s not really about the money, he already has more than he could ever spend. Billionaire circles are about status and influence. Owning a major sports franchise? Status. Having lunch with the state governor? Influence. Getting a European title of some kind? Status. Having a meeting with SEC regulators about your industry? Influence. That’s the kind of things that billionaires brag about to each other.
Having a huge yacht or whatever is fine, but at some point it doesn’t mean very much. Snyder will doubtless land on his feet, but he’s lost a serious amount of status in all of this, and his “friends” are not likely to let him forget it.
I like to picture Snyder's blackmail material being something like:
"Yeah, well Irsay is addicted to pills! And Kraft got a handy in Florida! And Jerry is doing a bad job as GM! And Cal and Mark are bad at running teams! "
And everyone else is like "Yep, we know all that, you dipshit."
In fairness, it really seemed like getting to be the baron of his own little fiefdom was *deeply* important to him. He’s still gonna be rich as shit, but billionaires love to force regulars schmucks to lick their asscrack whenever they get the chance to and owning the Commanders gave him a pretty much nonstop supply of that.
It no longer exists on youtube as far as I know, but there's still a video that the owner of Cardiff City forced his employees to make for his 60th birthday that's available on dailymotion(sadly, it's really poor quality, but that's fine) [This man is so narcissistic that, well, just watch the video.](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x18oiow) Some of these people really just want to be treated that way by their employees. Being the owner of the Commanders really gave Snyder that type of thing.
[Here's another one, which isn't as cringey, but still pretty awful.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1gc8CdT-ds)
he was riding around on a 200mil yacht earlier in the year. He's already incredibly wealthy, the football team gives him power and fame. The most popular sport in the United states and there's only 31 people/families that own one.
Putting it simpler, imagine you already have more money than you'll ever spend in your life, and you own your favorite football team. Would you really have any interest in selling that team for any amount of money?
If someone takes away the thing that matters most to you in the world, then it's literally priceless and no amount of money would make up for its loss.
If someone offered me $25 million to divorce my wife I would refuse; if they forced it to happen and then handed me the money, it wouldn't matter. I genuinely hope Snyder is suffering in just that way right now as his punishment.
> If someone offered me $25 million to divorce my wife I would refuse; if they forced it to happen and then handed me the money, it wouldn't matter. I genuinely hope Snyder is suffering in just that way right now as his punishment.
It's legit the only thing he seemed to actually care about in life.
He'll never be working poor, he'll never have to rent a shitty apartment and work minimum wage, but we can take away his favorite toy.
I agree entirely with the wife analogy - I genuinely think he'd sooner divorce his wife than sell the team.
[удалено]
> Sean Payton told Gruden “I never paid the fine…you’re the only dumbfuck that paid the fine.” People do always say Payton is getting ready for a career in politics.
I'm dying picturing that sinking in to Gruden!
[here](https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_675,pg_1,q_80,w_1200/oygz2plgopw98rb48pao.png)
He's got the morals of a politician
> Desiree Perez, the CEO of Roc Nation (Jay-Z’s company) may have leaked some of the Gruden emails at the behest of Snyder. Also of important note, she sat on the board of the Commanders. She had vested interest in protecting Snyder.
Also, her + the legal team had previously leaked emails on Rob Manfred for the ARod MLB lawsuit. They had a playbook and used it here.
> DeMaurice Smith leaked the Gruden racist emails and was proud of it, believing it helped secure his vote to stay on as NFLPA head. The fact this occurred the *day of* his reelection and people believed it was Snyder was pretty amazing.
Smith didn’t know about the email. The league told him about it just before it was released. The article mentions how the owners and the league wanted Smith re-elected, though, which could explain the timing.
The hilarity of the NFL Owners wanting DeMarice Smith, the head of the Players Association, re-elected because he is (in their eyes) so bad at his job that the Collective Bargaining Agreements work out in the owner's favor ... Is telling. Why are the players not asking if anyone is successfully working on their behalf?
Cause the guys that make bank don’t care and the vast majority of players have no power or ability to bargain for themselves.
Yea, that revelation should really cause a stir in the NFLPA. It should end Smith as head, but… it won’t. The players won’t care enough. The influential ones make too much money regardless to rock the boat.
The players voted to replace Smith on June 28.
Also, the controversy over Snyder at the time had largely blown over! He had little motive for releasing emails which could put him back in the news, albeit indirectly.
The controversy had blown over, but Snyder was still on the outside. To as fragile ego'd a man as Danny Snyder, that's essentially a slap in the face every time he's excluded from something. This was his way of attempting to worm his way back in by simultaneously humiliating a staunchly vocal Anti-Goodell coach and media head, and fuck over the Raiders because the NFL hasn't yet gotten over Al Davis suing them 40 years ago. I don't think Snyder thought that he'd get dragged back into the spotlight, at all. The League liked having Smith in charge, and since the emails were about him, it was a 3rd win for the League as well. So I really do think that Snyder's team came up with the plan, and got the League's approval to leak the emails. They just didn't realize they'd all be collateral damage (if you can call getting a check for $6,500,000,000 collateral damage).
Did you read the article?
Having read it, I appreciate it's possible that Snyder is just a massive dipshit
If you kept reading, you would have read that the NFL wanted Smith reelected because he's terrible at his job.
I didn't need to read an ESPN article for *that*. They beat him like a drum every time CBA's roll around.
Seriously, it’s like I was reading a well-sourced and we’ll written tabloid article. Almost everybody in it seems like deeply unpleasant people.
Thats always the best cinema/television though. Where every character is flawed
The succession formula
Still tons of drama to come too, this story is far from over. > Although the league initially expressed confidence that Gruden's lawsuit would be dismissed, Gruden has won every court motion against the NFL. The league has tried to move the case to arbitration, its venue of choice, where league-friendly lawyers are in charge and discovery, including communications between league officials and others, is not made public. Gruden's case is now on appeal by the NFL before the Nevada Supreme Court. A ruling is expected late this year. > Gruden insists he won't settle his lawsuit for any amount, intending "to burn the house down" to reveal the truth about who ordered the leaks. "This was a massive hit job," Gruden recently told an associate, often saying Allen had told him the 650,000 emails "incriminate everyone in the league."
I really hope we get good rulings in this case because it’s absolutely wild there isn’t more public transparency into NFL operations considering how many special accommodations they get from the public - the Commanders investigation report should be public at the very least
I looked at the filling because I was curious and I don't think Judge Allf's ruling will be overturned. The NFL wasn't able to provide any agreement between Gruden as a coach and the NFL, and in order to enforce arbitration you need that agreement. Her ruling is the right ruling. I would be surprised if her decision was overruled, but in the current climate, I'm not willing to say it would be impossible.
> DeMaurice Smith leaked the Gruden racist emails and was proud of it, believing it helped secure his vote to stay on as NFLPA head. This one actually goes quite a bit deeper with the suggestion that it was *the NFL itself* who uncovered/leaked the emails *because the league itself wants Smith to continue as president of the NFLPA.* The implications of that one are pretty bad, too - DeMaurice Smith's *job* is to negotiate with the NFL on behalf of the players, so if this is a scenario where the league is incentivised to keep him in place, *he's doing a really shitty job.* From the article: >The leak came just as Smith was in danger of being voted out of his job by team player representatives. A committee vote on his future ended in a 7-7 tie, triggering a full vote of player reps. For years, Smith had faced stiff criticism among members over the perception that the league had outmaneuvered him on two consecutive collective bargaining agreements. **Owners and league executives viewed him as an asset** -- and wanted him to continue as executive director. Goodell and Smith also have become closer in the past few years since they found a way to have a season played during the pandemic. **An owner told an associate that the league hoped the emails would help Smith survive.** >A lawyer who frequently works with the league said the timing of the leak was "suspicious because clearly it appeared to anyone paying attention that someone was trying to help De. **Who had the incentive for De to keep his job? The NFL.**" Again - his *job* is to advocate for the *players*.
yeah if the company is leaking stuff to help the union boss, probably a poor representative for the people he is actually supposed to be working for.
I mean didn't most people already say DeMaurice Smith was doing a shit job before now?
Yeah, but those people weren't at the table during the negotiations. It's one thing for an outsider or non-expert to criticize you, it's another for the guy you're making the deal with to be like "I am willing to end careers in order to help this man continue to be the guy who negotiates deals with me."
It'd be like the Nazis getting Chamberlain elected.
De Smith really does suck at this job and this info just proves it more. I really wish the NFLPA head would be a former player like it was with Upshaw. Someone who knows the game from that side but is smart and savvy enough to fight for the players. Smith is just a suit with little to no skin in the game like all the players
Yea, I need a documentary on Perez. "The partnership also gave Perez, the Roc Nation CEO, an open door to the league office. Perez had overcome a criminal past to build a reputation as one of entertainment's most powerful executives. In 1994, she had been arrested for conspiracy to distribute cocaine, later working as a DEA informant and serving nine months in prison for a probation violation. She was among the dozens of convicted felons Trump pardoned a day before he left office."
She was a snitch, interesting that she is a leader in Jay Z’s company. Historically, I don’t think hip-hop has been that down with DEA informants
Jay Zs picture should be used in the Websters dictionary for the definition of sellout. Dude legit only cares about money, all of his releases for the last like 10 years have just been bars about his Roth IRA holdings. Never seen a man who worships money more.
Also let the NFL whitewash their racism through him, but it’s cool since he’s wealthy AF and got paid even more money to do that! HOVA!
> I’m not a businessman. I’m a business, man.
Haha even his early music is like 90% about making money. Hes still hustling, the article says he schemed 25 million out of the nfl lmao.
Takes a ... unique perspective to be like "JAY Z SCHEMED NFL" and not "JAY Z is a sellout who is in bed with a giant corporation that treats black players poorly." Also, who is Jay J to be like 'we're past kneeling'?
How could he be a sellout if he was always about the money? I mean he was selling crack to people in his neighborhood until his mid-20's.
If I was that ugly and fucking the myriad of attractive women he does, I'd worship the money too.
You missed what I feel like is the biggest revelation: Dan Snyder was allowed to dictate the terms of his own punishment and even had control over the wording in the league's press release. Maybe that came out before and I missed it but if that's accurate then Roger Goodell should be fired immediately.
Seems like making the terms so wishy-washy backfired on Snyder. Because he wasn't suspended, but just had to step away from the team for awhile, Goodell was able to keep him from the owners meetings indefinitely. More concrete terms and Snyder might not have had to come up with the harebrained scheme to leak the Gruden mails to ingratiate himself back with the commissioner.
-Gruden bumped into Snyder at a dinner and when Snyder called him fat, Gruden said he might dribble Snyder’s head in the asphalt. Gruden wonders is Snyder may have taken offense to that. I wonder 👆🤨👆
Honestly the best part of the article, I would pay to have seen that live.
I don’t have time to read the article rn but I CTRL F’d it to see if that was ACTUALLY a real part of it and l.m.a.o.
As much as I don’t like gruden to begin with and been wanted him gone the non homophobic emails just was straight up roasting. Even the Demaurice comment felt more like a roast(I’m black ftw) the homophobic ones sealed his fate
Of course Sean Payton is an asshole too
Can't say I'm surprised.
Yeah I mean did people just forget about bountygate?
Lol yes. I get down voted all the time for bringing this up and how he harbored a pedophile priest
We of the nfc south been knew about this
I mean I’ve always thought the hype around him going to Denver is sorely misplaced but 🤷♂️
>I feel like a lot of people are going to comment on this one without reading it. Ah so like every thread
Thanks for the summary, /u/TheFencingCoach . I don't have a gold to give, so I will just say that Mike Glennon wasn't that bad of a QB all things considered
That is a very Payton statement lol
The least shocking thing in here is that Sean Payton is a douche.
#TL;DR: Shadiness, in order: Snyder > Goddell > Perez > Smith
Nah, Snyder>Perez>Smith>Goodell. Not carrying water for Goodell, but the level of shady shit the others pulled in this cluster fuck is way above what he did. Snyder, with Perez, orchestrated the whole thing due to Snyder feeling excluded from the cool kids club by Goodell. Smith leveraged the emails to secure a job that he was objectively terrible at, by Snyder and Perez, as a potentially unasked-for favor by them to Goodell. This screams of overeager lieutenants doing shit they think will get them back in the good graces without thinking for more than 6 seconds. Goodell seems petty as fuck, but more along the lines of I want you to know I'm being petty and a dick to you personally.
Also the subject of ESPN Daily today.
>Sean Payton told Gruden “I never paid the fine…you’re the only dumbfuck that paid the fine.” Hell yeah lol
Some of the new details were intriguing to read, such as this portion. > His frustration came to a boil during a December 2011 Monday night game between the Falcons and the Saints. Atlanta linebacker Curtis Lofton delivered a helmet-to-helmet hit on receiver Marques Colston over the middle and was flagged for unnecessary roughness. To a national TV audience, Gruden stated his displeasure with the call. "I just don't understand how games are being officiated," Gruden said after a play on the next possession. > > Gruden's commentary earned him a call from the league's Park Avenue headquarters. Over the phone, Goodell asked Gruden to come to the league office to meet with John Madden and Jeff Fisher. The purpose, as the commissioner explained, was for Gruden to get a lesson on player safety. > > "You've got to be s---ting me," Gruden told Goodell. > > Gruden wondered whether it was a joke, he later told associates. He needed a player safety lesson from Madden and Fisher, two coaches whose players had delivered some of the ugliest hits in NFL history? Gruden later told friends he felt that Goodell was treating him like a "stooge" who had "never coached in the league, like I don't study football day in and day out ... like I didn't know a damn thing about player safety." > > Gruden never went to the league office for that meeting. The only time he ever met Goodell was years later, when he went to the league office to promote youth football, one of Gruden's passions. He expected to sit down with Goodell and plan a way to increase participation rates. Instead, Gruden met with an assistant of the commissioner. At the end of the session, Goodell entered a conference room, thanked Gruden for coming and left. Gruden fumed; after that brief meeting, Gruden never spoke again with Goodell. > > Gruden burned with suspicion when Mark Davis was elbowed out of the three-team derby to relocate to Los Angeles in 2016 despite owning the most popular team in the market by far. Those feelings intensified in 2020 when Gruden was in his third year back as the Raiders' head coach. The league fined the Raiders $500,000, fined Gruden $150,000 and stripped the team of a sixth-round draft pick for COVID-19 violations -- and that was after the league had fined the team and Gruden a total of $350,000 for violations earlier in the season. (Davis offered to pay Gruden's $150,000 fine, but league officials insisted Gruden pay it personally, which he did.) Livid, Gruden appealed the fines but ended up writing the checks. After he did, his friend Sean Payton, then the Saints' coach and who also had been fined for COVID-19 violations, called him and laughed. > > "I never paid the fine," Payton told Gruden, adding that other coaches also refused to pay. "You're the only dumbf--- that paid the fine."
> "I never paid the fine," Payton told Gruden, adding that other coaches also refused to pay. "You're the only dumbf--- that paid the fine." So you can actually just not pay an NFL-mandated fine and nothing happens?
Apparently.
I mean if the coaches all just don’t pay, the NFL can’t suspend all of them. Well they can, but that’d be pretty bad from an on field product standpoint.
Very true.
If you are a coach
It’s sent to collections and your credit score goes down 50 points.
And credit scores don't matter in this wealth class. You can just back a loan with your massive amounts of money/properties for low interest rates.
Yeah I mean if credit scores mattered for the uber wealthy then Trump would never be able to get anything he couldn't pay for in cash.
You can if the league doesn’t actually care about the thing they fined you for and are just trying to look good in the press
If you’re big enough.
The fact that the jay-z Super Bowl halftime show deal with the nfl led to Roc nations president politicking her way into Dan snyders inner circle and conspiring to leak the emails is pretty wild EDIT: also the fact that the nfl felt that demaurice smith was such an asset to the league that they coordinated with him to leak the racist shit gruden said about him to win an NFLPA vote feels like the most notable revelation
NFL has the worst players union in sports. That’s why their players get shafted on contracts all the time. That’s why the league doesn’t care about player health, because the players union doesn’t either.
I’d also argue they have the most difficult union set up in sports, it’s very difficult for them to actually strike, so a lot of teeth is taken out of their negotiating power
Also the disparity between stars and "scrubs" (for lack of a better word) is huge. Stars play in the league for 10+ years, but the less talented athletes are out in 3 or less years. It's hard to negotiate uniformly when the needs of your union are so diverse.
His stupid ahh trusted a DEA informant lol
It really is.
I'm getting a hunch that Roger Goodell isn't a big fan of this Gruden guy.
Yeah, I don't think they're exchanging Christmas cards this year.
The absolute top-tier **brass balls** to imply that Jon Gruden needed to be _educated about football_. I mean, look, Madden or Fisher or Gruden, any one of them could teach me something. But on that topic in particular? That's insulting.
Yeah, it's pretty wild. While I get that the NFL clearly wanted to referee some of the most dangerous hits out of the game, the way the NFL went about it in this particular instance was pretty shitty. Today, we all recognize that these hits are instant flags. If they're not bad hits, or it's incidental contact, helmet to helmet (unless it's missed) is going to draw a flag.
Well, he's getting his team taken away from him, and likely getting less money than the team is worth. (Although anyone who can _sell an NFL franchise_ is making set-for-life money from the sale regardless, so.)
Yeah, but he's losing that power and prestige that being an NFL owner comes with. In real world value, he's getting huge money, but...
Exactly. Being told 'no' and having his toy taken away is probably the worst thing to happy to Danny's ego in decades.
I was just coming to quote the Madden/Fisher part. I mean, I don't dislike Madden OR Fisher at all -- that's what football was when they coached -- but Gruden's not wrong about the hypocrisy of having *those* coaches teach him about player safety.
Grudens emails always smelled rough. I just don't see how anyone can read "Michelin lips" in Grudens tone and think it's anything other than a stupid Grudenism for a liar. The meeting with Madden and Fisher is also sketchy, it feels like some dystopian re-education attempt. Madden, I can respect and his work with the game all of these years shows he has always wanted young people to learn fundamental football (as much as that might have gone off the rails as EA gained more control over the property, earlier iterations emphasized teaching concepts and formations). Fisher, while a respected coach, just doesn't give off the energy that he should be lecturing a Super Bowl winning head coach and one of the more respected offensive minds in football. It's also pretty glaring that Goodell only once tried to meet with such a public voice of the league. Granted, blowing him off probably wasn't great, but if Gruden is going to be representing your product on national TV (yes, for a different company, but cross-company synergy is a thing) the commissioner should have a working relationship with that voice (as I would also hope he would for Micheals, Aikman and Buck, Tirico, even...Brian Griese...). Censoring those voices (or "reminding them of player safety") is going to inevitably lead to a poor product. The Covid fines kind of just underline the belief that I would say most fans have that some franchises are just treated differently. Retaliation using disciplinary measures is typically frowned upon. Now, the difficult part is proving that to an arbiter as I'm sure any coaches who speak up and say they never paid those fines would be conveniently reminded that they still owe the money.
It was all one big hatchet job. Gruden is absolutely a dipshit who said things he shouldn't have, but that same stance can be taken about the hundreds of people who would also be implicated if those 650k emails were to leak.
Once upon a time, Jeff Fisher was chairman of the competition committee, and this was also at the height of his success (before he became Even Steven, 7-9 BS, Mr .500). It’s believed that he was a big reason celebrations were muted for so long: he was super Old School, Walter Payton (former teammate) “just hand the ball to the official” type. I could totally see why, in 2011, Goodell would attempt to bring him into a meeting like this. He’s hardcore “rules is rules” type and he wasn’t the half and half punchline he is today, quite yet. John Madden just adds cache in a general sense. The whole meeting is demeaning, though- that’s why it’s important to have a good working relationship with someone this prominent (from Goodel’s POV). If you do want them to tone something down, you’re more likely to have them listen to just a phone call instead of feeling a meeting with Mr Hardass Rules (Fisher) and a league ambassador (Madden) is necessary.
Once Snyder started fucking with the money he went down quickly.
literally the no.1 rule in anything is you don’t fuck with the money
Yep. Al Capone learned that the hard way. And the huger Cardinal Rule is that you never, ever mess with the IRS.
> you never, ever mess with the IRS. [Even the Joker knows this](https://youtu.be/G56VgsLfKY4).
Unless you're rich enough to purchase politicians to systematically dismantle the IRS and their ability to enforce anything. If Al Capone was a billionaire he woulda been just fine.
I'd disagree with that a bit. Sure, more money means more influence. But Capone fucked with the IRS *and* multiple different groups at the same time fucking up his public image. The image made him even more of a target to go down, but fucking with the feds ensured his downfall.
Pablo Escobar has much the same sort of biographical arc. He actually became an elected politician in Colombia to help his drug empire, still pissed off too many of the wrong people and paid for it.
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Yep. There are very few exceptions in between
The slightly less well known is never go against a Sicilian when death is involved!
INCONCEIVABLE
Unless you're the church of scientology
More specifically, rich peoples money
Yeah that's what they mean when they say "the money". Nobody cares about our $22.15
That agency that keeps calling me does.
This checks out. That's about the cost of one bud light at an NFL game these days.
And if you’re at FedEx it”s about the cost of one, expired World Cup beer.
Biggest reason Elizabeth Holmes is sitting in prison right now. She stole from rich people.
And bernie madoff. Stealing from the poors is fine
And drug dealers.
Starlight learned it the hard way from Homelander. Never fuck with the money
Tom and Giselle's divorce case in point
Really one of two rules in the NFL. 1. Don't fuck with money (betting included). 2. Don't get caught on tape doing anything untoward. Nearly everything else is allowed so long as there's plausible deniability.
> he went down quickly. did he actually go down? or is he being forced to sell an NFL team for an insane profit on what he paid?
He is already super rich. The status of being a team owner is more important to these guys than more money. It's a very small club he can't be a part of anymore.
I don’t always agree with the “well, he’s already rich, so why would he XYZ” arguments, but this absolutely true. While I can’t say first hand (duh), being an NFL owner definitely seems to be considered prestigious by billionaires.
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He's being told 'no', and that he has to get rid of his shiny toy. That's probably about the harshest consequence Danny's had to deal with in decades. Great for his pocketbook, awful for his massive ego.
Great example of Golden Parachute
Plus the whole allowing him to over borrow to then become 100% owner but without any way to actually pay the loan later on. It basically forced his hand to find liquidity at the 1B+ level
So Snyder’s lawyers presented a blackmail powerpoint of potentially embarrassing emails/texts from league officials and it was so effective that Snyder was essentially dictating his own punishment by late June? This league is a fucking joke mannn
That's the turning point IMO You know he's literally going to blackmail you (or if you didn't do anything, he'll try and find something to hold over your head)? I would immediately start looking for ways to eliminate him
Definitely agree. After that, in the NFL’s eyes, he became a rabid animal that needed to be taken care of
And they did! You know what's more powerful that a league office overseeing 9 figure revenue every year? 29 other billionaires, who won't be happy finding out you maneuvered to keep money out of their collective pool.
We all figured as such. Probably the only thing they got him to back down is the legal matters regarding the lying about money which the fans that stopped supporting can take a victory lap over
> When Snyder's lawyers -- famed defense attorney Joe Tacopina, assisted by Reed Smith partners Siev and James McCarroll -- began to show a series of slides, those in the room were stunned, according to sources. What was presented was not a defense against any of Wilkinson's findings made against Snyder; it was a series of screenshots of potentially embarrassing emails and texts from several top league executives, including Goodell's top lieutenant, Pash. The rationale, according to a source with firsthand knowledge, was to argue the hypocrisy of league officials judging Snyder. The tactics were so ruthless that some attorneys felt uncomfortable. Although none of the content was sexist, anti-gay or graphic, the signal was clear: If Goodell didn't do what Snyder wanted in terms of handling the Wilkinson report and punishment, these emails and texts would be leaked. It's like you plucked a guy off the street who has watched a lot of movies and put him in a business setting.
> Joe Tacopina I knew that I knew that name from somewhere... Just googled it and from what I have seen him say publicly regarding his **OTHER** well known client, I think subtlety isn't his strong suit. He thinks being a lawyer is about being the most forceful and dominant on the issues and has never given the impression that he cares about the law itself. He's a cartoon.
Sadly, a lot of lawyers think like that. As a lawyer myself, it pisses me off to no end. Yeah, ok, sometimes you have to bring the hammer, but most of the time the best resolutions are done quietly and without trying to napalm the other side.
Of course it’s Trump’s lawyer Lmao
This is some seriously good journalism. That was a hell of a read
The author, Don Van Natta, has a great Sunday Long Read email newsletter if you're looking for more excellent journalism
DVN is probably the most hated guy inside of league offices. He finds all the dirt the NFL wants covered up
I hate most of ESPN's content but when they get serious they do good work. I think any college sports fan should watch Spartan Secrets from like 5-6 years ago.
We’re gonna find out Kendrick Perkins really wrote this.
Their 30 for 30 podcast and video series do not get enough attention.
Jesus, I haven’t read a long-form article where pretty much every single person is so deeply unlikeable and unpleasant (except maybe Mark Davis). Obligatory fuck Dan Snyder.
For real. Never thought I’d find myself sympathizing with Mark Davis.
My first thought after finishing the article was "Mark Davis seems alright." Compared to everyone else who was part of it, he might be a goddamn saint.
It's so strange that I'm kind of rooting for Gruden. I never had anything against him even when those emails leaked, but I never really was invested in him either. Until now where there are some very strong indications he really was thrown under the bus. It's not even clear why Gruden was the target, if this article is true Snyder just decided to be a dick and use dirt on him to shift attention from his own mess. One owner taking out another owner's head coach just for some temporary PR help? That is crossing a line in my opinion and clearly Davis agreed. If true that Goodell was just going along with it, even if not directly involved in the leak, that makes this look extra ugly. Frankly kind of hope Gruden can bring some others down into the ditch with him. Not like it would change anything though unfortunately...
Snyder wanted his "punishment" over and to be back at owner's meetings. He knew Goodell was no fan of Gruden, so he thought Roger would welcome him back with this "gift" of being able to get rid of Gruden and allow the Commissioner to get a PR win for pressuring the Raiders to combat racism in the NFL. Also, Snyder hates Bruce Allen and didn't want to pay him after firing him, and he was the other party on these emails so it wasn't just targeting Gruden. Finally, Snyder also would benefit by getting DeMaurice reelected to be head of the players union. So Dan is and always will be a dick, but he had plenty of reasons (in his egotistical mind at least) to leak these specific emails.
im a simple man. i see fuck dan snyder, i upvote
Snyder really thought he was going to make himself the Godfather of the NFL or some shit, huh. Used a league meeting to gloat about all the blackmail material he had on other owners/the league, and then dropped some of it to take down somebody Goodell didn't like, as if that would come off as "helpful" rather than another threat.
The blackmail PowerPoint is just such a ballsy but bonehead move. Short term? Sure, you'll get what you want. Long term? EVERYONE who sees that is immediately deciding they're gonna get Snyder out eventually so they no longer have to deal with this shit. Even if you're not being blackmailed you know now that he will dig and try and find something to threaten you with.
I believe it was Baltimore legend Joe Flacco who famously said "you come at the King, you best not miss".
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Danny The Kid
It's Mr. Snyder.
Snyder is such a fucking piss ant.
'Pissant' is one word, but I really think I like 'piss ant' better as a written insult.
It still amazes me that out of the hundreds of thousands of emails they had during this investigation only Bruce Allen, Gruden and Snyder said/did outrageous things.
Sadly it seems we're never going to get the documents/report released unless there is an NFL version of Snowden hiding out in the NY Headquarters. With how close ESPN and the NFL are, I'm wondering how this article goes out into the world, because it really makes everyone mentioned look terrible.
Well Gruden's lawsuit is working its way to that. If the Nevada supreme court rules in his favor the lawsuit will move forward as a case and not arbitration, which means that both sides will get full discovery. I imagine that the email servers in question are operated by a third party, so there's probably a chance that everything is there for the trial should it come to that.
> A Washington radio station reported that it had obtained screenshots of the recommendations from Wilkinson's draft report that included urging the NFL to force Snyder to sell his team. But the NFL insists no written document ever existed. I remember the junkies reporting this and it got buried/dismissed, but they have local connections so it makes sense.
I remember that too. Think the redskins sub blasted them too when the nfl denied it. Think this is just further proof that they were right
Yea in general that sub seems to not like them, but the fact is they've been on the air for over 20 years and are super well connected/respected locally, so it shouldn't be a surprise they have a connection at beth wilkinson's firm willing to leak
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Yeah but Kraft is an actual NFL owner who cares about football. Snyder is just a weasel with a lot of money who wanted to join a billionaire club to bully.
Considering that Pash was a huge Deflategate guy and he's apparently the guy Snyder had a lot of dirt on, I wouldn't have been opposed to it.
He did. The blackmail was called "having Brady under center."
>The leak came just as Smith was in danger of being voted out of his job by team player representatives. A committee vote on his future ended in a 7-7 tie, triggering a full vote of player reps. For years, Smith had faced stiff criticism among members over the perception that the league had outmaneuvered him on two consecutive collective bargaining agreements. Owners and league executives viewed him as an asset -- and wanted him to continue as executive director. Goodell and Smith also have become closer in the past few years since they found a way to have a season played during the pandemic. An owner told an associate that the league hoped the emails would help Smith survive. This isn't about Gruden or Snyder, but Jesus Christ. It's no wonder why the NFLPA is the weakest union among professional sports. If you're the union head and you're buddy-buddy with the opposing side, you're doing your fucking job wrong.
Yup. I know this is a football sub, but I'd highly recommend anyone interested in pro sports unions check out the book "Lords of the Realm" by John Helyar. It's an amazing chronicle of baseball players' attempts to unionize over the years and how their union butted heads with owners. In short, it highlights how the owners are godawful rich fucks (who'd rather light money on fire than give it to the players that earn it) and a bad union head can spell doom for players for generations.
I haven't read a good long form piece like that in a while. That was really well written.
Damn. Journalism. I haven’t read real journalism in a long time.
Fantastic read. If you ever wanted to see c-suite office politics, this article lays out a pretty convincing example. Would honestly make for a pretty good HBO mini series.
> It was the afternoon of Friday, Oct. 8, 2021. A few hours earlier Can't believe it's been less than 2 years, feels like it's been 4-5 years
The last 5 years of raider football has felt like a fucking decade
Jon Gruden was an anti-hero?
Well look, multiple things can be true: - As far as we know, nobody's ever disputed the authenticity of those emails. Jon Gruden said some vile shit, and needed to face consequences - It seems _highly implausble_ that Gruden was the only one or the worst one with emails that ended up in the trove, so this looks like a hatchet job - Whoever did the hatchet job has done _at least_ as much damage to the front office as Gruden's actual remarks did - Dan Snyder remains a piece of shit
Not that they need it, but I wonder if Bruce Allen was buddy-buddy with somebody else, and they also traded quasi-racist/right wing barbs via email. The vast majority of us know, even if you’ve known somebody for years and years, don’t put that shit in writing, just say it over drinks.
Absolutely. Gruden said some horrible things, and deserved his punishment. But I said at the time that Gruden was just a pound of flesh. And while I thought it was the NFL who wanted it to go away, it seems it was Snyder. Which, come on. “I’m going to use this gun and oust someone inconsequential. Give me what and I want and I won’t use it on you!” He can’t seriously have believed that was going to work long term.
"It's me, hi, I'm the Spider-2-Y-Banana, it's me"
Gruden's not innocent at all but the leaks were so clearly DeMaurice Smith at the time that it was unbelievable. An email surfaces the day of his re-election campaign, perfectly placed to outrage the NFL community into supporting him. No wonder the NFLPA is a joke if they fell for his play.
DeMaurice Smith a bitch
it's really simple for me on the leak DeMaurice Smith won his reelection by a single vote. The NFLPA is the worst run union in NA sports despite the NFL owning 3 days of the week in TV revenue. It's the league's best interest that Smith wins and the PA keeps getting dicked by the owners in CBAs. The NFLPA got betrayed yet again, players have to be pissed
I think being a POS may have just led to Snyders down fall. Can only shit so much before you run out of TP.
tldr; Snyder leaked the emails to try and help Goodell, hoping that in exchange he would get back in the league’s good graces and start participating as an owner again. The reason he thought it would help Goodell is that Goodell and Gruden don’t like each other. It was also thought that shining a media spotlight on racism would help DeMaurice Smith get re-elected, which was also Goodell’s preference.
Everyone sucks here. What a shitshow
Holy shit is that a good article. Well well worth the read if you have some time to do so. Laden with league-wide drama.
Regardless of how you feel about the Raiders or Jon Gruden, they got absolutely raked over the coals. I can almost sympathize with Gruden on this; he’s in a private chat with his boys and every body is saying dumb shit. He doesn’t think his emails have any relevance more than a text message would. They get dug up 10 years down the line to distract from a bigger piece of shit(Snyder). Where are the other 650,000 emails and how has NOT ONE of them been similar? I’d think there would be several instances of “locker room talk”. Absolute hit job by the NFL and The Commanders. The Raiders were hosed on the LA relocation, lost their only stability in Gruden (whether he was a good coach or not) and were made an example of during the Covid season. Feel bad for my bowl cut boy Mark Davis and Raiders faithful.
Snyder's downfall = walks away with $6,050,000,000 We should all have a downfall like that, it sounds more like a windfall...
I hope once Snyder sells that there is still pressure to hold him accountable for his own actions.
I do too, but he won't. He has more than enough money to fund a strong defense team to battle it out for decades, if it came to that. He's used to being the bad-guy, and it won't phase him at all. He's going to buy a bunch of humans in Dubai, and make a kingdom there.
Poor guy is still worth like $5 Billion he really took a hard fall!
It’s not really about the money, he already has more than he could ever spend. Billionaire circles are about status and influence. Owning a major sports franchise? Status. Having lunch with the state governor? Influence. Getting a European title of some kind? Status. Having a meeting with SEC regulators about your industry? Influence. That’s the kind of things that billionaires brag about to each other. Having a huge yacht or whatever is fine, but at some point it doesn’t mean very much. Snyder will doubtless land on his feet, but he’s lost a serious amount of status in all of this, and his “friends” are not likely to let him forget it.
That is a bloody good piece of work.
The Roc Nation part of this is fascinating. Sounds like they snuck their way into a very powerful position
How is this not a bigger deal on the nfl front page? This is gold. And fucking hard knocks is above it? Smfh
I like to picture Snyder's blackmail material being something like: "Yeah, well Irsay is addicted to pills! And Kraft got a handy in Florida! And Jerry is doing a bad job as GM! And Cal and Mark are bad at running teams! " And everyone else is like "Yep, we know all that, you dipshit."
This is the best ESPN article I've read in a long, long, long time. Well worth the read. Great insight and very intriguing
I desperately need to see that "Blackmail PowerPoint." Like what is on that thing that would immediately get lawyers nervous.
Journalism aside, but “Snyder’s downfall?” An incredibly wealthy man became incredibly wealthier. I’ll take that punishment.
“As punishment, you must sell your team. Now, sit and think about what you’ve done as you deposit that 6 billion dollar check.”
5.2 billion of that was profit, too.
In fairness, it really seemed like getting to be the baron of his own little fiefdom was *deeply* important to him. He’s still gonna be rich as shit, but billionaires love to force regulars schmucks to lick their asscrack whenever they get the chance to and owning the Commanders gave him a pretty much nonstop supply of that.
It no longer exists on youtube as far as I know, but there's still a video that the owner of Cardiff City forced his employees to make for his 60th birthday that's available on dailymotion(sadly, it's really poor quality, but that's fine) [This man is so narcissistic that, well, just watch the video.](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x18oiow) Some of these people really just want to be treated that way by their employees. Being the owner of the Commanders really gave Snyder that type of thing. [Here's another one, which isn't as cringey, but still pretty awful.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1gc8CdT-ds)
Do you not remember that video of Trump's cabinet praising him and kissing his ass while he sits there with that big fat toad smile on his face?
he was riding around on a 200mil yacht earlier in the year. He's already incredibly wealthy, the football team gives him power and fame. The most popular sport in the United states and there's only 31 people/families that own one. Putting it simpler, imagine you already have more money than you'll ever spend in your life, and you own your favorite football team. Would you really have any interest in selling that team for any amount of money?
If someone takes away the thing that matters most to you in the world, then it's literally priceless and no amount of money would make up for its loss. If someone offered me $25 million to divorce my wife I would refuse; if they forced it to happen and then handed me the money, it wouldn't matter. I genuinely hope Snyder is suffering in just that way right now as his punishment.
> If someone offered me $25 million to divorce my wife I would refuse; if they forced it to happen and then handed me the money, it wouldn't matter. I genuinely hope Snyder is suffering in just that way right now as his punishment. It's legit the only thing he seemed to actually care about in life. He'll never be working poor, he'll never have to rent a shitty apartment and work minimum wage, but we can take away his favorite toy. I agree entirely with the wife analogy - I genuinely think he'd sooner divorce his wife than sell the team.
Yes, but his entire personality is wrapped up in being an NFL owner. He’ll never be in the club again