Tag: Sell the Team

Dan Snyder isn’t selling the Washington Football Team, but buying more of it

Among endless calls for him to sell the team, Washington owner Dan Snyder is working to buy more shares and become the sole owner.

After a tumultuous 2020 left Washington Football Team owner Dan Snyder changing the name of his team and at the center of several lawsuits that involved both infighting in the front office and sexual harassment allegations, there were many calls from the fan base for him to sell his stake of the team, and even multiple part-owners looking to cash out as well.

Instead of selling the team and giving many fans what they want, Snyder is doing the exact opposite; he is now working to buy the remaining shares and become the sole owner, according to multiple reports.

Here is the explainer from the New York Times on Wednesday morning:

Support for Snyder’s purchase comes as the N.F.L.’s investigation into sexual harassment claims made against former Washington Football Team executives concludes. In the coming days, Commissioner Roger Goodell may address the findings collected by Beth Wilkinson, a Washington-based lawyer whom Snyder hired last summer to investigate after several Washington Post articles reported widespread sexual harassment of women who worked for the team over a 15-year span. The N.F.L. took over her investigation from Snyder.

So one of the most controversial owners in the NFL, a man who is at the center of multiple lawsuits and an ongoing investigation into sexual harassment under his watch, is being made more power, and the NFL is encouraging it? Yep, that’s what it sounds like.

However, this new move, if approved by the rest of the NFL owners next week, would not mean that the investigation from Beth Wilkinson is over.

There is still a chance that the owners do not reach an agreement in a vote to allow this, but that seems unlikely, considering the NFL is one of the parties pushing for this.

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Report: Dan Snyder is still not planning to sell the Washington Football Team

It’s been a tumultuous year for Dan Snyder, but a report from Adam Schefter shows that he still has no intentions of selling the team.

The past year has been quite a ride for Dan Snyder and the Washington Football Team.

After being forced to change the team name after decades of pressure, Snyder found himself with mounting lawsuits that alleged sexual harassment in the front office, and growing vitriol with shareholders and minority owners, with seemingly everyone around him looking to either get out or pushing for him to sell the team. Meanwhile, the on-field product was improving, with new head coach Ron Rivera finding a way to take a mediocre product and make the franchise’s first playoff appearance since 2015.

So what does this mean now? Well, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, Snyder has no plans of going anywhere.

“He’s got no plans and no intent to sell that franchise. Ever,” Schefter said Friday, via NBC Sports Washington. 

However loud the calls from fans get for Snyder to sell the team, we’ve never gotten any real indication that he would want out. A report arose last week that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was interested in buying an NFL franchise, with the WFT high on his wishlist, but none of that is possible unless Snyder was willing to take a step to the side.

That appears like it won’t be happening anytime soon, and Snyder is likely to put up a fight, as he has been doing for much of the past year in the numerous lawsuits that he’s been a part of. It seems that the only way he’d sell the team is if the NFL forced a sale, based on the findings of their investigation into the team’s actions regarding the sexual harassment allegations.

“I think in the NFL rarely are there any absolutes, rarely is everything black and white,” Schefter said. “But I can tell you that today, even though there are all these limited partners putting pressure on him and even though there are a lot of people that want him to sell and even though there are a host of issues, unless the NFL steps in and forces him to sell that franchise, which could happen, he’s not going to voluntarily step up and sell that team. I feel very comfortable in saying that.”

We don’t yet know if the findings of that investigation are going to be made public, but earlier this week, the 20 former Washington employees wrote a letter to the NFL demanding that transparency is used and that the public be informed of the findings. Whether Roger Goodell listens is another story.

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Report: Dan Snyder attempts to block limited partners’ sale of Washington Football Team

A legal battle is brewing in Washington as Dan Snyder reportedly has attempted to block the sale of stakes in the team by limited partners.

The Washington Football Team is in the news for reasons other than football once again, this time with it having to do with team owner Dan Snyder reportedly trying to block the sale of stakes in the team from limited partners.

According to a report from the New York Times, three minority partners in Washington wish to sell their shares of the team, which consists of about 40% stake, but Snyder is holding up the sale, which has led to the partners asking for a federal judge to get involved.

“Such filings are rare in the opaque world of buying and selling N.F.L. teams,” wrote Ken Belson and Katherine Rosman. “Most ownership disputes are handled in-house by a league arbitrator, but by taking it to court, the minority shareholders are signaling the depth of the discord with the majority owner, Daniel Snyder.”

The three minority owners are Fred Smith, Robert Rothmann and Dwight Scharr, who have agreed to a $900 million price. Snyder, however, has offered to buy out Smith and Rothmann’s shares but doesn’t want to allow Scharr’s 15 percent sale to go through.

We’ve known of discord among owners for much of the summer now, with several partners and sponsors played a pivotal role in getting Snyder to move away from the team’s former name and mascot. It’s unclear what will happen next, but important for fans to know that there is a legal battle brewing behind the scenes in Washington.

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