Seth Wickersham co-authored an ESPN story with Don Van Natta last week that Daniel Snyder was lobbying the NFL to limit how much of and what from the Mary Jo White report goes public, perhaps using his agreement to sell the Commanders as leverage to get the NFL to cooperate.
However, as Wickersham told BMitch & Finlay Wednesday, he knew a sale was more than just an idea after a previous story he published last fall, and thinks that by the time a year passes from that story, Snyder will be gone.
“I’m still not sure it’s definitely going to happen,” Wickersham laughed, “but the story we published last fall about Snyder and all the dirt he was collecting really rubbed owners the wrong way, and you had Jim Irsay come out and speak about removing him – and then two weeks later, he announces they’re exploring a sale. You had Tanya Snyder not getting warmly received by fans, and I think it was obvious they didn’t want him anymore and he knew it, so they started to move. I still think there are hurdles to overcome, but my gut tells me that by the season opener, Dan Snyder will not be the owner of the Washington Commanders.”
And as for the idea that Snyder, who also agreed to step away from the team years ago when a Beth Wilkinson report was minimized, might be using his own unpopularity as leverage?
“Yeah, and I think a lot of that has been exposed, and it’s my opinion that we’re looking at someone who is desperate, or was desperate at the time, to and onto his team by any means possible,” Wickersham said. “In my opinion, he’s using the fact that the NFL wants to get rid of him so badly, and is living in a post-Snyder world at the moment, as leverage to try to get other things that he wants – including legal indemnification, which I don’t think he’ll get from the Harris group, and limiting what’s public of the Mary Jo White report. He’s trying to attach strings to him selling, knowing how badly everyone wants him gone.”
Moving onto that new ownership, Wickersham got a copy of the prospectus the Harris group sent
“What makes it interesting is that it exists in the first place,” he said. “Usually, when an NFL team comes up for sale, you don’t need to put together a prospectus for potential investors; all you need is the knowledge that it’s an NFL team and will appreciate, and the NFL is so powerful in America. But, because Snyder wanted at least $6 billion, and there are so few who can afford to put down the 30 percent of the team in cash NFL owners are required to, he needs to solicit limited partners, so this was a fascinating window into how he’s marketing the team.”
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And there were two particular things that stood out to Wickersham in reading the 43-page prospectus.
“I think the two things that stood out were number one, his confidence that once Dan Snyder is gone, there are piles of revenue waiting to be earned from sponsors and a fan base ready to return,” Wickersham said, “and number two, the fact that the team told him they could potentially get up to $1.5 billion for a new stadium in Virginia. That is a fascinating piece of data.”
The document also revealed the numbers behind that expected revenue bump, including the idea that they could more than double local revenue in the next eight years, going from $171 million last year to $380 million, more if they build a new stadium, by 2031-31.
“I think that’s what the Harris group is expecting,” Wickersham said. “I’m not a financial wizard, but I asked people who are familiar with this prospectus go through it with me, because you don’t get to see the raw financial figures for NFL teams that often, and they think there will be a Harris bump. Will they essentially double local revenue in the next 10 years or so, or more if they have a new stadium? Those were open-ended things, but when you look at these documents, you try to discern the realistic projections from the rosy ones, and I think this document had a little of both.”
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Oh, and when it comes to that stadium, and the possible ten-figure sum from Virginia among other ideas, there’s the fact that Harris is willing to invest $188 million immediately into FedEx Field to improve the structure and the fan experience, even if it is just for the short-term, which is something fans should at least be excited about in that short-term.
“We’ve obviously seen the videos of fans falling out of the stands and things like that showing the shape it’s in, but look: every billionaire sports team owner has pluses and minuses on their resume as an owner,” Wickersham said, “but on of Harris’ pluses is that he provides juice into teams. The prospectus includes information about how the Sixers went from 27th to fifth in ticket sales, and I think he’s asking potential investors to give him some faith with this. This investment shows that he’s not Dan Snyder, and when people looked at this document, it showed how far Snyder has run this team into the ground. So, when you talk about $100 million needed for immediate structural repair, that’s an example of that.”
Listen to the whole interview above!
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