Superbowling for cash with the NFL Billionaires Club

Amid the comedic revival of national anthems duels, TV commercials signaling virtue, and rappers touching their private parts during recess celebrations, it’s easy to forget that the Super Bowl and the NFL are really big business run by some of the most powerful business people (yes, , they are mostly male) in America.

Super Bowl spending last week was about $15 billion; the league’s annual revenue is approaching $20 billion. The league’s profits are likely to continue to rise given the popularity of this sometimes violent and increasingly lucrative sport.

Still, covering the NFL’s billionaire club is tricky. Their lust for money and power is filtered through carefully orchestrated events and announcements from image-obsessed NFL commissioner Roger Goodell.

Mostly it’s propaganda, of course. But if you crack the code, you’ll quickly realize that Goodell’s obsession with staying awake, endless kumbaya about racial issues, etc. is a smokescreen that’s hard to break.

Although not impossible. I have often been able to glimpse into this mysterious world through events such as the annual Inner Circle Tailgate Party. It happens once a year before the Super Bowl. It is largely hidden from the common people who attend the big game, in a private room within walking distance of the stadium where the game is taking place.

There’s good food, lots of booze, and amazing gossip behind velvet ropes and a phalanx of private security guarding billionaire owners, investment bankers, some celebrities, and many politicians. If you can get a ticket, as I have done for many years, it is a show of power and privilege among the country’s ruling business, cultural and political elite.

Full disclosure: I didn’t attend this year’s celebration in Glendale, Arizona, but some of my sources were there to report on the NFL’s cool kids club’s shenanigans. While many Americans were betting on the winner of the big game, the bosses, I was told, were preoccupied with two issues in particular: presidential politics and the next owner of Washington Commanders.

The back door party is nominally a bipartisan conversation, so you’ll see Democrats and Republican Party representatives take part. The owners themselves are strongly Republican-leaning and are not afraid to throw money at candidates for national office, including a much-awake Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020.

This year, the hosts are changing their tone not to the party, but to Trump. Rumors are coming out the back door that some of the biggest GOP funders in the league don’t want Trump at the top of the list, citing his nasty baggage like the Jan. 6 riot.

That’s one reason why Tim Scott, Republican Senator from South Carolina and the party’s rising star, was welcomed with open arms by the owners during the Super Bowl celebration. He was often accompanied by Speaker of the Republican House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, and according to my contacts, Scott licked visitors for money in preparation to run for the Republican Party nomination against a field that includes Trump, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, and someone who it is said to be the owners’ favorite, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. (Press representatives for Scott and McCarthy did not return calls for comment.)

Yes, the NFL overlords don’t want Trump to run because they don’t think he can beat Sleepy Joe Biden. They are also concerned that he cannot be beaten for the nomination since so many others split the anti-Trump GOP vote.

Sell ​​this team!

The thought of another four years of an increasingly debilitating White House lord moving to the left of even Barack Obama was almost enough to spoil the festivities. I said almost because the other big topic was the possible looming and massive payday.

It’s no secret that Commanders owner Dan Snyder is under pressure from the league to sell the team following allegations of workplace toxicity. The league insists that he get rid of the commanders, perhaps before the next owners’ meeting in March. His asking price for the legendary franchise (formerly known as the Washington Redskins) will be around $6 billion, and league rules require any major owner to bid at least 30% of the shares.

That’s why the owners were dizzy when it came to Snyder (and not Biden): the more teams are valued, the more he gets for commanders, the more other franchises are worth. He bought the team in 1999 for a then-record $800 million, so at $6 billion you can see the numbers starting to add up in the league.

However, not many people have such a bank. Among the bidders the owners spoke of include the likes of Harris Blitzer Sports Entertainment’s Josh Harris, a former top executive at private equity firm Apollo who now owns various sports franchises, including the Philadelphia 76ers. The other is Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, who is also said to be eyeing the team.

Harris is a billionaire. It’s unclear if he’s a billionaire enough for the numbers to work. (He did not return a call for comment.) Bezos, on the other hand, is worth about $120 billion, most of which is liquid and some of which is in Amazon stock. This means he is guaranteed to hit Snyder and the league and make the owners even richer.

There’s nothing like adding a few more billions to your net worth to make you forget about four more years of Sleepy Joe.