NFL Rumors: Owners Investigate Rule Changes for Potential Team Ownership

A select committee of NFL owners is examining the league's ownership rules so that a wider pool of candidates would be permitted to purchase a stake in a team, according to ESPN's Michael Rothstein.

"One of the possibilities on the table: allowing institutional wealth, including private equity, to invest in NFL franchises, which the league has never permitted," Rothstein reported.

He explained how the revenue gained from selling off minority stakes in a franchise "could free up cash for owners to pursue projects such as stadium renovations."

It has never been a better time to be an NFL owner. The league continues to make more money than it knows what to do with, and that has in turn increased the valuations of its 32 teams.

Last summer, Forbes estimated the Cincinnati Bengals to be the least valuable NFL team and they still had a projected price tag of $3.5 billion. The last two ownership sales (Denver Broncos in 2022 and Washington Commanders in 2023) were both record-breaking transactions.

The downside to that, however, is that the barrier for entry is becoming higher and higher. There are only so many people who can even afford to buy an NFL team, and even fewer will have any interest in pursuing the endeavor.

Ted Leonsis, who owns the NBA's Washington Wizards, NHL's Washington Capitals and WNBA's Washington Mystics, was skeptical about whether this would be the windfall some proponents of the idea project.

"These people are really rich and successful. They're used to being the center of the universe," he told Rothstein. "And now you go, I need a quarter of a billion dollars. Fantastic, what do I get? Nothing. Do you have any control? Any role? No, you're passive investors. You'll get your name on a website somewhere or something and you get to tell people I own a piece of an NFL team."

Rothstein also interviewed Brad Humphreys, an economics professor at West Virginia, who said there would nonetheless be something in it for private equity. Humphreys called NFL teams "profit-making machines" and thus something that would draw investors who were motivated purely by the bottom line.

Because this is only in a very preliminary stage for the NFL, there are clearly a lot of details left unresolved that would paint a better picture of how this would work in reality.