Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is not backing down from his position that Stan Kroenke should have the right to decide whether to move his St. Louis Rams to Los Angeles.
In an interview last week with SportsBusiness Journal, Jones said that while the NFL’s relocation bylaw requires good-faith stadium negotiations in home markets, owners should respect the right of an owner to make a financial decision he or she decides is necessary.
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JERRY JONES
Photo by: GETTY IMAGES
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“Of course it’s his decision. It’s his risk, his effort; that risk is his,” Jones said.
Earlier this month, Jones caused a firestorm with comments to The New York Times essentially saying the same thing: that an owner is free to move his team. That predictably caused an alarm in St. Louis, where local leaders believe, based on the NFL’s bylaw, the city has a good chance to keep the team with its latest stadium proposal to replace the aging Edward Jones Dome.
The current expectation is that the Rams will enact an option they hold to change the terms of their lease to be a year-to-year agreement. The NFL, however, has said no team is relocating this year.
Speaking shortly after Jones made his initial comment, Dave Peacock, the St. Louis business leader co-managing the stadium task force appointed by the state’s governor, told SportsBusiness Journal, “We are disappointed anyone associated with the NFL would dismiss the bylaw in any way. We put our faith in the integrity of the bylaw and the league and its honor.”
After The New York Times story appeared, the NFL quickly tried to walk back Jones’ comment. League executive Eric Grubman was quoted in the St. Louis press saying that Jones had commented in the heat of the moment after the Cowboys’ late-game playoff loss to the Green Bay Packers and that all he was trying to articulate was that in the past some teams had moved without permission. Grubman added that relocation without permission would not happen again, according to the reports.
“It quickly became obvious that there’s nothing really here,” Grubman told StLouisToday.com, “because in the heat of the moment you had an owner who wasn’t really focused on the issue at hand, and talked about history and remembers that but doesn’t remember much of the detail beyond that.”
Jones made his remarks to The New York Times before the Green Bay game, though, and his comments last week went beyond simply acknowledging that teams had moved without permission before.
“We are lucky to have a Stan Kroenke; that is a big plus,” Jones said in the interview last week.
“My comment, my reference is to have an orderly process, respect our bylaws,” he said when questioned about what he had meant. “But when you are an owner in the NFL, you take on responsibility, a financial responsibility, and that is your decision.”
Jones’ latest comments are likely to reignite talk that Kroenke will move the Rams no matter the NFL’s bylaw, which the league added in the late 1990s. The Rams owner earlier this month announced plans for an NFL stadium in Inglewood, Calif.
Nine owners could block a relocation — assuming, of course, the owner in question honors the vote.
Jones, with his comments, also appears to be trying to walk that fine line of respecting the NFL process but saying the matter will never come to a negative vote, because if Kroenke tells his peers he needs to relocate, he will win their assent in any event.
The NFL declined to comment.
