NFL Owners Power Rankings

For some reason, people love power rankings. I am not going to lie. I get a kick out of how ESPN, FOX, CBS and SI rank the teams during the season because the Top 10 can be very different depending on the site.

SI decided to take on NFL Owners. The Giants ranked LAST in the NFC East behind #2 Jerry Jones and his new Mega-Stadium and marketing juggernaut that is the Cowboys… #5 Dan Snyder and the Redskins who really haven’t done much besides be worth over a Billion Dollars and #6 Jeff Lurie who, according to the SI article is, “a positive, progressive force in league circles who generates revenue through Lincoln Financial Field, which opened in '03 after the team sank $310 million into the project.”

The Top Owner is the Kraft Family. The Patriots have built a system that has produced three Lombardi trophies in 4 years time earlier this decade. Kraft came in and built Gillette Stadium and is in process of building something called Patriot Place which I guess will be like Xanadu out at the Meadowlands.

The Giants ranked at #14:
14. John Mara/Jonathan Tisch, Giants

As they step up to replace their recently deceased fathers, Mara and Tisch are taking different approaches, the latter co-owner staying largely in the background. Mara, one league insider says, has a lot of promise, "a chance to blend his dad's best qualities with a modern flair. He's calm and loyal and respectful of the tradition, yet he understands that the league has evolved."

Mara impressed many league honchos when, during last year's debate over the proposed revenue-sharing agreement, he stood up to several old-line owners and told them, "You're not being realistic." And though he couldn't pull off a stadium deal in Manhattan, Mara did a nice job of making do with a new facility in Jersey, where a significant slice of the team's fan base resides.

First, the West Side Stadium was a Jets disaster. The Jets asked the Giants if they wanted in because New Jersey was dicking the Giants around for more money after an agreement was reached and we now have what is the aftermath. Second. There is no ryme of reason behind some of these rankings. Did the Mara’s and Tisch families fall to middle of the pack because of the Jets failed efforts at a West Side Stadium?

To be fair, the Jets came in at 17…

17. Woody Johnson, Jets
To Johnson's credit, he tries hard and seems to have scored with last year's hiring of Eric Mangini as coach. But Johnson's peers don't believe he's especially deft when it comes to high-level business maneuvers. Though his joint deal with the Giants on the new stadium in Jersey is a 50-50 proposition on paper, many NFL insiders think he got played. "Because it's in Giants' country, the Jets will still be second-class citizens there," says one owner. "He should've figured out how to do a Westside stadium. It's New York -- you could get people to build one out there."

I don’t know why the Jets didn’t try to build a stadium on Long Island or in Queens. It’s a LOT closer to their fanbase and would make more sense for them. Woody Johnson had to come back to the Giants and ask to become partners in the Stadium at the Meadowlands because the West Side Stadium fell through.

The Jets will always be the second show in town in the shadows of the Giants.

Anyway, back to the “rankings”. I disagree with the way Silver did his rankings. I am going to write up my own rankings over the coming months and share them with you when I am done.