Of the various witnesses who testified during the Sunday Ticket trial, only one of the owners testified directly in court.
On June 17, the eighth day (and part of the ninth) of the trial, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones took the stand.
He wasn’t the only one to testify. Earlier, a deposition of Patriots owner Robert Kraft was played for the jury, but Kraft did not testify in court. (During Jones’ testimony, an NFL lawyer inadvertently referred to Jones as “Mr. Kraft.”)
Jones wasn’t as talkative as he was in other moments, but he did share a story that created an amusing image of a young Jerry Jones when explaining that his family owned and operated a grocery store.
“My mom worked full time, and so did my dad, so we all worked,” Jones says. “When I was about 9 years old, my mom would dress me in a little bow tie and I’d greet customers at the door. If she’d wink at me, that customer knew I was okay with pushing a basket. If I helped them grab a can off the shelf, maybe they’d give me a little tip.”
Jones said he pays himself a salary of about $250,000 a year for the much larger business he bought in 1989. Asked if he ever made a profit from the team, Jones replied: “No, I don’t.
“I have not done that,” he states on page 1,562 of the transcript. “All of the cash and capital generated from operating the team has been reinvested and put back into the team, the stadium, the facilities, etc. So I’m not saying I haven’t been using money in a positive way. I just haven’t been taking money out to buy suits and shirts.”
Or a $225 million superyacht..
Jones defended the league’s history of revenue sharing, even if it would interfere with its financial ability to win the Super Bowl. He said he wouldn’t want revenue sharing anymore if the 32 teams were to sell out-of-market TV rights individually. (Of course, the teams already have.) Agreed to share television revenues from all sources.A unanimous vote of all 32 owners was needed to overturn it.
“The Cowboys, in my opinion, could be a lot bigger if they could just dream,” Jones said of the league without revenue sharing, “but it would have been like a big fish in a small pond. If you look at the fan base as a pond, I’d rather have an NFL fan base that’s bigger, broader, more passionate. And then you have to fight your way through 25 years to get to the Super Bowl. I’d like to see the Cowboys compete in that environment, because it’s more exciting for the fans. And not only does it work, it’s worked better than anyone could have ever imagined. It’s good for the fans.”
And, despite the fact that he states on page 1,571, line 24 of the record, “I’m not sure I care that much about money,” this results in the league generating more revenue for everyone.
He admitted he likes the fact that people hate the Cowboys because having a good villain makes the league more appealing.
“The key is that it’s substantial and interesting,” Jones said. “The fact is, over half of NFL fans don’t like the Cowboys and want to kick our ‘nee’ every time we play. And I say that with all due respect to everybody here. But it’s because they hate me. I guess to some degree they hate me for paying that much attention. But that’s what makes us interesting. It’s more than just the points and the tackles. It’s an expression of interest, something to root for. It’s my town against your town, sure, but it’s so much more. And we’ve been able to get more fans to experience it by putting it on free TV across the country.”
And there’s more money coming into the league, but he doesn’t really care about the money.
Throughout the case, the league was careful to convey the message to jurors that it only cared about the fans, not the money. At 1,574 pages, Jones made his case a bit too forcefully, even by his standards.
“But it just gives a little bit of respite for the people who are really suffering and have concerns,” Jones said. “At one point, my coach said to me, ‘Do you know what pressure that puts on me? Don’t vote for a two-pointer after we score a touchdown. Don’t vote for that. It just puts pressure on me as a coach. Mr. Jones, don’t vote for that.'”
“I say pressure because the people sitting in the stands and the millions watching on TV, many of them having to go to the bank, going to work, having to go to the bank, they don’t know. They’re going to the bank maybe to renew their loan or ask for an increase and they don’t know what that’s going to be. That’s the pressure in life. That’s pressure.”
“What we have to be is a respite from all that, which is why it’s so important that we get as many fans as possible to see it. If we’re doing any good for society, we’re a respite, an escape from the real heroes who are educating people, creating jobs and making this show run.”
Jones’ testimony also included a number of questions about a lawsuit he filed against the NFL in the 1990s to secure the right to sell Cowboys merchandise independently, separate from the NFL’s collective organization.
His lawsuit accuses the league of maintaining an “illegal cartel” that, if broken up, would ” [the Cowboys] and to ensure that the other Member Clubs compete vigorously with each other and with the NFL in the licensing of professional football trademarks.”
The plaintiffs’ message was clear: if it was enough for Jones to compete with other franchises for merchandising, why not compete for out-of-market television rights?
In his lawsuit against the league, he also argued that “equal distribution of profits would not in practice lead to competitive balance” and that “profit sharing would provide no incentive for underperforming teams to increase spending on players or strive to improve, and could have the opposite effect.”
To prove his point, Jones’ lawsuit against the league pointed out that the Buccaneers won fewer games than any team from 1980 to 1990, but made more profits than any team during that same period.
Profit. Money. That’s what it’s all about ultimately.
As the saying goes, whenever someone says “it’s not about the money,” it always is.
It’s only fitting that Jones actually said, “I don’t know if I care that much about money.”
One thing is certain: He’ll be worried about the money when he has to come up with the $440 million he’ll shoulder of the $14.1 billion in antitrust liability the league now faces.
