If Jerry Jones can’t overthrow Roger Goodell, he wants to make him bleed for his money.
The Cowboys owner is part of a group of NFL owners who want Goodell’s next deal to be incentive-laden, making his compensation more performance-based than a flat, guaranteed figure, ESPN reported, a development that someone close to Goodell said has made him “furious.”
“He feels as if the owners have made a lot of money and he should be compensated accordingly,” the source told ESPN. “The incentives thing really angers him.”
Goodell has made more than $200 million since he was elected commissioner in 2006 as part of “the most one-sided deal ever,” Jones told fellow owners last month. The owners very much enjoy their deal with the players, who do not have guaranteed contracts, and would like to ensure Goodell earns his money, too.
This is Plan B for Jones, who is on the warpath to oust Goodell from his role. Jones, who most recently hired Harvey Weinstein lawyer David Boies to aid his case against Goodell, has been lobbying his fellow billionaires for months about Goodell’s upcoming contract — which, for months, has seemed an inevitability but is still not finalized. With Boies’ help, Jones is trying to move the other owners toward his side; Jones needs 24 owners to approve of Goodell’s firing.
Jones has long maintained that the commissioner is overpaid, and the two have clashed over Goodell’s handling of the national anthem protests. Goodell has not taken a hardline stance, saying he would like the players to stand for “The Star-Spangled Banner” but has not mandated it. Jones, meanwhile, has said some players taking a knee has hurt the league, and he has threatened Cowboys onto their feet with the penalty of not playing if they protest.
Further adding to the Goodell-Jones collision has been the never-ending Ezekiel Elliott saga, in which the commissioner suspended the star Dallas running back for six games under the NFL’s conduct umbrella for a domestic violence case in which charges were never pressed.