With the NFL’s annual meetings only days away, an agenda for the multi-day gathering has been created. To little surprise, there’s no specific item devoted to the potential sale of the Commanders.
As reported by Daniel Kaplan of TheAthletic.com and confirmed by Mark Maske of the Washington Post, the status of a sale by Daniel and Tanya Snyder hasn’t “formally” appeared on the agenda.
Maske adds that the sale will “likely” be discussed by the NFL’s finance committee. The topic also could possibly be discussed in the one-per-club “privileged” session of owners and only owners.
Given the intense secrecy surrounding the process, coupled with (as PFT reported last week) a belief in the team facility that a sale is “imminent,” it’s no surprise that nothing has been officially placed on the agenda. It seems that things are discreetly moving forward, perhaps with the goal of buttoning up all details, getting all documents signing, and securing all internal approvals before announcing, in one fell swoop, that Daniel Snyder is completely out and a new owner is completely in.
With lingering concern that Snyder might decide not to sell the team, the goal could (arguably should) be to do everything in one fell swoop. With no lag time. No grace period. No opportunity for Snyder to ask for something else once a sense of inevitability has emerged that, basically, ding dong the witch is dead.
It’s smart, if that’s what the league is doing. Snyder could (arguably would) use public anticipation to his advantage, asking for a little more and a little more and a little more and knowing that he’ll get what he wants in the name of getting rid of him.
The only lingering issue of substance relates to whether and to what extent Snyder will be indemnified by his partners for other liabilities. If he’s looking for indemnity for his own alleged or actual misdeeds, that likely won’t be happening.
