John Kent Cooke’s wealthier than he would have been to begin with because of Daniel Snyder.
But the son of the former Washington owner didn’t have many kind words for the man who bought the team from his father Jack Kent Cooke.
Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post took a lengthy look at Snyder’s legacy as he enters his third decade of ownership, and the younger Cooke said he was disappointed to see what the team has become.
“I think that what’s happened over the 20-year period is that he has taken a franchise that has been universally respected in sports, not just the NFL, and proceeded to drag it down to mediocrity,” the 77-year-old Cooke said. “It’s no longer one of the premier sports franchises in the United States.”
He has a numerical argument to back it up, as Washington is 139-180-1 during Snyder’s ownership —which means there’s work to do to reach mediocrity. They have made just five playoff appearances in those 20 years, with just two wins (one of which came in his first year).
A number of unnamed executives around the league also had some pointed comments, but Snyder did not.
His spokesman and an outside PR firm offered the Post the chance to interview Snyder, “but on the condition the interview ran in full, in place of this story.”
The Post declined to be used in that way.
“Unlike Snyder,” Cooke said to Kilgore, likely with great glee, “I return phone calls.”
That leaves the words of others, and the team’s record, to do all the talking.
