NFL Owners: The 5 worst in professional football

2. Jerry Jones, Dallas Cowboys

Oh Jerry Jones, owner and general manager of America’s Team, the Dallas Cowboys. Jerry took over the team in 1989 and immediately fired legendary coach, Tom Landry. That move however, is not why he is on this list despite it being one of the main reasons he is on this list.

The reasons he is on the list includes his incredible errors as a general manager, his gigantic ego forcing out the most brilliant mind he hired and his audacity to turn the game of football into a side-show.

The first issue is easy to see, Jones is an awful GM. Some of his errors running the team in this capacity include drafting a change of pace running back with their first round pick in Felix Jones, avoiding drafting LeSean McCoy because they had Marion Barber, overpaying Barber on a contract extension, signing receiver Terrell Owens, trading two-first round picks for receiver Joey Galloway and doing it again for receiver Roy Williams despite how bad the Galloway experiment worked and of course, drafting Quincy Carter at quarterback.

The second issue, his ego, came when his Cowboys were at their best. The team became a power house after trading running back Herschel Walker to the Minnesota Vikings for eight draft picks, including three first-rounders. Players the team netted in the end included running back Emmitt Smith, safety Darren Woodson and tackle Russell Maryland.

The coach who claims to have orchestrated this trade was the replacement for Landry, Jimmy Johnson. He then led Dallas to two Super Bowl victories in 1992 and 1993.

Rather than let Jimmy’s work prove him right in moving on from Landry, Jones let his ego get in the way. He decided he deserved the credit, not Johnson. To this day, the two still are at odds about who made the move and built the team. So of course, Johnson was gone and Jerry brought in Barry Switzer, who won one more title for the ‘Boys, but slowly dug the team into the ground.

Since then, Jerry makes sure everyone knows he is at the forefront of every football decision, and a slew of mediocrity has been the result as the team is famous for shooting themselves in the foot and missing the playoffs.

The last reason Jones finds himself high on this list is the way he turns his team into a circus act. He travels Dallas around like a show pony, making the Texas-based team spend training camp in Oxnard, California and even has them spend time in San Antonio some years.

On top of the traveling, Jones turned his beautiful football stadium into a running punchline. AT&T Stadium features a Victoria’s Secret, an art gallery and go-go dancers….yes, go-go dancers in cages.

To top it off, the team runs onto the stadium through a blue-lit tunnel that goes through a bar with fans all around. It resembles more of a WWE entrance than an NFL team bursting on the field. It makes it especially odd when a player makes that slow walk back to the locker room hurt and crosses that same path.

Overall Jones is a terrible NFL owner for all these reasons, but he is a great businessman because he makes money with his “no such thing as bad publicity” attitude. Still, he isn’t the absolute worst owner in the NFL.

Next: Number 1