So, no. No bygones. On the contrary, I’m calling bullshit.

To say nothing of the fact that this “lockout” resulted completely and entirely from the owners’ own failures (at the last CBA, and of self-control). And his use of deflective, meaningless language insults my intelligence. Oh, “the lockout was between the league and the players,” you say? Well, I guess the owners weren’t involved after all! Thanks for clarifying.

This little publicity tour is a reincarnation of his PR strategy of transparency. So he does it better than most owners. Doesn’t make him any less of a jackass.

“From an economic standpoint, the league is much healthier, so as you grow your revenues you can proportionately grow your payrolls. The business model has been right-sized. We are not stressed now about the economics. Now we have to go about reselling the game. [The team will lose $5 million this year, but these are] gentleman’s losses.”
– October 1, 2005, The Washington Post

“…with a $25 million payroll, our team will still lose money, but in the vernacular those losses will be considered a ‘gentleman’s loss.’ As a league, we will have less TV revenue, and locally I don’t think we can expect to increase our ticket revenue. However, our ticket prices are going down even more. That price reduction may help attendance, but we don’t anticipate it helping overall revenues.”
– August 8, 2005, “Owner’s Corner”

Just sayin…