Read this story when you have a chance. Then, reflect on what would happen to you, in your job, if you were so cavalier about what information you shared.
Keep reading for much more on the NFL’s new top lawyer Ted Ullyot, the league’s spot in the tumultuous world of DEI, a sendoff to the NFL’s Howard Katz, Woody Johnson’s complaints and more coming out of a busy few days at the annual meetings.
New NFL General Counsel Ted Ullyot starts May 1. Getty Images
The NFL was always going to find a lawyer with sterling corporate credentials to become its next general counsel. What makes Ted Ullyot stand out is his equally strong background in government, regulatory and political circles -- and his robust identity as a Republican at a time when that seems to matter a lot more than usual.
Ullyot led venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz’s policy and regulatory team and was general counsel at Facebook and for AOL Time Warner’s European operations. But Ullyot was also a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, deputy to future Justice Brett Kavanaugh on the White House staff of President George W. Bush and chief of staff to Attorney General Antonio Gonzales. Kavanaugh even wrote the NFL a letter of recommendation for Ullyot, according to a senior league source.
His business experiences will serve the NFL as it navigates the substantive challenges it faces on streaming, global expansion, tech and investing, to name a few. But the political connections may matter even more in a time of Republican dominance of the U.S. government, with the memory of President Trump’s attacks on the NFL in 2017 still fresh in the minds of many top league officials and owners.
“He’s a man who’s dealt at high levels,” said Patriots owner Robert Kraft. “We’re at the top of the heap. We’re going to be a target in antitrust, and in a lot of other ways, we’re going to need legal representation that knows how to go on the offensive and play defense to protect where we’re going.”
One source cautioned against assuming that Ullyot’s Republican bona fides necessary translate into a skeleton key to Trump 2.0. The 2025 White House, this source notes, is a machine driven by the whims of one man, and traditional conservative establishment connections don’t necessarily go very far (Ullyot’s co-founder at Torridon Law is Bill Barr, who went from Trump cabinet member to pariah).
The one relative weak spot in Ullyot’s resume is labor relations, which figure to be a dominant theme around the NFL in the coming half-decade. The decision to hire him, therefore, lends weight to rumors I’ve heard that Larry Ferazani, longtime top counsel to the NFL Management Council, will be newly empowered to fully own NFLPA matters. The league had no comment on that aspect.
Outgoing General Counsel Jeff Pash will stay on as a consultant once Ullyot gets started May 1. Falcons owner Arthur Blank called Ullyot “a very impressive guy” before praising Pash. “He’s replacing a giant, to be clear. Jeff is a special attorney,” Blank said. “Not only a special attorney, but a special person. He gave great counsel to the league for a long time.”
Commish in the making?
About a year ago, I speculated that the new general counsel could be a future commissioner.
At this moment, it’s tremendously difficult to picture Ullyot in that category, considering that ownership politics are the hardest part of the top job and he just met most of them.
But Ullyot fits with all the reasons I laid out when Pash retired, and he’s got some time to build the relationships -- especially if Goodell gets another contract, which I’m told is highly probable.
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and Cowboys owner Jerry Jones both say nothing has changed in the league's diversity policies. AP
Roger Goodell and four senior NFL owners all reaffirmed the league’s commitment to their diversity policies at the annual meeting, which comes amid the Trump administration’s onslaught against efforts to promote diverse workforces, including at longtime NFL outside law firm Paul, Weiss.
“We have to stay with the diversity and have it be merit-based as well,” Patriots owner Robert Kraft said. “Most of ownership is committed to that -- I know we are committed to this diversity.”
Falcons owner Arthur Blank: “There’s real progress that’s been made, but there’s always work that has to be done, and I think the league is absolutely committed to the work regardless of any situation that we may find around us.”
Chiefs owner Clark Hunt: “The league remains very committed to growing diversity, whether it’s in the coaching staffs, the front office, really just across the league. I don’t think that’s something where you see a significant change in policy.”
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones: “We’re right where we’ve always been. And we’re a part of America, and we all have our opinions and our input, and right now it is the same for me as it was a year ago, two years ago.”
Goodell: “I’ve been very clear that we think diversity makes us better. I think a lot of our policies are designed to give opportunities and develop that talent. A lot of our programs are designed in that way, and we’re fully committed to continuing that work to try to develop better talent and give them that opportunity and make the NFL better, ultimately. So, we’re all in on that and, obviously, we’re going to be fully compliant with federal laws. We always have been, and we’ll continue to do that.”
To follow up, I asked Blank if he was sure Ted Ullyot, the new general counsel, had their back on DEI. Blank responded by expressing faith in search firm Russell Reynolds Associates, which recruited and vetted Ullyot. “I am quite certain that was part of the conversation,” Blank said.
The retiring Howard Katz, 75, has been with the NFL since 2003 and held important roles in sports media before that. NFL
Howard Katz, the NFL’s schedule-making maven for most of the last two decades, will retire after this year’s slate is finished in May, Commissioner Roger Goodell officially announced to assembled owners and execs in Florida this week.
Katz, 75, has been with the NFL since 2003 and held important roles in sports media before that. He’s the person every team and network lobbies before the schedule is released each spring and the person they complain to after it’s released. Katz has had tough conversations with everyone who matters in the NFL world, but on Monday, it was all smiles and applause when Goodell singled him out for appreciation.
“I was flabbergasted,” said Katz. “I did not expect that, and the reaction was very emotional. To be surrounded by a group of owners -- and I’m often getting yelled at by them because they don’t like things in their schedule -- they gave me a standing ovation. It blew me away.”
In Katz’ time, computers became exponentially more capable of helping the scheduling task. But the task grew more complicated, too, with more rightsholders joining, more TV windows emerging and the stakes of all NFL business growing with the league’s cultural dominance. Everybody wanted something from him, to the point where different people from the same team would lobby for opposite outcomes. “The key was to be fair and equitable, and know at the end of the day, you could look someone in the eye and say you did the best we could.”
“Howard is a legend,” said CBS Sports President David Berson. “He has meant so much to the NFL, CBS and all the league’s rightsholders. We can’t thank him enough for his friendship and being a true partner.”
Katz, whose formal title is SVP/Broadcasting & Media Operations, said he’s not sure what’s next. “My work has been my life,” he said. But he does expect to spend much more time with three grandchildren.
COVID season work among biggest accomplishments
One lasting memory: Navigating the 2020 COVID season without any cancellations. He recalled a daily morning phone call with Chief Football Administrative Officer Dawn Aponte to go over COVID testing results from teams, trying to both handle present schedule crises and stay on top of potential future problems. It was a constant battle to keep the league on track.
“Getting every game played in the COVID season is probably the most remarkable accomplishment I’ve been part of,” Katz said. “We played every day of the week, in that season. Literally every single day of the week. The fact we got every game played is just an incredible testament to Roger Goodell, and all the football operations team, and the scheduling people. Everyone who played a part in that should be really proud.”
Jets owner Woody Johnson complained this week about the NFLPA’s report cards on working conditions, which gave him an “F” grade. Getty Images
In Florida, Jets owner Woody Johnson complained this week about the NFLPA’s report cards on working conditions, which gave him an “F” grade. He channeled Seinfeld’s David Puddy with his “bogus” remark, but he said something else worth fleshing out.
“It’s supposed to be a process that is we have representatives, and they have representatives, so we know that it’s an honest survey,” Johnson said.
He appears to be referring to page 217 of the collective bargaining agreement, which establishes a combined NFL-NFLPA “accountability and care committee” to jointly conduct surveys about medical care and other oversight activities. I last heard that argument in 2024.
But as I wrote at the time, the NFLPA’s report cards are about far more than medical care. Also, the contract does not appear to have any language that prevents the union from doing its own surveys in addition to the mandated joint committee activities. Besides, if anyone believes the report cards are really a problem under the contract, I’m not aware of them taking any steps commensurate with a breach.
A lot of news came out of the NFL annual meetings this week. Beyond the league’s new general counsel, here are some of the other headlines:
Ten companies so far have responded to an NFL RFP to help “invest and operationalize” a professional flag football league, sources tell me, with the deadline for submissions coming this week. One company that responded is Seven Seven Six, the venture capital firm founded by Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit and husband of Serena Williams.
Approximately 170 of the N.Y. Jets’ 250 employees were given the choice this week whether to accept a buyout offer issued earlier this month, a deal that Terry Lefton and I report would give the most senior employees more than 18 months of full salary and health insurance if they leave. This offer was the talk of the meetings, with many staffers and executives from other teams marveling at the terms of the offer and speculating on outcomes.
Jersey Mike’s was formally unveiled as the league’s newest corporate sponsor, replacing Subway, an NFL sponsor since 2020, notes Lefton. Jersey Mike’s first big execution will be as presenting sponsor of the NFL Draft Experience in Green Bay later this month.
The NFL formalized its adoption of Sony’s Hawk-Eye camera-based optical tracking system as its primary method of line-to-gain measurements, starting with the 2025 season, notes SBJ’s Rob Schaefer.
Owners approved a $650 million debt waiver for the Bills’ new Highmark Stadium, which has ballooned in cost from $1.4 billion to $2.2 billion since it was first approved. Separately, owners also approved an additional $100 million in debt for the Titans’ project to build the new Nissan Stadium.
Two years after the NFL and RedBird Capital Partners launched EverPass Media to deliver streaming sports to commercial establishments, their basic business bet has proved true, but as Mollie Cahillane and I write in this week’s SBJ, bars and restaurants are still a challenging, fragmented industry that requires “trench warfare” to penetrate, its executives and investors say.
The Steelers and Bundesliga club Dortmund have forged an alliance that will see the two organizations collaborate on joint team activities, content and fan engagement initiatives, reports SBJ’s Alex Silverman. As part of the partnership, the Steelers will host their first Germany-based flag football clinic later this month at the BVB Football Academy.
The UFL debuted its Friday night Fox window over the weekend, drawing 690,000 viewers for a St. Louis Battlehawks-Houston Roughnecks game, notes SBJ’s Austin Karp.
SBJ this week unveiled our 2025 class of Forty Under 40, and among those with ties to football are the Chiefs’ Laura Krug, the Panthers’ Kristi Coleman, the Browns’ Ted Tywang and the Dolphins’ Jason Green.
