Houston Texans http://www.houstontexans.com Team Value - $905 mil (#3) The Houston Texans are owned by Robert McNair (Forbes Rich List/ $1.3 bil), who bought them in 1999 for $700 mil. Player-costs-to-win ratio - 57 2003 Coach - Dom Capers The skinny A lot of people scoffed at Forbes 400 member Robert McNair when he paid a record $700 million expansion fee to the other NFL owners in 1999. And they laughed even louder when the billionaire had to pour another $100 million into his franchise before his team ever played its first game. But McNair didn't make his billions by being stupid. Among other things, Houston has the second most Fortune 500 headquarters in the U.S., which has enabled the Texans to rake in a fortune from corporate sponsors. The team's $300 million, 30-year stadium naming rights deal with Reliant Energy is just one example. Onlookers are no longer laughing as McNair's franchise is now worth $900 million. Major corporate sponsors are Ford Motor (nyse: F), Miller Brewing, Coca-Cola (nyse: KO), Anheuser-Busch (nyse: BUD), Verizon Communications (nyse: VZ). Naming rights sponsor is CenterPoint Energy's Reliant Energy (nyse: CNP).
I assume Forbes is mostly listing large national corporations rather than comparatively small local companies.
Not to toot my own horn but.... Texans were #1 for the second year in a row in Customer Service in the NFL, according to JD Power. I think anyway, maybe it's just BS that our boss filled us with.
I was one of the skeptics who thought McNair would never live to see this franchise be worth more than he paid for it. I just thought with the economy seeing a downturn after the stock market bubble, there was no way it would increase in value this soon. Good for him.
Yeah, right. The Redskins and Cowboys are the most valuable, and both play in dilapidated, run-down stadiums. I remember seeing this kind of thing as soon as the Oiler's moved to Nashville. They were ranked #3, then, too. Now they're #15. This list is a bunch of B.S. Forbes, show me what "value" these two teams have, other than intangibles. And intangibles aren't worth this much, period. Stupid Forbes.
I think the Redskins play in a new stadium, but I could be wrong. The Cowboys are the most popular franchise in football. They make tons off of merchandise sales. Sort of like the Rockets with Yao Ming. Just like the stadium is an asset for Bob McNair, the Cowboy brand is an asset for Jerry Jones.
And the Cowboys are one of the most marketable teams in America, with the Yankees being the possible exception.
I've got a real problem with the Cowboys ALWAYS being in the top three on this. What have they done in the past decade? Honestly? What makes that current team more valuable than the 49'ers or the Giants, or a hell of a lot more teams. Intangibles are all this team has. There "good-will" value is off the charts, and it is ridiculous. I wasn't aware of the Skin's getting a new stadium, so I'll retract that. But the Cowboy's value is completely ludicrous.
Ummm, their revenues last year were #3 in all of sports. Thats hardly an "intangible". They've also won 2 superbowls in the last decade.
I agree Fatty that it seems like other teams could compete with the Cowboys in popularity, specifically the 49ers and the Packers. But I do think they enjoy the most popularity of any team outside the US by far. That's why they've played that preseason game in Mexico City in previous pre seasons. They are by far the most popular NFL team in that country.
Plus, they have a simple and easily identifiable logo - and their teams in the 90's were easy to identify with - no matter what drug you used, someone on the Cowboy's used it as well.
