A group of online people want to use crowdfunding and fake money (cryptocurrency) to buy the Denver Broncos.
Read that again. It’s insane. It’s idiotic, honestly.
Buying a team, with thousands of “owners,” with cryptocurrency won’t work for three reasons: 1. Cryptos are still relatively new and unproven as a currencies, 2. The world of crypto and football are incredibly intense, divisive and toxic groups online, seemingly unable to agree on the simplest of things, and 3. The crypto group will likely be out-bid by a real, legitimate group using, real currency (See: Dollar, dollar bills, ya’ll).
Oh, and the fact that an NFL ownership group can only be 24 members, no larger.
According to CNBC, “BuyTheBroncos” is using a DAO — or decentralized autonomous organization — to raise more than $4 billion in an attempt to bid for the Broncos. DAOs are a new concept, but it’s like GoFundMe on steroids with, again, made-up money.
Basically, a group of people come together and pool money online, in this case using crypto, to buy something. It’s worked before for smaller items; the famed single-copy Wu-Tang Clan album was bought by a DAO for $4 million. However, another group pooled together $47 million to buy an original copy of the Constitution, per CNBC, and failed. No mention of what happened to that pooled money after the auction was all said and done: Did the crowdfunders get their money back? No, the DAO gets to decide where it goes. (Although, in this case, they said crowdfunders could get their money back.)
Meanwhile, crypto bros are constantly complaining online their NFTs — bought with one form or another of crypto — are being stolen. In fact, $1.7 million in NFTs was stolen yesterday.
Those NFTs — or non-fungible tokens — are being assigned insane values, all while many are accusing both NFTs and cryptocurrency trading to really be money laundering in plain sight. The US Treasury Department is warning of just that.
As for the “ownership group” of thousands of investor/fans: It’s a novel idea, which again, won’t work.
Why?
One only has to spend five minutes on Broncos Twitter to see how toxic football fans can be when they’re behind the autonomy of a fake name and avatar. If a member of the media doesn’t agree with their opinion, they shout, call names and cuss them out. And fans are even more terrible to one another online — the Drew Lock “debates” over the last two years have shown just how divided the fan base is. Crypto bros are just as bad as NFL fans, and in fact, a venn diagram of the two may just be a circle.
Now, the group “BuyTheBroncos” wants fans to actually own a piece of their favorite franchise and decide the future of the team.
Hey, it’s one thing to have a Twitter poll about if the team should change their jersey colors or not. But it’s another to have a “fan/ownership poll” to determine whether or not, say, Vic Fangio should be fired. Or, who should start at quarterback. Or, really, any other, meaningful discussion around the franchise.
Imagine an email goes out to the thousands of new owners: Should the Broncos build a new stadium?
Or even worse: Should we move the Broncos out of Denver if the city doesn’t build us a new stadium? Etc.
From the CNBC piece linked above:
“Sorensen says the BuyTheBroncosDAO will adopt an entirely different governance structure. Though the group will still fundraise in cryptocurrency, the idea is to give people partial ownership, in which they will participate in deciding how the team is run. They also plan to form the group as a cooperative, similar to outdoor sports retailer REI, rather than a LLC, which they believe will exempt the owners from certain SEC regulations governing investing in securities.”
No offense, but I personally don’t want a bunch of emotional, beer-fueled football fans making decisions for the franchise. Hard pass.
And finally we get to the last reason why this will not work: A real-deal group will end up buying the Broncos with real money.
This week, Colorado Governor Jared Polis said the state will start accepting taxes in crypto currency, and he said of this potential situation:
“I can’t play favorites. Obviously, whoever buys the team, we’re totally, as a state, we want to have a good owner, but this would be really noteworthy for Colorado if they could pull this off,” said Polis.
The NFL is likely thinking the same thing.
Would it be noteworthy if a bunch of crypto bros bought one of the biggest franchises in the NFL? Of course.
Would the NFL rather have a group of millionaires/billionaires, who are well-known businessmen/women with real companies come together and buy the franchise? Almost certainly.
NFL franchises don’t get sold very often, and the competition for the Broncos will be intense. Even if this crypto group raises $4 billion, they will likely be out-bid by another group.
Of course, for football fanatics to actually own a piece of their favorite franchise would be incredible. We’ve all had that, “If I were the owner, I’d …” moment.
Unfortunately, this isn’t going to work. At least, not in 2022. Especially considering league rules.
In ten years from now, if cryptocurrency continues to grow in legitimacy, maybe?
For now, give me a real owner, with real money.