On Tuesday, a four-month-old guilty plea by one of the NFL’s best-known marketing agents finally came to light. Whether the story has legs beyond Mike Ornstein’s guilty plea remains to be seen.
What is known at this point is that the feds are still investigating the case, according to Liz Mullen of SportsBusiness Journal.
“The case isn’t over,” Mike Tobin, spokesman U.S. attorney Steve Dettelbach, told Mullen. “It’s being investigated.”
Since Ornstein pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges, common sense suggests he was conspiring with someone. Also, the fact that he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud in relation to the ticket-scalping situation suggests that there was something more complex -- and deceitful -- happening than the purchase of tickets at one price and the re-sale of the tickets at a higher price.
Meanwhile, a reader pointed out to us today a compelling profile of Ornstein that was written by Josh Peter of Yahoo! Sports in the fairly early days of the Reggie Bush investigation.
Among other things, the former Raiders employee (in fairness to the Raiders, Ornstein hasn’t worked there in more than 20 years) once pleaded guilty to misdemeanor battery after punching out John Herrera in a dispute regarding who had last used a movie projector.
“When you work for Al [Davis], you kind of think you can do whatever you want,” Ornstein said at the time. “As a young guy, I was a feisty guy. . . . I did a lot of stupid things. I try not to do too many stupid things anymore.
“I haven’t punched anybody out in 25 years.”
We’ve got two observations in response to that quote. First, the crimes to which he pleaded guilty indicate that he conducted to do whatever he wanted, even after leaving the employment of Mr. Davis. Second, Ornstein’s non-punch-out streak almost was broken in February 2010.