In the wake of the most embarrassing Super Bowl incidents since the term “wardrobe malfunction” entered the American lexicon, a difference of opinion has emerged as to whether the NFL, the Cowboys, or both bear blame for the fact that 400 people who believed that they’d be attending the Super Bowl ended up, you know, not attending the Super Bowl.
The same Dallas Morning News article revealing that the league knew about the potential problem last week (but said nothing) contains some competing quotes from league officials regarding the ultimate responsibility for the snafu.
“We put on this event,” Commissioner Roger Goodell told the Dallas Morning News. “This is the responsibility of the NFL.”
Executive V.P. of business ventures Eric Grubman seemed to spread the blame to the Cowboys, calling it a “shared failure,” per the Dallas Morning News.
“When parties are working together and something goes wrong, everybody has a responsibility,” Grubmab said. “We will figure out what the key steps were, which ones were ours, which ones were someone else’s.”
If the “someone else’s” is anyone else’s than the guy who owns and operates Cowboys Stadium, we don’t know who else it would be.
In the end, look for the league to quietly investigate the situation internally, to identify the responsible parties within the organization, and to gently nudge them into jobs with one of the 32 franchises, possibly with more pay, a bigger title, and more responsibility.
That’s essentially what happened to the guy who took the fall for the last high-profile Super Bowl screw-up.