OAKLAND, Calif. _ Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is saddened by the news of Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson deciding to sell his franchise in the wake of sexual and racial allegations detailed in a Sports Illustrated report.
Richardson will put the team up for sale after the 2017 season and it comes after a report published Sunday morning that he settled with at least four former employees regarding inappropriate workplace.
The accusations made against Richardson, 81, included sexual harassment of multiple women and the use of a racial slur toward a scout who has since left the team.
"I'm very sad," Jones said after the Cowboys' 20-17 victory against the Oakland Raiders. "Jerry is one of the really, really, really outstanding men of football that I've ever met, and I really admire him. I know that he made it the old-fashioned way. He worked for it. He took what he made in a short time in pro football and turned it into a great business and then used that to get the Carolina franchise. So he's a great story."
Richardson is on the only former NFL player to own a franchise. And he survived a 2009 heart transplant.
"I'm saddened by any of the stories or things that might have incited this at this time," Jones said. "He's a battler; he's a big man with a big heart. And by the way, that's somebody else's heart _ he's had a heart transplant.
"He'll be the first to tell you he's had a blessed life. I'm really sad. I want all of those kind of men we can have in the National Football League."
