maust
Just Another Guy
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Look at the crap Jeremy Jacobs got back in the 80s and 90s.
John Henry (not so much recently) but over the past few years..
The Sullivans in the 80s.
Aside from losing there is nothing worse that destroys a fan's morale than a cheap owner.
Quite a contrast in those owners.
Jacobs in the 808's and 90's truly was cheap and did not care about winning. He was at least honest about it though. Jacobs bought The Garden, the Bruins were a 'comes with' incidental. He came right out and said his hockey team would not operate at a loss. It was painful as a B's fan to watch that team and know how close they were to several Cups but realize it was not going to happen unless the few teams above them suffered catastrophic injuries. The B's didn't quite have the horses to get them over the top and Jacobs wasn't bringing them in if it meant red ink. In retrospect the teams that dominated that era, (Oilers, Islanders, Detroit and Montreal) were winning championships but losing money. Owning a top NHL team in that era was a sort of rich guy's hobby. As a fan I despised Jacobs for not caring but at the same time the adult in me, while being outraged at his decision making, at least understood it. He didn't lie to us.
Henry on the other hand has earned and is deserving of our contempt. It is absolutely all about the money for Fenway Sports Group, winning is part and parcel of the profit dynamic. The team only has to win enough to keep the fans buying the product, rinse and repeat. The issue is Henry & Co paint themselves as 'stewards' of the Hometown Nine and even of The Game itself while in reality milking the cash cow. They treat some of the most savvy fans in all of Pro sports as though we're children. It's insulting.
The Sullivans really were broke. They started the franchise broke and they ended their error broke. The Pats under their ownership were at best a house of cards disguising a long con, with Billy & The Boys out there playing fake it 'til you make it versus guys that had such deep pockets the Sullivans were essentially shine boys to them.
Which brings us to King Bob. Which of the owners you listed is he most like? We honestly don't know. Maybe he is as cheap as some folks here paint him or maybe he cares about winning as much as he professes but for 20 years all he had to do was just press play. I am slowly coming around to thinking the latter of those extremes is closer to the truth. It's possible Kraft's team won so much for so long that he became like a lot of the younger fans here and came to believe falling out of be should net him a 10 win season simply because he is King Bob. One thing has become obvious, ol' Krafty Bob convinced himself his guiding hand was the key to the team's success when he was more or less along for the ride.
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