| How integral is an owner to a team’s success? Maybe the more relevant question is: What is the value of an owner who doesn’t meddle? The Washington Commanders offer a fascinating case study with their remarkable turnaround this season. A year after finishing tied for the league’s second-worst record, they won their first playoff game since 2006 and will face the top-seeded Detroit Lions on Saturday in an NFC divisional-round matchup. Sally Jenkins wrote this week about the value of a humble owner, examining the Commanders’ success since Josh Harris’s collective bought the team and Daniel Snyder left town. She painted Snyder as nothing but an impediment to achievement — conceited, both filthy rich and stingy, more concerned with power than winning, and, crucially, meddlesome. “Michael Lombardi … once gave the greatest description of Snyder’s performative ownership,” Jenkins wrote, “feigning commitment to greatness when really he just wanted to play with his little green Army men: ‘Hire people that are popular, allowing him to win the news conference, then work behind the scenes to destroy their ability to operate.’” That’s quite the contrast to how Jenkins painted Harris’s ownership group with a quote from limited partner Magic Johnson, who spoke to reporters after Washington’s playoff win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. “New vision, new owner with a strategy, picking the right people,” Johnson said, “first our coach, Coach [Dan] Quinn, [General Manager] Adam Peters, and then we all step out of the way and let them do their job.” I’ve been thinking about the value of a nondisruptive owner a lot lately, both because of the Commanders’ success and because there are six head coaching vacancies in the league — the Jaguars, Jets, Raiders, Saints, Bears and Cowboys. There is no such thing as a “bad” head coaching position in the NFL, because there are only 32 of those spots in the world. Everybody with the skills, experience and drive to be an NFL head coach wants to be an NFL head coach. But what elevates a job to a truly desirable position has a lot to do with ownership. The Dallas Cowboys have foundational players in wide receiver CeeDee Lamb, pass rusher Micah Parsons and quarterback Dak Prescott. The Jets have ample salary cap space and a nice collection of young talent. The Bears are a storied franchise with a promising quarterback in Caleb Williams. But there are questions about how good those coaching jobs actually are, because all three franchises have been viewed as having challenging ownership situations. Until recently, the same (and worse) could be said of Washington. Now, they’re a testament to the value of picking the right people then stepping out of their way. | 
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