Pro athletes have increasingly been investing in professional sports teams over the last few years, and now Charles Woodson has joined the club.
According to The Athletic’s Dianna Russini, the Pro Football Hall of Famer is purchasing .1% of the Cleveland Browns from the Haslam family, which owns the team, for $5 million. That values the organization at $5 billion.
But the sale does come with some conditions.
Because of the NFL’s alcohol policy, Woodson must remove his name, image, and likeness from the packaging of new bottles from Charles Woodson’s Intercept Wines, the liquor business he’s involved in.
In addition, because he works for Fox Sports as an analyst on “Fox NFL Kickoff”, Woodson is subject to the rules governing the broadcasting career of fellow Wolverine, Tom Brady, due to his ownership stake in the Las Vegas Raiders.
Although Woodson’s .1% is far less than Brady’s 5% stake in the Raiders, he will follow the same rules. So he will be barred from other teams’ facilities and practices, can’t criticize officials or teams and won’t be allowed to participate in team pre-game production meetings.
But for an ownership stake in a team from his home state, that’s a small price to pay.
Woodson won a national title at Michigan in 1997, was the first defensive player to win the Heisman, won Super Bowl XLV with the Packers in 2011, and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2018 and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2021.
In 2020, a year after launching his wine brand, Woodson, per the site, became “the first Black Pro-Football player to achieve national distribution on a wine brand.”
Now he will add team owner to his growing resume.
