After its victory over the Green Bay Packers yesterday, the Carolina Panthers football team announced it’ll be up for sale at the end of the season. The team didn’t give a reason, but Sports Illustrated later reported on an ongoing NFL investigation into multiple counts of alleged workplace misconduct—everything from sexual harassment to addressing a Black employee with a racial slur—by the team’s current owner, Jerry Richardson. Not long after the news broke, a surprising (and surprisingly exciting) potential buyer emerged: the man currently known as Diddy, a.k.a. Sean Combs, a.k.a. Puff Daddy, a.k.a. P. Diddy.
Although the team technically represents both Carolinas, Diddy took to Instagram to make his case to the people “of the beautiful state of North Carolina.” First off, he would be “the best NFL owner that you can imagine.” Second, he would “immediately address the Colin Kaepernick situation and put him in the running for next year’s starting quarterback.” Third, he would make sure the Panthers are putting on the NFL’s best halftime shows and playing the best music. He also threw in something about leading the team to Super Bowl wins, which seems like a pretty important promise.
If Diddy were actually to buy the Panthers, a team Forbes values at $2.3 billion, he would be the first African-American majority owner of an NFL team. It goes without saying, but this would be a huge, long overdue moment in the league’s history. And it would be especially impactful right now, given the hateful cloud hanging over the sport thanks to racially-charged politicization from prominent white dolts like Papa John and the president of the United States.
For it to happen, Diddy would probably have to assemble an ownership group. Luckily, he’s already got a couple of noteworthy takers. For starters, NBA star Stephen Curry tweeted back at Diddy to tell him he wants in. And not content to just settle for being in the running for starting QB (especially when the Panthers already have a star quarterback in Cam Newton), Colin Kaepernick himself has thrown in with Diddy: