You may have seen the month-old quote from Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shad Khan making the rounds on the Internet as his Jaguars were being trounced 34-3 at halftime of Monday’s prime-time game:
“Winning now is the expectation,” he said. “Make no mistake, this is the best team the Jacksonville Jaguars have ever assembled. The best players, the best coaches. But most importantly, we’re going to prove it now by winning.”
Aside from his previous head coach leaving the team to pursue other interests at a bar and grill after one of those nasty late-night losses, this is the most embarrassing moment of Khan’s tenure. The Jaguars are completely drained of energy. Trevor Lawrence makes $55 million a season and hasn’t set foot in the door since entering the league in 2021 – and this at a time when Sam Darnold, Baker Mayfield and Andy Dalton are giving it their all. Lawrence’s rookie contract included a playoff appearance. The Buffalo Bills, a team that should have been one of Jacksonville’s rivals in the AFC at the time, could have rested their starters at the end of the first quarter of Monday night’s 47-10 loss and still come close to Mercy Rule status.
The problem with Khan’s quote is not that he said it. It’s that he believes the person who gave him that information. Here’s something we don’t discuss nearly enough about the NFL football industry: Owners make decisions largely based on who can work their way into the inner circle and sell themselves in a way that wealthy and successful business people can understand, package and sell. It’s no different and no less annoying than in the American economy, where the politically savvy people are often at the top of the food chain while those who actually do the legwork stay, like boxers in Animal Farmget to work.
What went wrong in Jacksonville is that, at an absolutely critical point in franchise history, Khan once again fell into the understandable but foolish pursuit of a “sure thing” instead of taking the time to pick the right thing. Urban Meyer has similarly acted as a fortune teller for Lawrence, boastfully flouting NFL norms and assembling the roster like a 2000 Rivals.com recruiting list. Trent Baalke, who took over personnel after Meyer was hired, is no less innocent. Before that, Khan had precariously brought 70-year-old two-time Super Bowl winner Tom Coughlin into the executive team after Coughlin was ousted as head coach of the New York Giants.
That attitude made Doug Pederson, who came to Jacksonville from Philadelphia in 2017 with his Super Bowl records, another perfect escape ramp during a hectic coaching carousel in which Khan had to save face and erase Meyer from the record books. Pederson has won a Super Bowl, so of course he could figure out how to do it again.
Such a move is a painfully common tic in the NFL ownership circle. When billionaires are blessed with generational talent, they often panic and hire someone who has “reached the pinnacle.” The Dallas Cowboys did that with Mike McCarthy, who won a Super Bowl with the Green Bay Packers. The Denver Broncos are about to do the same with Sean Payton, who won a Super Bowl with the New Orleans Saints. Of course, this doesn’t take into account that the coach reached the pinnacle at a specific time and place (and most often with the help of a generational quarterback). It’s like a failing record label hiring the Bee Gees to revamp its music department in 2024. Disco was great when disco was great. It could be great again. Right now, it’s not really that great.
Anyone who has ever met a Super Bowl- or national championship-winning coach knows that the magic lies in their ability to convince people that they have all the answers. And Khan, like everyone else, has entrenched himself in a strange and twisted echo chamber of people who specialize in elegance and are able to articulate some form of progress that is on the horizon.
The truth is that Josh Hines-Allen is still the best player on this Jaguars roster, and has been since he was drafted by Dave Caldwell in 2019. This regime got Blake Bortles to an AFC title game. This team can’t beat the stormy Cleveland Browns at home in a rainstorm.
While coaches like Sean McVay and Kyle Shanahan are rare, there is no shortage of bright young minds in the league who can handle the modern quarterback, maximize players’ skills, and foster a relaxed and comfortable work environment. Shane Steichen comes from a branch of Frank Reich’s family tree. Dave Canales came from the school of Pete Carroll. And while those coaches were being hired, Khan was most likely sitting in a room with his general manager, hearing how good, how talented, and how ready the Jaguars were to turn things around. There are plenty of people out there who can save Lawrence; who can save the Jaguars. My guess is they just aren’t the ones who promise Khan they can — or have already done.
Perhaps the spread of this quote will be motivation enough to turn away from this destructive cycle of chasing things that were achieved long ago somewhere else and focus on the things that need to be achieved now.
