National Football League franchise owners discussed allowing private equity investment in teams on Wednesday during the league’s quarterly meetings in Nashville. Although no vote was taken, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell told reporters that he expects something in place by the end of the year.
“We’re being very thoughtful and deliberate,” Goodell said. “The finance committee is working it pretty hard. We’ve got a lot of interest in the private equity space … I expect there to be something by the end of the year.”
The league is working with investment bank PJT Partners as its liaison with investment firms interested in buying stakes in teams, according to multiple people familiar with the engagement.
The NFL would be the last of America’s major sports leagues to sanction private equity investment—Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer, the National Basketball Association, and National Hockey League already allow private equity involvement, although each league has varying guidelines addressing how much firms can invest, how many teams per league they can invest in, and how long they must hold their stakes before an exit.
People familiar with the matter say the NFL’s move is sparked by teams' rapid valuation growth and a shrinking pool of potential buyers. Each team has historically been run with single-family ownership (excluding the fan-owned Green Bay Packers)—this week’s proposal would be the first change since the league’s founding.
Allowing private equity firms to invest as limited partners, who typically have no decision-making power in NFL ownership structures, could also free up capacity for owners to pursue cash-intensive initiatives like stadium renovations. Although non-control positions may deter some would-be investors, many sports-specific firms specifically note a preference for minority stakes. Arctos Partners, for example, calls themselves “long-term horizon investors with no aspirations for control ownership.”
Once a framework is passed, NFL owners must still develop a specific policy governing private equity investment, a process that may take several additional months. Key terms will be the allowable ownership percentage and whether pensions or sovereign wealth funds will be permitted to participate. Cross ownership—when a firm takes limited partnership stakes in multiple teams—may also be a concern, as may the treatment of investors with existing stakes in gambling entities.
Investment exits and hold period requirements are also expected to be addressed as the league manages its general aversion to rapid ownership turnover. The NFL will hope to avoid situations like Dyal HomeCourt Partners’ position in the Phoenix Suns, a portion of which was sold in 2023 after just two years (at a valuation 158 percent greater than their entry).
Regardless of the league’s final terms, investor appetite is expected to be high: alongside college athletics, the NFL is one of the largest untapped opportunities for private equity firms increasingly keen on sports and entertainment assets. So far this year, there have been 31 private equity-backed sports deals worth more than $20 billion, according to Preqin data.