Cooke sees NFL coming to T.O.

It's only a matter of time before Toronto becomes a full-time home for a National Football League franchise -- and that viewpoint is coming from someone who was born in the city and later became the owner of the Washington Redskins.

John Kent Cooke, a Torontonian who along with his father Jack, a Hamilton native who began his multi-successful sports properties career in Toronto in 1951, won three Super Bowls as owners of the Redskins. And he told sportsnet.ca in a phone interview from his home in Virginia that he wouldn't mind becoming involved in the ownership of an NFL franchise in Toronto if it ever happens.

And he thinks it will.

"I think it's inevitable (Toronto will have an NFL team) because the league would like to be international," Cooke explained. "The (NFL) would like to have a team in London (England) and the most logical place to go (international) is just across the border in Canada. Toronto would be an absolutely perfect city for it. It's a vibrant city, and it would be good for the National Football League. It should take place, but when I can't predict."

The Redskins will be in Toronto Sunday playing the Buffalo Bills at the Rogers Centre. Cooke said his father would've been proud that the Redskins are playing a game where he began his career.

"I think it would've been one of the heights of his sports career," said John, who ran the administrative side of the team for his father beginning in 1981 and played a major role in designing and building the team's state-of-the-art practice facility and its new stadium, which was originally named after Jack Kent Cooke.

"The team meant a great deal to the whole family, particularly my father, of course, and to me because the last 18 years I ran it for him."

The Redskins were sold to Daniel Snyder in 1999, two years after Jack Kent Cooke died, in a public auction for $800 million, which was a record at the time for a professional sports franchise. John was the under bidder at $750 million.

Cooke said he could possibly see himself becoming involved as an NFL owner again, provided it could be done with a group of people because the cost of buying a team is too prohibitive for one person.

"There's only so many Bill Gates' or Warren Buffet's of the world, so I think the NFL has already changed their bylaws to allow groups of people to buy into a franchise," he said. "Personally I would be delighted to be one of those partners. I wouldn't mind being in the Toronto franchise, which would be a complete circle in my lifetime if and when that ever takes place."

Whether Toronto gets a franchise is something that has been a source of debate for some three decades. But it's worth noting that Cooke wasn't asked about the possibility of it happening -- he raised the subject himself. The issue has normally been generated from Torontonians, but rarely from those outside the city or Canada.

Cooke knows about the inner workings of the NFL. He was a member of the Executive Committee of the Management Council, which negotiated a new contract with the players union in 1992.

He learned the business through his father, whose evolution as a sports owner began with the ownership of the triple-A Toronto Maple Leafs in 1951 and later included ownership of the Redskins, Los Angeles Kings, Los Angeles Lakers, the Los Angeles Forum and thoroughbred racehorses.

Jack Kent Cooke originally bought a quarter interest in the Redskins and gradually built up his stake in the team. He became the team's majority owner in 1974 and sole owner in 1985. John owned a 15 per cent share of the team when his father owned the team outright.

The Redskins enjoyed unprecedented success with the Cookes, winning Super Bowls in 1982, 1987 and 1991, and the team became one of the marquee franchises in the league. They were a struggling franchise on and off the field prior to the arrival of Jack Kent Cooke, who had a knack for creating interest in his sports properties with a brilliant business mind. John's contribution in the administration of the business side of the team played a major role in taking the Redskins to unprecedented heights.

"We were very proud of what we accomplished during that time," John said. "During the time (he and his father owning majority control of the team), we were successful with our ticket sales, our waiting list, our advertising, even NFL Properties merchandise. We were always in the top five in the National Football League. That is done by the way you operate your club. It's not necessarily winning those championships, although it surely helps."

Cooke is critical of the way Snyder has operated the Redskins, which have plummeted under his stewardship. Two years ago in an article in the Washington Post, Cooke publicly criticized Snyder's management of the Redskins, saying he destroyed the reputation of the franchise. He said his father "would be horror-struck of what has happened" to the team.

"I sure as hell don't like the way (Snyder) gutted the organization after we left." Cooke told the Post. "And he commercialized the Redskins like my father would have never commercialized the Redskins. People brought cushions and pennants to the games. You know how they got those? My father gave them out at fan appreciation days."

John's thoughts about Snyder's handling of the team have not changed.

"I'm extremely disappointed, as every Washington Redskins fan is in Washington is, more so with me because of the effort my father and I had to build up this reputation and to have such fabulous fan support and corporate support in our community," he told sportsnet.ca. "That, I'm afraid, has dwindled, if it exists at all now."

Cooke said a poll in the Washington Post indicated the Redskins are no longer the most popular sports franchise in their region, and he said that is a direct mark against the current ownership.

"We turned this franchise over to them at the top of the league and the most popular in Washington," he said.

Cooke is not confident the team's popularity and success will turn around under the Snyder banner.

"They have to change the way they're operating that franchise, let's put it that way," he said. "They have to change."

Perry Lefko keeps you connected to all the news in the CFL on Sportsnet.ca.