Black Billionaire Robert F Smith Could Make History, Being The NFL’s First Black Owner

(LOS ANGELES, CA) Sports News:  According to the Financial Channel Network’s sports Columnist Todd Wells that The Denver Broncos are in the search for a new owner, and as John Elway, Peyton Manning and Jeff Bezos are names that have all been floated and that have garnered attention, a new bidder has emerged and is gaining steam.

Robert F. Smith, a billionaire investor and CEO, has seemingly entered the bidding war, according to Todd Wells From Financial Channel Network. If Smith were to eventually purchase the team, he would become the first black owner in NFL history.

Smith is a native of Denver, who was born in 1962. According to a New York Times article, Smith’s mother carried him with her when he was a baby, during Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech during his March on Washington.

After attending East High School in Denver, Smith attended Cornell, before entering the workforce as a chemical engineer, where he designed multiple different patents. In 1994 he got into investment banking and quickly made a name for himself. Just a few years later, in 2000, Smith opened up his own private equity and venture capital firm, Vista Equity Partners, which is now the fourth-largest enterprise software company in the world (behind only Microsoft, Oracle and SAP), according to PCMag.

Smith is now worth $6.7 billion dollars, according to Forbes, making him the wealthiest black man in America, and making him one of the very few people with pockets deep enough to be able to personally afford the Broncos.

This should excite Broncos Country, as Smith appears to fit the bill of having just about everything Broncos fans should want in a new owner.

First, he’s a Denver native, which makes it pretty impossible to see him relocating the team. The Broncos relocating is highly unlikely as is, but Smith buying the team would remove whatever minor concerns persist.

Second, his immensely deep pockets and additional revenue streams means that he wouldn’t have to make the Broncos profitable and that he would have the ability to sign big checks to help Denver compete. As crazy as it sounds, there are NFL owners that have little revenue outside their NFL team, and that necessity to keep the franchise’s books in the black can hamstring its ability to compete.

Third, he’s a self-made multi-billionaire, and that intangible seems to speak to someone who is used to having to build something great, as opposed to someone who was just handed something great — like a certain celebrity CEO of a popular electric car manufacturer.