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Forbes
an hour ago
- Business
- Forbes
Strip Club Expenses Could Be Just The Start In NFLPA Investigation
NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA - FEBRUARY 05: NFLPA Executive Director Lloyd Howell discusses the state of ... More the union and its direction for the upcoming year before fielding questions from the media on February 05, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo by) Lloyd Howell Jr. resigned as the Executive Director of the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA) amidst allegations of conflicts of interest and expense impropriety. It's a startling turn for an organization known for stability; Howell was just its third executive director in the last 42 years. Howell may have left the NFLPA, but reading the reports and having investigated hundreds of similar matters, my immediate reaction was that any probe should not just continue, but also expand in scope. This article will focus on why, and what that investigation might look like. NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA - FEBRUARY 05: NFLPA Executive Director Lloyd Howell discusses the state of ... More the union and its direction for the upcoming year before fielding questions from the media on February 05, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo by) Executives Have A Fiduciary And Moral Responsibility Athletes take fiscal management of their unions seriously, as they should. External to unions, athletes targeted for fraud prorates to a billion-dollar issue based on this Ernst & Young study (which, full disclosure, I co-authored when I was at the firm). Union executives - who have a legal and fiduciary responsibility to their members - should be held to the highest standards in managing what is ultimately athlete money. To that end, unions have internal processes and controls, sometimes based on these Department of Labor recommendations. One such process, submitting expense reports – familiar to many cube monkeys – is part of this issue; expenses from a 2023 and 2025 visis that Howell and colleagues made to strip clubs were submitted for reimbursement to the NFLPA. (Original Caption) 10/15/1987-Washington, DC- Gene Upshaw (R), head of the National Football League ... More players union, announces the end of the strike at a press conference. Alongside Upshaw is Dick Berthelsen, the union's general counsel. Upshaw also said that the union has filed a federal suit in Minneapolis, alleging breach of antitrust laws by the NFL. But Strip Club Shouldn't Be The Only Area Of Concern Consider not just the 'where', but also the 'what' and the 'how'. The line items on the 2025 expense report included 'numerous' cash withdrawals Howell made during the visit. Cash – and its cousins, PayPal, Venmo and gift cards – are high-risk areas for expense reimbursements because they mask the ultimate nature of spend. In addition, Howell reportedly 'instructed (another employee present) to file the expense reports '. That move might have masked total spending for the evening, and also allowed Howell to essentially approve his own expenses if the employee was his subordinate. Expense policies typically prohibit such activities, and both might indicate a willingness to circumvent internal controls that have broader implications. WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 25: A microphone sits outside the building where members of the NFL Players ... More Association are meeting on July 25, 2011 in Washington, DC. (Photo by) Comes Amidst Other Concerning Stories Exacerbating the concern is another report that Howell was operating as a consultant for Carlyle Group, one of the private equity firms approved to make minority investments in NFL teams. That issue is more optical than logical; reportedly, Howell consulted in Aerospace & Defense and the relationship was disclosed and vetted by internal and external teams before he joined the NFLPA and again when Carlyle was approved for NFL investment. But there are also concerns around suppressing potential collusion allegations, a sexual discrimination and retaliation lawsuit at a previous employer, and an ongoing FBI investigation into personal enrichment through the NFLPA's OneTeam investment. Perhaps relatedly, a source close to the partner WilmerHale hired to investigate Howell said 'our work continues'. WASHINGTON, DC - MAY 28: The office building that houses WilmerHale law firm is seen on May 28, 2025 ... More in Washington, DC. (Photo by) How that investigation might proceed Investigations are part art, part science, and no two are the same. But based on experience and the facts that have been publicly disclosed, it's reasonable to suggest counsel and the forensic accountants they hire will pursue a few angles. First will be interviews, including Howell, if he's cooperative, as well as any employees directly or indirectly involved. That also means whistleblowers, especially since the strip club expenses were 'received' by the outside investigator. Second, the NFLPA's attorneys might extract emails for Howell or other employees. Those emails will go into a legal data platform like Relativity that is more effective than the Microsoft Outlook search bar for identifying patterns. Third, they'll pore through two years of expense reimbursement and vendor spending data. Analytics will help, such as math and pattern analyses to identify red flags, or even - ironically - yellow flags. Those results are married to emails and interviews, and sometimes further testing – such as looking at supporting documentation – is necessary for painting a clearer picture. Given the concerns around conflicts of interest and circumvention of internal controls, investigators will also look closely at vendors that the NFLPA paid during Howell's tenure. Did they provide legitimate services? And who else within the organization was aware of conflicts and did enough to communicate them – where reasonable – to broader membership? At the end of this process, WilmerHale will provide a report. If I'm a player, and not just an executive committee member, I'd demand to see it, understanding some parts may be redacted to protect whistleblowers. Transparency is paramount; not just with the union, but with the government, since there are reportedly labor law implications. Necessary for restoring faith As this process unfolds, scrutiny and pressure continue to widen beyond Howell. J.C. Tretter, the President, was reportedly one of two people being considered to replace Howell. He just resigned amidst public criticism on his role in Howell's hiring and other matters from constituents like Will Compton. It's been a tough period for the NFLPA, but with CBA expiration on the horizon, hopefully this investigation and the new executive director will be key first steps in restoring faith from membership.
NBC Sports
5 hours ago
- Politics
- NBC Sports
NFLPA executive committee strongly preferred David White to Lloyd Howell
There's an irony to the finger-pointing in the aftermath of the failed tenure of NFL Players Association executive director Lloyd Howell. During the process that resulted in Howell being hired, the union was ridiculously secretive. No one knew who the candidates were, including the dues-paying members of the union. The board of player representatives, who had the power to vote on the next executive director, didn't know until they showed up for the meeting. Now that Lloyd's two-year stint with the union has gone as well as Thurston's three-hour tour on the Minnow, those who refused to say anything about the process are saying plenty. It started on Sunday afternoon, with the surprise resignation of former NFLPA president and then-NFLPA chief strategy officer JC Tretter via a lengthy interview with Jonathan Jones of From the article: 'For the first time, Tretter now reveals that Howell was not the executive committee's top choice. In a straw poll conducted prior to the candidates being presented, the committee voted 10-1 in favor of [David] White over Howell. Members of the committee did not share their preference with the board.' It's the 'first time' it was revealed because Tretter previously refused to reveal anything. Now that the mop is out for the cleanup on Aisle Howell, Tretter's revelation has a distinct 'don't blame me' vibe to it. And there's more. Tretter also told Jones that Tretter wasn't the one from the executive committee who voted for Howell. Tretter said he preferred White, because White had labor experience. Howell had none. 'So the idea that I was jamming anybody through was false,' Tretter said. Making the 10-1 issue even more strange is the fact that, hours after Tretter's on-the-record quotes emerged, the Washington Post reported the same facts as if they were previously unknown, attributing the information to unnamed sources. But Tretter had already said it with his name on it; that fact wasn't mentioned in the lengthy item from the Post. Regardless, here's the message from Tretter and whoever told the same information to the Post: Don't blame the executive committee for Howell. We wanted the other guy, but the voters never asked for our opinion. That point was underscored by an 'unnamed union source' to Jones and sprinkled into the Tretter interview: 'Maybe [the executive committee] should have given them a recommendation instead of giving the board a binder of information that they won't read, while they golf and drink, to make a decision.' It's hard not to wonder whether the unnamed union source is the same guy who was on the record throughout the article. Routinely, people who are being interviewed will say that certain things are off the record. If those off-the-record comments make it into the final article, they get attributed to an unnamed source. Whether it was or wasn't Tretter, the broader points are these: (1) Tretter seems to be trying to distance himself from the hiring of Howell; and (2) Tretter seems to be blaming the player representatives for picking the wrong guy. There's one last point to make. Given the possibility if not likelihood that Howell resigned because he knew ESPN was about to report on the strip-club expense-report misadventure, it's also possible that Tretter caught wind that the Post would be dropping something about Howell's hiring on Sunday night or Monday morning. Tretter possibly decided to force the issue by preemptively handing to Jones the '10-1" wrinkle that became the first topic of the Post story — and which has been the subject of at least five tweets from the reporter who wrote it. To put it as simply as possible, if Tretter knew the Post would be reporting that the executive committee overwhelmingly supported White over Howell and that Tretter, as NFLPA president at the time, didn't convey that information to the players who voted, Tretter may have concluded that he had no chance of becoming the interim executive director. Which made it the perfect time to declare victory and retreat. After, of course, scooping the Post by handing the biggest news nugget in its story to CBS.
Washington Post
17 hours ago
- Sport
- Washington Post
The rise and fall of Lloyd Howell at the NFLPA
When the player representatives of the 32 NFL teams gathered at the Salamander Resort and Spa in Middleburg, Virginia, in 2023 for the two-day meeting at which they would elect a new executive director of the NFL Players Association, they didn't know much about the results of the search process they had authorized the union's executive committee to oversee. They didn't know that the executive committee's finalists for the NFLPA's top job were Lloyd Howell, the former chief financial officer of consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton, and David P. White, the former national executive director and chief negotiator for the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA). They didn't know what the vetting process conducted by search firm Russell Reynolds Associates and the background report compiled by due diligence firm Mintz Group had — and had not — found about Howell. And they didn't know that the players on the executive committee had voted, 10-1, to recommend White to the player reps as the union's next executive director if they were asked to make a recommendation. 'We held an internal vote before that meeting,' a player who was on the executive committee during the search said Sunday. '… It was never communicated [to the board of player reps]. They made up their own mind. That's what we wanted.' The player reps voted the following day via a single confidential, written ballot to elect Howell to succeed DeMaurice Smith. That June 28, 2023, decision turned out to be ill-fated. Howell resigned Thursday, a little more than two years into his term, amid a string of controversies that brought intense scrutiny and spurred unrest among some players and agents. Some on the players' side are unhappy about the process that led to Howell's election, saying it lacked transparency and failed to make the player representatives aware of warning signs regarding Howell's candidacy before they voted. But as the NFLPA works to elect an interim executive director, perhaps by Monday, and faces the prospect of launching a search for Howell's permanent successor, those involved in the process that led to Howell's election defend it. They say Russell Reynolds conducted a by-the-book search and the executive committee fulfilled its goals to avoid media leaks and put qualified finalists in front of the player reps for their vote, even if the outcome of Howell's tenure was calamitous. According to multiple people familiar with the process, Howell's consulting position at the Carlyle Group and his involvement in a sexual discrimination and retaliation lawsuit in 2011 while at Booz Allen were discussed by the players before his election. There was no discussion, those people said, about Howell reportedly being questioned and reprimanded by Booz Allen for a 2015 incident in which he and a colleague visited a strip club in New York and the colleague sought reimbursement on an expense report. 'That was missed,' the player who was on the executive committee said. 'That was not known.' But of the overall process, the player said, 'I would do it the same way.' The search has produced particularly sharp criticism of JC Tretter, then the NFLPA's president as a recently retired player and more recently its chief strategy officer under Howell. One person on the players' side of the sport said this weekend that Tretter 'has an us-against-them mentality' that produced a flawed search. Some observers have suggested Tretter tilted the 2023 election in Howell's favor and was rewarded with his position in union leadership. 'I deny that theory,' the player who was on the executive committee said. Another person with direct knowledge of the search called that notion 'outrageous.' They and others spoke with The Washington Post on the condition of anonymity because of the confidentiality of the search and the sensitivity of the issues following Howell's resignation. Tretter told CBS Sports on Sunday that he's resigning from the NFLPA. Tretter did not cast the one vote in favor of Howell in the executive committee's June 2023 vote on the recommendation that was not delivered, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. That person and the player who was on the executive committee confirmed the 10-1 vote in favor of White. 'We wanted [the player reps] to make up their own mind,' the player said, adding that the vote was taken about a week before the meeting of the team-by-team player representatives. 'We did that in case we were asked for our recommendation.' The NFLPA hired Russell Reynolds in June 2022. The board of player reps had authorized the executive committee to conduct a search in which it brought two to four viable candidates for the consideration of the player representatives. The player reps agreed at the outset of the process that they would not have access to information about the candidates until the final voting meeting, two people familiar with the search said. 'They said, 'We want a process that any Fortune 100 [company] or significant nonprofit would use.' … They did not want to repeat the past, and they wanted to professionalize and have something that they could be proud of and stand behind,' a person directly involved in the search said. The executive committee, in particular, did not want a repeat of the NFLPA's 2009 search process, which was marked by rampant media leaks. 'The better we kept it quiet, the better we were able to get better candidates,' the player who was on the executive committee said. 'I think we were successful at that.' Russell Reynolds spoke with more than 150 people and presented 46 potential executive director prospects to the executive committee. Fifteen candidates were interviewed by the executive committee. The search firm remained in regular contact with the executive committee, with a weekly call every Monday night between November 2022 and June 2023. The executive committee interviewed 12 candidates over Zoom, then cut its list to six and conducted in-person interviews with them in March 2023. When Russell Reynolds asked the executive committee if it wanted to refine the search in any way, the committee expressed an interest in candidates with strong business profiles. That led to Howell being contacted and added to the search, along with two other candidates. They were interviewed in person in April 2023, and the executive committee cut its list to four candidates. Those four were informed of their status and asked to participate in psychometric testing, which included online testing and a multi-hour behavioral interview with a psychologist. They agreed to undergo a comprehensive background report by Mintz Group. The four candidates gave presentations to the executive committee in D.C., and each had a meal with the committee members. The executive committee chose Howell and White as the finalists for the June meeting of the player reps. The players were aware of the sexual discrimination lawsuit, first reported by ESPN, in which Howell had been involved. 'The discrimination case was raised in the Mintz report and exhaustively discussed with the [executive committee],' the person directly involved in the search said, adding that the lawsuit also was discussed with the player reps at the late June meeting. The player who was on the executive committee said: 'We knew about that. Lloyd was open about that.' Howell's role as a part-time consultant to the aerospace and defense investment team of the Carlyle Group, a global investment firm, also was known and discussed, they said. Carlyle had not been approved at that point to make private-equity investments in NFL teams, as it now is. So the issue that was discussed related only to his outside work, not to a possible conflict of interest. Eventually, the player said, the executive committee deliberated with Howell about his outside work and determined he could continue to serve on corporate boards as long as there was no conflict of interest. 'It was a little back-and-forth,' the player said. 'We wanted none. He wanted some number. Maybe it was three. Maybe it was five.' ESPN reported Friday that Howell had charged the union for two visits to strip clubs. That included a charge of $738.82 for a car service in November 2023 that took him from the Fort Lauderdale airport to a Miami-area strip club, according to the report, and a visit by Howell and two union employees in February to an Atlanta strip club that led to $2,426 in charges that Howell instructed an employee to submit in expense reports. ESPN also reported on the 2015 strip club incident while Howell was at Booz Allen. According to the person with direct knowledge of the search, Russell Reynolds asked the candidates' references if there was anything potentially embarrassing to the candidate, to the NFLPA or to the search firm that the firm should know about. None of Howell's references disclosed the reported 2015 strip club incident, the person said. Russell Reynolds said in a statement Sunday that it 'conducted an extensive search and vetting process for the NFLPA that adhered to [the firm's] best practices in governance.' The firm said it 'was fully transparent with the NFLPA about its findings for each candidate at every interval of the search process.' The firm said it takes issue with any characterization that there was anything improper about one of its employees, Anamika Gupta, subsequently being hired by Howell as the NFLPA's chief of staff. She also was a former Booz Allen employee. 'This individual was a stellar employee who excelled during her eight years at' Russell Reynolds, the firm said. 'She neither knew Mr. Howell during her prior employment at Booz Allen Hamilton nor had any communication with him during the search process. Any suggestion to the contrary is reckless and categorically false.' At the June meeting of player reps, the players were briefed and spent time with Howell and White. Russell Reynolds made presentations about the two candidates. Its organizational psychologist was on hand. The executive committee presented the issues that it wanted raised from the Mintz background report. That's when the player reps were told about the sexual discrimination lawsuit involving Howell. 'Specific to Lloyd, the discrimination lawsuit was a major topic of discussion' with the player reps, the person directly involved in the search said. The Carlyle Group issue was not a major topic of discussion with the player reps, that person said. The players again were warned about media leaks. 'Doors were closed,' the person with direct knowledge of the search said. 'Phones were gone. ... There were ground rules set.' The candidates made two-hour presentations and were made available to the player reps in smaller-group settings. They made final remarks before the vote on the meeting's second day. According to the person involved in the search, the NFLPA hired a third-party auditor to conduct a confidential vote by written ballot. The auditor collected the player reps' ballots and announced Howell as the winner without disclosing a vote count to the players. 'Lloyd won the day,' that person said. 'He gave a very eloquent analysis of what he felt and he saw.'
NBC Sports
a day ago
- Politics
- NBC Sports
Report: NFLPA board of player reps is expected to vote on interim executive director soon
With executive director Lloyd Howell abruptly out, the NFL Players Association needs to replace him. It soon will. Via Adam Schefter of the NFLPA board of player representatives 'is expected to vote' on a new interim executive director before the widespread launch of training camps, on Tuesday. The news comes a day after Dianna Russini of reported that it's currently a two-man race: JC Tretter and Don Davis. (Her tweet caused confusion because it omitted the word 'interim.' But it's obviously an interim hire.) Because the NFLPA Constitution doesn't contain a procedure for selecting an interim executive director, the NFLPA apparently has come up with a plan for proceeding. It's unclear how the voting will work — especially if no one gets a majority of the votes on the first ballot. Some have suggested that the NFLPA should take its time in hiring an interim executive director, given that too many of the current options are too close to Howell. There's a belief that the best play would be to find someone from the outside to step in and stabilize the situation while the search for a full-time, non-interim executive director proceeds. My own reaction to that possibility? Good freakin' luck. How will the NFLPA find someone good who'll shut down his or her life temporarily in an effort to repair the damage done by the Howell regime and to lay the foundation for someone else to take over? If, as it appears, the interim executive director will be someone who worked for the NFLPA while Howell did, it will be important to move very quickly to find the next executive director — and to make it clear that the interim executive director will not be a candidate and, ideally, will have no role in the selection of his or her replacement. Frankly, the best approach for the NFLPA could be to eventually blow up current union management, with the exception of anyone who realized that Howell was a problem and sounded the alarm about it internally.
NBC Sports
a day ago
- Sport
- NBC Sports
Former NFLPA executive committee member says JC Tretter "seems just as culpable" as Lloyd Howell
There's a storm raging within the NFL Players Association, and at times it feels as if we're in the eye of it. The vast majority of texts and calls to the PFT hotline since the resignation of NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell relate to the next steps for the union. There's plenty of noise, some of which has been posted here — and plenty of which (at least for now) has not been. Our goal isn't to tee up names or play the Game of Thrones game. It's to make sure the players understand what's happening and, ideally, that they reclaim control of their union. Because it seems that both the NFL and NFLPA non-player leadership have weaponized player apathy, any sign that the players are waking up and taking charge is significant. Here's something that has happened within the past day. Sam Acho — a former member of the NFLPA executive committee — has sounded the alarm via Twitter. 'Players who are voting,' Acho said, 'I understand you've been kept out of the loop. Listen to [the Pablo Torre Finds Out] podcast or read the article by [Kalyn Kahler of JC Tretter seems just as culpable (if not more) than Lloyd Howell.' The Acho tweet tags five current members of the board of player representatives: Zaven Collins, Von Miller, Shelby Harris, Cole Kmet, and Zaire Franklin. Acho's plea comes at a time when a text message critical of Tretter has been making the rounds. A longer document entitled 'Risk Assessment of NFLPA Interim Executive Director Candidates' (which focuses only on Tretter) has been circulating, along with rumors that Tretter could be pushing for current NFL Players Inc. president Matt Curtin to become the interim executive director, since Curtin would be likely to keep Tretter in position as chief strategy officer. Meanwhile, the NFLPA has remained largely silent. There's been nothing from NFLPA president Jaylen Reeves-Maybin. Nothing from Tretter. The executive committee's only statement came a week ago, when it vowed to not rush to judgment on Howell. It's therefore very noteworthy that a former member of the executive committee has decided to publicly share his opinions in a public forum, with five members of the board of players representatives specifically mentioned.
