On the morning of one of the biggest days of his life, David Tepper stood in the lobby of The Whitley Hotel in Atlanta's Buckhead neighborhood, fussing over his sleeves. He had forgotten the cuff links gifted to him by Carnegie Mellon University, where he'd delivered the commencement address just two days earlier.
"Does anyone have extra cuff links? Does this even match? Oh well," said Tepper, who hours later would be unanimously approved as the next owner of the Carolina Panthers, a team he agreed to buy for a record NFL price of $2.