In the first year of his sole ownership of an NFL franchise, David Tepper was in the backseat of an automobile heading south on a freeway from Charlotte, North Carolina.
In his hands, the hedge fund multibillionaire and Carolina Panthers owner held a diagram laying out a proposed $800 million practice complex and team headquarters in Rock Hill, South Carolina. On Tepper’s lips: The grandiose future of his NFL dream, which he’d been hunting since becoming a minority owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2009.
“There’s no reason not to have first class of everything here,” Tepper said of the Panthers.