Ex-Cardinals VP Terry McDonough accuses Bidwill of cheating

[Dr. Jones]

Ex-Cards exec accuses owner Bidwill of cheating

Former Cardinals vice president Terry McDonough is accusing team owner Michael Bidwill of gross misconduct, including cheating, discrimination and harassment, in an arbitration claim.

www.espn.com

Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill is accused of gross misconduct, including cheating, discrimination and harassment, in an arbitration claim filed Tuesday by former Cardinals executive Terry McDonough to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell.

McDonough maintains that both he and former Cardinals head coach Steve Wilks were left no choice but to follow Bidwill's plan to use burner phones to communicate with former Arizona general manager Steve Keim while Keim was serving a five-week suspension after pleading guilty to extreme DUI in Arizona.

McDonough says he still has the phone, which he says contains the evidence of the cheating scandal, as well as documentation and eyewitness testimony on each item presented in the petition.

In a detailed response sent to ESPN, the Cardinals strongly denied the allegations, calling them "outlandish."

"We are reluctantly obliged to provide a public response along with broader context for some disappointing and irresponsible actions by Terry McDonough," said Jim McCarthy, external public relations adviser to the Cardinals. "Claims he has made in an arbitration filing are wildly false, reckless, and an opportunistic ploy for financial gain.

"Our position was consistent with many efforts we've made to accommodate Terry during his time with the team, despite difficulties in his personal life and his often volatile demeanor toward colleagues," the statement from McCarthy said. "That's why we are saddened to see that Terry is now lashing out at our organization with disparagements and threats that are absurdly at odds with the facts. This unnecessary and vindictive action by Terry was intended to malign his co-workers, our owner Michael Bidwill, and our team with outlandish accusations."

 

[Lefty]

Maybe Bidwill will be forced to sell the team. We can only hope, https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/36069257/ex-cardinals-vp-terry-mcdonough-accuses-owner-cheating

 

[Dr. Jones]

May I request that Baxter Holmes be assigned to this story?

 

[Dback Jon]

Wow, if any of that is true, Bidwill needs to be forced to sell

 

[Dr. Jones]

Wow, if any of that is true, Bidwill needs to be forced to sell

OMG..... A fever dream I have wished for all winter.

 

[Zalixar]

Maybe Keim is not the hero we wanted, but the hero we needed.

 

[Dr. Jones]

If Keim winds up being the reason we get a new owner....... I want a Keim DUI face statue out near the Tillman garden.

 

[BritCard]

This is nothing.

Keim's suspension was a franchise suspension, not an NFL suspension. What are the NFL going to do?

Plus everyone knows they were speaking to him during that time.

 

[Dr. Jones]

Well...... All of this COULD be provable.

In the filing, McDonough said he and Wilks "objected to and sought to avoid participation in a scheme hatched by Bidwill to utilize burner phones to communicate with general manager Steve Keim -- in violation of the terms of Keim's suspension for extreme DUI -- during a critical period of the Cardinals training camp in the summer of 2018.

"In response to McDonough's objection to the illicit burner phone scheme, Bidwill cursed at, berated, and formally reprimanded McDonough, and ultimately demoted him -- irrevocably damaging the trajectory of McDonough's 34-year career in the National Football League. Bidwill also subjected McDonough to bullying, mocking, harassing and abusive behavior."

McDonough said he wants to prevent Bidwill from treating people the way he said he was treated and that he believes he is giving voice to a group of Cardinals' employees too scared to speak out against Bidwill. He called his treatment "consistent with a pattern of workplace misconduct by Bidwill that is endemic and the hallmark of his stewardship of the storied Cardinals franchise."

McDonough said in the filing that Bidwill once berated a young Black employee "in a racially charged manner." At the time, Bidwill was serving as chairman of the League's Racial Equity Committee.

The grievance also said Bidwill reduced two pregnant women -- one five months pregnant, the other seven months -- to tears after screaming at them with "abusive and bullying mistreatment."

McDonough said that he has proof that in 2019, the Cardinals top brass decided to conduct an employee engagement survey with all their employees, only to see Bidwill intercept the results of the survey and cancel it when he realized that the majority of his employees were working in "fear" of the owner.

"Many of the employees who responded to the survey indicated that they were fearful of Bidwill on a daily basis, as a result of Bidwill's erratic and often abusive interactions with them," the filing said.

The Cardinals responded by saying that "the 2019 employee survey referenced in the complaint was not ignored but in fact formed the basis for significant enhancements to our workplace practices. That included creating a new role for a Chief People Officer along with boosting our Human Resources staff and adding robust employee wellness initiatives."

 

[TheCardFan]

This is nothing.

Keim's suspension was a franchise suspension, not an NFL suspension. What are the NFL going to do?

Plus everyone knows they were speaking to him during that time.

Probably lose a draft pick(s).

 

[Stout]

Ugh, this is bad. Why? They're not going to force Bidwill to sell. That's a fantasy, a dream that will never come true. What they will do is dock the franchise draft picks. That is a very believable nightmare.

 

[Shane]

Shouldn’t be hard to prove if it’s actually true. And what took so long to come forward?

 

[Alan]

Let’s quickly trade that #3 pick…

 

[BritCard]

Probably lose a draft pick(s).

For what? An accusation from a bitter former employee that they broke a self imposed suspension?

It wasn't an league suspension so I'm not sure why the league would be bothered by it 5 years later and potentially create negative headlines for themselves.

I'd be amazed if this goes any further.

 

[unseenaz]

This really feels like nothing, and certainly won't force the sale of the team.

 

[Dback Jon]

This really feels like nothing, and certainly won't force the sale of the team.

Isn’t that what people said at the beginning of the Sarver saga?

 

[TJ]

Ken Kendricks needs to sleep with one eye open

 

[football karma]

the gloves are off on both sides

Terry Mc accusing Mike of being western Daniel Synder

Mike B telling the world that Terry Mc is unemployable: "difficulties in his personal life and his often volatile demeanor toward colleagues"

it tells me that Mike fired McDonough for cause and didn't pay out his contract, so Terry is going nuclear in an attempt to get a settlement

its been a bad 18 months for Mike.

 

[Buckybird]

He said, she said. Most likely a big fat, zero nothing other than a disgruntled ex employee trying to bury the ship.

But then again…when things like this start & keep piling up against the owner it often has bad results! Stayed tuned

 

[SeattleCardinal]

At this point, I wouldn't be unhappy to see Bidwill get Sarvered.

 

[SoonerLou]

Ugh, this is bad. Why? They're not going to force Bidwill to sell. That's a fantasy, a dream that will never come true. What they will do is dock the franchise draft picks. That is a very believable nightmare.

Good thing we got Monti instead of Keim.

 

[football karma]

another observation:

Mike is a lawyer. To suspend Keim and then have your employees use burner phones to talk to him feels like Keystone cops.

If a lawyer wanted to get around a suspension -- it would have been a far more sophisticated scheme with plausible deniability.

and it definitely wouldn't involve yelling at employees when they don't go along with your scheme.

 

[Buckybird]

Is having a burner phone to communicate with Keim during his suspension a huge story like bountygate or spygate? Absofreakinglutely not.

 

[juza76]

another observation:

Mike is a lawyer. To suspend Keim and then have your employees use burner phones to talk to him feels like Keystone cops.

If a lawyer wanted to get around a suspension -- it would have been a far more sophisticated scheme with plausible deniability.

and it definitely wouldn't involve yelling at employees when they don't go along with your scheme.

U probably talking about a lawyer good at this job

 

[Red on White]

Surely our results are adequate defence against cheating accusations of any kind