You may have seen this quote from Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shad Khan circulating the Internet a month ago, as his Jaguars were getting hammered 34-3 at halftime of Monday’s game:

“Winning now is the expectation,” he said. “Make no mistake, this is the best team the Jacksonville Jaguars have ever put together. Best players, best coaches. But the most important thing is we prove it by winning now.”

Aside from the fact that his previous head coach left the team after one of those horrific late-night losses to pursue other interests at a bar and grill, this is the most embarrassing moment of Khan’s tenure. The Jaguars are utterly sloppy. Trevor Lawrence makes $55 million a season and hasn’t lost a foothold since entering the league in 2021—and this at a time when Sam Darnold, Baker Mayfield and Andy Dalton are all hot and bothered. Lawrence’s rookie contract included one playoff appearance. The Buffalo Bills, a team that should have been Jacksonville’s peers in the AFC at this point, could have rested their starters late in the first quarter of Monday night’s 47-10 loss and still come close to mercy rule status.

The problem with Khan’s quote isn’t that he said it. It’s that he believes whoever told him the information. This is something we don’t talk about nearly enough when it comes to the business of NFL football: Owners make decisions based on whoever is able to find their way into the inner circle and sell themselves in a way that wealthy and successful business people can understand, package and sell. It’s no different and no less maddening than corporate America, where the politically astute often find themselves at the top of the food chain while those who do the real work, like Boxer in Animal farmgo to the grindstone.

What went wrong in Jacksonville is that Khan, once again, at an absolutely critical time in the franchise’s history, fell into the understandable but foolish pursuit of a “sure thing” instead of taking the time to select the right one. Urban Meyer similarly positioned himself as a soothsayer for Lawrence, brazenly trampling on NFL norms and building the roster like a circa-2000 Rivals.com recruiting list. Trent Baalke, who considered himself in charge of the personnel when Meyer was hired, is no less innocent. Before that, amid uncertain footing, Khan thrust septuagenarian two-time Super Bowl winner Tom Coughlin into the front office fold after Coughlin was ousted from his head coaching position with the New York Giants.

That kind of attitude made Doug Pederson, who came to Jacksonville with his 2017 Super Bowl credentials in Philadelphia, a perfect escape during a hectic coaching carousel in which Khan had to save face and erase Meyer’s existence from the record books. Pederson won a Super Bowl, so of course he could figure out how to do it again.

Such a move is a painfully common tic for the NFL ownership circle. When billionaires are blessed with generationally talented players, they often panic and hire someone who has “reached the mountaintop.” The Dallas Cowboys did this with Mike McCarthy, who won a Super Bowl with the Green Bay Packers. The Denver Broncos do the same with Sean Payton, who won a Super Bowl with the New Orleans Saints. Of course, it neglects to acknowledge that the coach reached the mountaintop at a particular place and time (and usually with the help of a generational quarterback). It’s like a failing record label hiring the Bee Gees to revive its music division in 2024. Disco was great when disco was great. It could be great again. It’s not great now.

Anyone who’s met a Super Bowl-winning or national championship-winning coach knows that the magic is in their ability to convince people they have all the answers. And Khan, like everyone else, has locked himself into a strange and warped echo chamber of people who specialize in flair and are able to articulate a version of progress that’s just on the horizon.

The truth is, Josh Hines-Allen is still the best player on this Jaguars roster, and has been since he was drafted by Dave Caldwell in 2019. That regime made an AFC title game run with Blake Bortles, who can’t beat the declining Cleveland Browns in a rainstorm at home.

While coaches like Sean McVay and Kyle Shanahan are rare, the league has no shortage of bright young minds who can connect with the modern quarterback, maximize player skill sets and create a loose and fun workplace. Shane Steichen came from a branch of the Frank Reich tree. Dave Canales came from the school of Pete Carroll. And while those coaches were being hired, Khan was probably in a room with his general manager hearing how good, how talented and how ready the Jaguars were to turn things around. There are plenty of people who can save Lawrence; who can save the Jaguars. I guess they’re just not the ones Khan is promising they can—or have yet.

Perhaps spreading the quote will provide enough motivation to break the destructive cycle of chasing what has long been achieved elsewhere, and focus on what needs to be achieved now.