San Francisco 49ers CEO Jed York arrives at Levi’s Stadium before his team played the Arizona Cardinals in Santa Clara on Sunday, January 8, 2023.
Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle
Turns out that Kyle Shanahan’s cell phone slipping off his lap while he was driving wasn’t the most dramatic offseason story for the San Francisco 49ers.
Team owner Jed York was arrested on Sunday morning at 9:35 a.m. on prostitution charges in an East Palestine, Ohio, trailer park. He allegedly arranged to have sex with a prostitute for $140. On Monday morning, York — a father of two young boys who filed for divorce from his wife Danielle in May after 15 years of marriage — pleaded no contest to lesser charges, including disorderly conduct.
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This is a shocking, deeply embarrassing development for York, for the 49ers and for the NFL. York’s team hosted the Super Bowl six months ago. In just a little over a week, his team will depart on a goodwill mission to Australia to play a prominent season opener and promote the NFL as a global brand. The 49ers are one of the league’s most powerful teams, ranked fifth in the league in value at $8.6 billion, according to Forbes.
The NFL may not punish York in any serious way. New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft was arrested on prostitution charges in 2019 but the charges were later dropped on a technicality and the NFL never issued any public punishment or fine.
The league would surely like this whole embarrassing incident to go away, as evidenced by the muted coverage of York’s arrest on ESPN, which now owns NFL Network, and on NFL.com, and that their NFL “insiders” failed to break the story. Ironically, their big news was quarterback DeShaun Watson, shamed by his own sexual misconduct scandal, being named starter for the Cleveland Browns.
The 49ers, who are about to start a critical season, would like the story to disappear. On Monday the team issued a statement: “As this is a legal matter, which has been resolved, we will not be providing any further comment at this time.”
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Even without official censure, York’s credibility and integrity are badly undermined, perhaps permanently. If the morals and judgment of the person at the top of an organization are questionable, it’s hard to expect anyone else to be held to a higher standard. The 49ers talk about wanting a team made up of players of high moral character. Oh, to have an owner who could meet that description.
You would think York would be more than a little more aware of the damage any illegal activity could have on his reputation and status. After all, he’s only in his position because of his uncle’s legal trouble. Eddie DeBartolo Jr. pleaded guilty to failing to report a felony, when he paid a bribe to former Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards in a riverboat gambling scheme and, in 2000, was suspended and fined by the NFL. DeBartolo surrendered control of the team to his sister, Denise DeBartolo York.
Denise and her husband John York took charge of the 49ers but after several disastrous years at the helm, gave the reins to Jed, the oldest of their four children, who became the totally unqualified CEO at 28. In 2024, he acquired enough shares to become principal owner. The NFL, which issued a statement saying the matter “will be reviewed under the personal conduct policy,” may not punish York, but there’s a chance Mommy and Daddy still could.
Though not as salacious as prostitution charges, this isn’t the first time York has acted as though the rules don’t apply to him. He essentially bought the Santa Clara City Council, through massive election donations, in order to retain control of Levi’s Stadium and obscure its finances. The stadium is technically owned by the city, but the 49ers run it, now with little oversight or accountability thanks to the pro-York city council. One of York’s hand-picked city council members, Anthony Becker, ran for mayor with team funding, lost and was found guilty of perjuring himself in front of a grand jury. Critics say the stadium has become a terrible deal for Santa Clara.
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For many years in York’s early tenure as team leader, he made disastrous decisions. He had a bitter falling out with Jim Harbaugh, the only good coach the York family had hired at that point, including apologizing to fans for Harbaugh’s team over Twitter. In the aftermath of Harbaugh’s departure, York crowed about the need to “win with class” and privately derided some of Harbaugh’s action and dealings with players. Then York hired, in a quick succession of failures, Jim Tomsula and Chip Kelly, who didn’t win, with class or any other way, going 7-25.
When York finally hired Shanahan and John Lynch he seemed to have learned his lesson. He stopped meddling with the structure of the team, instead concentrating on buying up the Santa Clara City Council, selling equity in his team and getting richer, buying stakes in British soccer teams and cozying up with other Bay Area billionaire movers and shakers like San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie.
“Jed got out of the way,” a source told the Chronicle in 2024, ascribing that new tactic to the team’s success.
Not any longer. Right now Jed is very much in the way. He’s in the headlines and the crosshairs, just days before a pivotal season for his team is about to begin.
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His actions are an embarrassment and a distraction. They are a sign of selfishness, of a lack of accountability and integrity.
And this offseason drama is an indication of a huge leadership void at the very top.