Getty Image
The NFL has its fair share of eccentric owners, but perhaps none are more eccentric than Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
Irsay took over the team after his father Robert passed away in 1997. And, all told, he’s had a good amount of success in his 25 years and counting at the helm.
Though much of that comes down to drafting Peyton Manning No. 1 overall in the 1998 NFL Draft.
Since Manning left the team in 2012, the Colts have largely been up and down.
Irsay hasn’t exactly helped that cause recently, isolating superstar running back Jonathan Taylor before he eventually requested a trade.
Meanwhile, Irsay has been off negotiating deals about rare guitars or trying to save captive whales.
Again, he’s a strange cat.
But perhaps none of that lives up to the story he shared on Wednesday about the time he tried to get former president Barack Obama to sign the Declaration of Independence.
Irsay posted the insane story on Instagram page, and according to him this is how it went…
“The Declaration of Independence, okay, that’s for real one of the few copies made by stone 223 years ago,” he said referring to a copy of the document that he owns. “President Obama, who I was with that night in Martha’s Vineyard, and I said ‘Mr. President, I have an idea. It’s a copy now, so maybe you’ll sign it. And that’ll bring the past to the future!’
“And he’s like ‘what? You want me to sign the Declaration of Independence?’ I go ‘Mr. President, don’t you think…?’ ‘I, Jim, am not signing the Declaration of Independence.’ I said. ‘Mr. President!’ ‘Jim, I said I’m not.’ I go ‘Yes, Mr. President, I get it!'”
You gotta credit Irsay for asking. But it’s a completely insane thing to ask.
And Obama seemed to realize the backlash he would’ve faced had he gone through with the idea.
Again though, talk about classic Jim Irsay. There’s a reason why he’s the league’s most charismatic owner.