The former vice president of the Arizona Cardinals, Terry McDonough, had accused owner Michael Bidwill of gross misconduct and discrimination, among other things. Now the accusations are confirmed by a letter.

Former Arizona Cardinals vice president Terry McDonough has accused franchise owner Michael Bidwill of “gross misconduct, including fraud, discrimination and harassment” in an arbitration filed with Commissioner Roger Goodell. This was last reported by “ESPN”.

Among other things, McDonough alleged that Bidwell stopped a “2019 external culture assessment of the Cardinals after an extensive set of responses criticized the Cardinals’ abysmal culture and placed most of the blame on Bidwill. “

Minegar’s letter confirms McDonough’s statements

According to McDonough, many employees had stated that they were “afraid of Bidwill on a daily basis as a result of his erratic and often abusive treatment of them.”

Now, apparently, another former Cardinals employee has confirmed some of those allegations, “Pro Football Talk” reports.

McDonough’s allegations were eventually backed up by former executive vice president Ron Minegar. The latter presented Bidwill with a letter back in 2019 that contained several statements reflecting McDonough’s concerns. Accordingly, “Pro Football Talk” has a copy of the letter.

Bidwill “points finger at others “

“You are no longer the guy I met in 2000,” Minegar wrote in 2019. “You were excited about the future and what it would mean for our organisation.”

It went on to say, however, “I know you’ve had a lot of problems to deal with in the past year, but you come to work every day upset. You treat almost everyone from the top down. You take credit for everything when things are going well, but point the finger at everyone else when we have problems. “

Minegar: “Employees work in fear “

Minegar confirms McDonough’s statements regarding staff throughout the letter, “Until recently, we had no indication of how our staff felt about working here. But the results of the staff survey showed that the majority of our staff work in fear. There are several factors for this, but a large part of it is directed at you.”

When the letter was publicly reported, the Cardinals released a statement in September 2022 making it seem as if Minegar was completely rowing back on the statements it had made. It said on Minegar’s part that “he realized how misguided he was and was proud of the work he did together with Bidwill. “

Minegar’s words taken out of context

Minegar disputed this statement in part. “I am disappointed that portions of the September 2022 correspondence were used by the Cardinals to falsely signal that I retracted statements from my 2019 resignation letter. This is patently false. I stand by the statements and am willing to discuss them with the parties involved through the NFL arbitration process,” Minegar said on “PFF.”

McDonough’s claims will be resolved in league-controlled arbitration.