Labelled a financial genius, meet the man who agreed to pay £20m for Lovren

Mike Gordon FSG profile: The man with Brendan Rodgers' Liverpool FC life in his hands

He's the man who has Brendan Rodgers’ future in his hands.

Mike Gordon is tasked with leading the end of season review which will determine whether Rodgers continues as manager following a disastrous campaign for Liverpool.

The 50-year-old American has become an increasingly important figure at Anfield over the past three years but most Kopites wouldn’t know him if they bumped into him.

He doesn’t give interviews. He doesn’t have a public profile and that’s how he likes it - out of the limelight.

Gordon is essentially responsible, alongside chief executive Ian Ayre, for the day to day running of Liverpool. However, his role extends way beyond simply reporting back to Boston-based principal owner John W Henry and chairman Tom Werner.

He is Fenway Sports Group’s second largest shareholder with around 12%. Only Henry (around 40%) holds a bigger stake in an organisation which has the Boston Red Sox and Liverpool among its lucrative business interests.

Gordon, who grew up in Milwaukee but moved to Boston as a student, is married with four children. He enjoyed a hugely successful career in finance prior to getting involved with FSG.

He worked for American multinational financial services corporation Fidelity in the 90s before founding the hedge fund Vinik Asset Management with Jeffrey Vinik in 1996. When they shut it down in 2013 it had assets in excess of $6billion.

Gordon, who had started out selling popcorn at Milwaukee Brewers matches, always had a passion for baseball and in 2002 he joined up with FSG when they purchased the Red Sox.

For years he was a limited partner but that changed following FSG’s takeover of Liverpool in October 2010.

Gordon was installed on the club’s board of directors and since 2012, when he increased his stake in FSG, he has spent more and more of his time on this side of the Atlantic.

A year ago Henry and Werner recognised that increased influence by giving him the title of FSG president.

Gordon is the most senior member of the club’s much maligned transfer committee and has been heavily involved in the Main Stand redevelopment. He is also a trustee of the Liverpool FC Foundation.

“Mike is well known among professional investors as being one of the brightest financial minds in the country,” Henry told the Boston Globe back in March.

“So he is involved in virtually all of our important financial discussions and decisions.

“He spent his career essentially buying businesses through choosing stocks. He understands present value, all of the financial issues that exist in an organization as wide and diverse as this is.

“He is by far FSG America’s most knowledgeable person with regard to soccer and is involved on the football side daily in constant communication with the members of our football committee and our manager. He took a lead role just about the same time as we brought in Brendan Rodgers.”

Former business partner Vinik, who now owns Tampa Bay Lightning ice hockey team, added: “Mike Gordon is one of the best human beings you could possibly meet.

“He’s very smart, very thoughtful and really outstanding at solving problems and finding solutions to difficult issues.”

What happens over the coming weeks and months will put that glowing tribute to the test.

At the end of a torrid season, Liverpool are in a mess and Gordon is tasked with putting plans in place to sort it out.

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If this guy is the senior member of our transfer committee and in charge of the money we pay for players he has quite simply failed.

They say Rodgers needs to convince Mike Gordon, but does Mike Gordan need to convince us? Is this all Mike Gordans fault?

 

What was the percentage kick back?

 

Gordon owens 12% of FSG..

He is rodgers most ardent supporter

he is also the guy henry has in charge of the committee review... ergo white wash... he is in effect the new christian purslow.

He was not orginally on the committee but was added to become the 6th voice

in effect this guy has edwards and fallows wrapped round his finger as well as hunter as they go the minute he says they do.

Its all about power and it looks to me like a nice little cabal of yes men. Rodger is safe as long as he does what gordon wants

 

“He is by far FSG America’s most knowledgeable person with regard to soccer"

And there lies a massive problem, he knows **** all about football and is an expert on all things baseball.

Any new manager(if Rodgers gets the bullet)would have to deal with this "soccer expert" and any top class manager would be telling him to keep his nose out when it comes to the footballing side of the club, but Rodgers is a yes man and looks sure to keep his job.

 

Gordan is essientially our director of football. A director of football with no background in the game.

By allowing the club to over pay for players like Lovren he has given us a bad reputation.

Lovren clearly has confidence issues and I think he struggled to handle being a £20m footballer, much like Downing. Had we not over paid his story at LFC could have been different. Not spectacular but better.

 

and the problem we saw instantly regarding the baseball to football transition is money ball.

In baseball you can sign players based on statistics due to the nature of the game. In football they only tell a small part of the story and can make a payer look a lot better than they are (ahem Lovren ahem), yet statistics have played a big part n our transfer strategy.

TBH right now I want this guy off the panel and replaced with a proper DoF with a background in the game.

Mike Gordan is nothing more than a fraud.

 

Blaming a shareholder for writing the cheques for the ****ing donkeys selected by Rodgers?

What next? the tea lady said Lallana had nice hair, so it's her fault we spunked that £25m

 

Totally agree JK but the baseball heads in Boston think they can run LFC along the same lines as the Red Sox and until they treat us as separate entities within our own respective sports with football people dealing with football issues at LFC we'll continue in mediocrity.

 

Make your mind up Tobes, you spent the best part of yesterday telling us he was part of the decision making committee.

 

How can you call the man a fraud?

He's the second biggest shareholder in FSG and has been charged with over seeing his and their investment at LFC.

What's fraudulent about him?

You're merely seeking a scapegoat to excuse Rodgers obvious failures imo.

 

Rodgers has the power of veto on that committee as you well know, and he therefore has the most influence.

 

Mike Gordon is essentially Ayre's replacement. He should be running the business/commercial side.

We need a proper DoF at the club. Problem is, will Rodgers want to work with one?

 

The quote I highlighted in my earlier post shows him to be out of his depth on football matters, if he wants to stick to dealing with finances and taking care of his share of the club fine, but he can't have it both ways, the manager is hired to(hopefully)bring the club success, once he's hired either back his judgement with the clubs money or sack him if his judgement doesn't work and money is wasted and then try another manager.
I understand that he's got a massive financial interest in LFC but imagine if one of the Glazer family was as openly hands on at OT and refusing players their manager wanted, it just doesn't work.

 

I'd like to set ramsey bolton on both rodgers and gordon and send their heads to boston in a box.

 

Rodgers will now hold no power of veto at the moment hes in limbo awaiting the meeting, if he gets kept on with diminished powers he'll be just a lacky to the owners.

 

how on earth do you know?

nobody knows.

its next week, this is ****ing boring now.. lets move on....

 

There's a massive leap between a quote saying he's FSG's most knowledgable man on 'soccer' and then deciding that means he's actively dabbling in team affairs.

The fact that he sits on the committee for transfers is as relevant as Ayre doing so, they're the money men, their focus would be on value and potential resale, rather than whether the target has got a sweet left peg.

It's not really any different to the traditional Chairman / manager relationship - the manager selects his target, the Chairman decides whether he's affordable and will only bring him in if he can do so on the right deal for the club.

 

Rodgers has no choice. If he resigns now he will be forever labelled a failure and never manage a big club again. Football is not forgiving.

 

The thing that angers me with Gordan is that he is in charge of the money for transfers and has over spend horribly, wasting a lot of money. If any one else (not part of FSG)as wasted that money they would have to be sacked.

Lets get Gordan out of that job because he's made us a joke.

 

If he wants a big job after Liverpool, he'll have no choice but to accept that structure because that's how they all operate.