Kansas City Chiefs' Value In Decline On And Off The Field, 18th In NFL

The Kansas City Chiefs rank 18th among the 32 teams in the National Football League in terms of franchise value, according to the Forbes magazine annual survey of the most valuable sports franchises.

The Dallas Cowboys have the highest value in the NFL and are the highest ranked U.S. sports team, with a franchise value of $1.85 billion, according to the survey. The Cowboys are second worldwide only to soccer's Manchester United of the English Premier League, valued at $1.9 billion.

The Chiefs are worth $986 million, based on the Forbes report, but this figure is down from the team's reported value of $1.027 billion a year earlier, when they were considered the 14 most valuable team in the NFL. The average value of the 32 NFL teams is $1.04 billion, up 1.4 percent over the previous year.

The Washington Redskins have the second highest value at $1.55 billion, the same as it was in the prior year; New England is worth $1.41 billion, compared with $1.36 billion a year earlier; the New York Giants increased in value from $1.183 billion to $1.3 billion, followed by their New York City rivals, the Jets, who have a franchise value of $1.22 billion.

Operating income dipped to an average of $30.6 million per team in the 2010 season, on which the latest survey is based, but the new collective bargaining agreement will bring the owners a bigger slice of the revenue in the future. According to Forbes, the owners who stand to benefit the most are the owners of high-revenue teams, who will now make lower revenue-sharing payments to the other owners. The Chiefs' had operating income of $14.5 million in 2010 on revenue of $252 million.

Under the new collective bargaining agreement, the owners will pay the players as much as 48 percent of total revenues, which is down from 51 percent previously.