The NFL Fined Cowboys Owner Jerry Jones $250,000 for an "Obscene Gesture"

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has been no stranger to controversy both on and off the field during his tenure as the team's owner. In fact, it has often seemed like Jerry was courting controversy on purpose, even if it meant that his team wasn't always as successful as it could have been on the field.

On Oct. 7, though, the NFL announced that it was fining Jerry $250,000, which naturally led many people to wonder what Jerry had done to warrant the fine. While he's certainly not going to have to sell the team because of the fine, here's what we know about why he'll have to pay it.

The incident apparently occurred during the Cowboys' road win against the New York Jets on Oct. 5. In a viral video that circulated online, Jerry appears to point at fans at MetLife Stadium and then flip them off with his middle finger. Jerry has suggested that the gesture was inadvertent, and according to CNBC, he is planning to appeal the fine. He said he made the gesture in response to Cowboys fans who were celebrating a touchdown during the game's fourth quarter.

“That was unfortunate. That was kind of an exchange with our fans out in front of us,” Jerry said during an interview on 105.3 The Fan. “There was a swarm of Cowboys fans out in front — not Jets fans, Cowboys fans. The entire stadium was brimming with enthusiasm of Cowboys and certainly late in the game."

He added that he had made the gesture because he was excited that his team had scored.

″(The gesture) was inadvertent on my part because that was right after we made our last touchdown, and we were all excited about it,” he said. “There wasn’t any antagonistic issue or anything like that. I just put up the wrong show on the hand. That was inadvertently done. I’m not kidding. If you want to call it accidental, you can call it accidental. But it got straightened around pretty quick. I had a chance to look at it."

"It got straightened out pretty quick, but the intention was ‘thumbs up,’ and basically pointing at our fans because everybody was jumping up and down excited," he continued.

It's certainly not unprecedented for an owner to be fined for making this kind of gesture, and it seems like it might be difficult to determine what his intention was when the gesture was being made.

Jerry doesn't deny raising his middle finger, and he hasn't formally appealed the fine yet, although it still seems like he's likely to do so. He will have to make that decision one way or another by Oct. 10.

Jerry's team is currently sitting at 2-2-1, and in third place in their division after trading away Micah Parsons late in the offseason in a blockbuster move. While there's still time in the season for the Cowboys to make a run, it's unclear whether their owner is focused solely on winning.