Hedge Fund Titan Has a Turnaround Plan (for the Carolina Panthers)

Humility is not a typical posture for a hedge fund titan, but David Tepper, the founder of the $20 billion Appaloosa Management, wants you to know he has made mistakes and is fixing them.

Mr. Tepper is not talking about positions on tech stocks that went south or wrong-way bets on a foreign currency. He is referring to the Carolina Panthers, the National Football League team he bought in 2018 for a record $2.3 billion.

The Panthers have been one of the worst teams in the league since he took over, winning just 33 percent of their games and never making the playoffs. Mr. Tepper has churned through seven coaches and 10 quarterbacks, sparred with reporters and been fined $300,000 for throwing a drink at a fan. He also shelved the construction of a team facility after a bitter dispute with officials in South Carolina.

Eight seasons into his tenure in one of America’s most exclusive clubs, Mr. Tepper is contrite and confident that he has finally found a winning formula. He hired new coaches and a general manager who rebuilt the roster, and used his deep pockets — he is the second-wealthiest N.F.L. owner, with a net worth of $24 billion, according to Forbes — to expand the team’s analytics department, renovate its stadium and build a new training facility.

His efforts are paying off this season: The Panthers are off to a surprising 6-5 start, a half-game out of first place in their four-team division, and surpassing the number of wins they had in their 17-game season last year.

“You really know you’re successful when you know what you don’t know,” Mr. Tepper said in a rare interview at the team’s headquarters in Charlotte, N.C., before the season began. He pointed to his cellphone as a proxy for his hedge fund. “I think that in that thing, I’m pretty fast. I’m early to see things, early to see when I’m wrong. It’s just a question of getting the right cadence. This is a little bit different because the cadence is a little different.”