John Madden

elliman.com

Any entourage of all-time great NFL quarterbacks can use a good coach and John Madden was one of the best. Although he might be better known today as a broadcaster (he won 14 Sports Emmy Awards and was the first person to do football broadcasts on all four U.S. Television networks) and video game star (Madden NFL video games have been best sellers since 1988), John was also one of the most successful coaches in NFL history as the head coach for the Oakland Raiders from 1969-1978. He led the Raiders to the Super Bowl in 1976 and posted an impressive 103-32-7 career record. He was the youngest coach ever to reach 100 career regular season victories, which he accomplished in just 10 seasons. Now he is trying to sell his apartment on the Upper West Side in New York City, and the price has just dropped from $4.9 million to $3.9 million.

John's apartment is in the famous Dakota (where John Lennon lived and died), and has been on and off the market for the last two years. John bought the apartment from Gilda Radner in 1985 but his main home is in the San Francisco area. He is afraid to fly and does not get to New York often since his retirement as a football announcer in 2009.

At almost 2,000 square feet and next to Central Park, the home has two bedrooms with two and a half baths, 13-foot ceilings, hardwood floors and it comes with an unusual private courtyard entrance. The Dakota was constructed from 1880 to 1884 and has always been a hot spot for wealthy New Yorkers. It is very European looking with lots of gables, balconies, dormers and steep roof lines. Electricity was originally generated by an in-house power plant and still features wooden mahogany shutters and mahogany door frames. The Dakota even has its own tennis court and croquet lawn.