Jaguars Hope Luxurious Locker Room Will Overhaul Image JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - The Jacksonville Jaguars have one victory, the lowest-ranked offense and one of the worst run defenses after the first month of the N.F.L. season. But they do have wenge-wood lockers and backlighted mirrors. The Jaguars, who use tarps to cover empty stadium seats, are now also using tablecloths at swank soirees, after spending more than $3 million to construct the N.F.L."s most luxurious locker room, at EverBank Field, where they practice and play. The locker room looks like a cross between a high-end nightclub (a 41,600-watt sound system) and a five-star hotel (stacked stone wall tile) and is so deluxe that the team recently used it to host a dinner for sponsors. That would have been an unappetizing proposition in the days of cinder-block rooms decorated with overflowing laundry baskets and crumpled tape. But in the most visible attempt to overhaul their image - and they hope, their fortunes - under the new owner Shahid Khan, the Jaguars have embraced their inner interior designer, replete with two waterfalls that splash into plunge pools, Euro-style toilets inside individual private stalls and leather chairs custom-built extra wide to accommodate even the heftiest linemen. There are ventilation systems built into each locker to dry equipment, helping the Jaguars to pull off the unimaginable: the locker room smells like a new car instead of a sweaty sock. "It's first class, just to show that's how he does things," said Khan's son, Tony, who is also a team executive. It's the best locker room in the N.F.L. He wants this to be the best organization in the N.F.L. Shahid Khan, who made his fortune in auto parts, did not just pay for this. He personally met with the designers and approved the details. He ordered the oversize leather swivel chairs at each locker after nixing the original plan of having metal folding ones - with an eye on the win column, not just the bottom line. Tony Khan joked that it would have cost a lot more if his mother had been involved. The locker room is more than just a potential entry in Architectural Digest. It is a step into an architectural arms race, contested by teams seeking any edge in the pursuit of free agents, the link between ventilation systems and victories. The Jaguars play in one of the N.F.L."s smallest and most nondescript markets and have made the playoffs just twice in the last 13 seasons. When they recruit players, they may struggle to sell history or endorsement opportunities. But when the door to the locker room swings open, one of the first things visible is an 80-inch television, and that sells something else: the signal that the team will spare no expense to be excellent at everything. "You want to like your work environment; you want to feel comfortable and know it's nice," Jacksonville receiver Laurent Robinson said. During free agency this off-season, the Jaguars showed Robinson and the backup quarterback Chad Henne the plans for the new locker room. "I was like, Wow, this is like heaven," Robinson said. It does attract free agents. They want to show you they value their players. Think new carpet doesn't help seal a new contract? The Jets opened their huge, airy Florham Park, N.J., training facility - which replaced their cramped, crumbling one at Hofstra University on Long Island - in the fall of 2008. But before it was completed, they used it to pitch linebacker Calvin Pace on the merits of signing with the Jets, taking him out to the leafy suburban site to show him where he would live and work. The Jets, the former coach Eric Mangini said, were offering Pace close to the amount of money that the Miami Dolphins were, and Mangini said he thought the new facility might have helped sway Pace. When Mangini, who is now an ESPN analyst, moved on to become the coach of the Cleveland Browns, the team immediately began to revamp its antiquated facilities, renovating meeting rooms, the team room, the weight room, the training room and the outside practice field. The Browns brought in high-definition cameras to film practices, because they knew the league would be using them. They purchased the latest in hot and cold tubs and shower systems to help recovery. The Browns" spotty record suggests there is not a direct correlation between shower fixtures and success, but in the detail-obsessed world of football, no hanging lighted logo fixture should be overlooked. "The first thing that has to be equal is the money," Mangini said of using facilities to lure players. If you're in a competition where the dollars are going to be same, there is real value to that. The thought process is when the player comes in, you're selling him on a lot of things, on the team and the location and then the organization, and it's not necessarily in that order. The salary cap is $130 million. If you put that much money into people, why wouldn't you create the absolutely best learning environment and a place they wanted to spend time at? The Jaguars seem to have accomplished that. The locker room looks like a modern SoHo apartment - that is, if modern SoHo apartments had space for shoulder pads - all high ceilings and dim lights. There are a few issues remaining. The large garbage cans around the room, which look like shiny black plastic, do not quite fit the aesthetic the way, say, stainless steel might. Uche Nwaneri, who has been an offensive lineman for the Jaguars since he was drafted in 2007, said he liked coming to the locker room now because it felt more "homey." "The locker room is where you're going to spend most of your time in a season," he said. You want to feel you have your own space. The old locker room, you couldn't tell the difference between his locker and my locker. There were clothes everywhere. At that, Nwaneri crinkles his nose in disgust. "This is like a spa, right?" he added. Maybe the victories will come later. But at least the Jaguars have won the design wars.