Congratulations to the Florida Panthers as the repeat Stanley Cup Champions eliminating the Edmonton Oilers in 6 games. According to reports I read, there are three historical items associated with the Panthers’ victory:
- This is only the fourth time in Stanley Cup history that a team has defeated the same opponent for the Cup in two consecutive years.
- Since the NHL adopted a salary cap in 2005, this is the third time a team has won back-to-back championships.
- The last time a Canadian team won the Stanley Cup was in 1993 (the Montreal Canadiens). The loss by the Oilers in the final series extends that streak to 31 consecutive years.
Moving on … It appears that two US sports franchises are in the process of changing ownership. According to Sportico.com. the Tampa Bay Rays are “in advanced talks to sell the team” to a bidding group led by a real estate developer from Jax. Sportico says the selling price will be around $1.7B and that the Rays’ principal owner, Stuart Sternberg has entered into “exclusive negotiations” with the potential buyers.
On one hand, this news is not all that surprising; the Rays have never drawn well in their home stadium and all sorts of negotiations and studies for ways to get them a new playpen in a better location have come to naught. There was a plan to put the new stadium downtown in St. Petersburg that seemed to have gotten closer to reality than any previous sites, but that one seems now to have run aground. So, current ownership understandably might be happy to sell the team and let someone else find a place for them to play after a hurricane rendered Tropicana Field unusable and potentially unfixable.
On the other hand, with the lack of a definite home for the team in plain sight, the selling price for the franchise must be in the “bargain basement”. So, the fact that Sterenberg is looking to sell the team implies that he has had it with the pols in coastal Florida and their unwillingness to make a deal with him.
The reported target sales price of $1.7B is in line with what the new ownership of the Orioles paid for that franchise last year. David Rubenstein led a group that purchased the O’s for $1.725B 15 months ago.
The other franchise that seems to be changing hands is the LA Lakers. According to news yesterday, the Buss family – – owners of the Lakers since 1983 – – will sell its controlling majority interest in the team at a price which values the entire franchise at $10B. The buyer is Mark Walter who is probably best known as the principal owner of the LA Dodgers. In addition to that position, Walter is also:
- Principal owner of the LA Sparks (WNBA)
- Owner of the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL)
- Primary owner of the Andretti Global F1 Racing Team
- He owns 12% of the company that controls Chelsea (EPL and RC Strasbourg in Ligue 1.
Walter made his money in the financial world but obviously he has more than a passing interest in sports given the wide range of “sports properties” he has chosen to invest in. If the reported price tag for the controlling interest in the Lakers is accurate, that would make the purchase a record for sports franchises in the US dwarfing the $6B price that the Washington Commanders sold for less than 2 years ago and the $6B price tag that was on the Boston Celtics last year. All the other NBA owners should give thanks to Mark Walter today; he just raised the valuation for every other NBA franchise out there and also raised the asking price for two expansion franchises that will be forthcoming from the NBA sooner than later.
Switching gears … A few days ago, I was unable to find TV data for the UFL Championship Game last weekend. Well, the news is out, and it is not good for the UFL.
- The Championship Game had an average audience of 983,000 viewers.
- That represents a 40% drop in viewership from last year’s Championship Game.
- This comes on the heels of an average 21% drop in viewership for regular season UFL games.
The league officials are clearly taking a “glass half full” view of this saying that these audience numbers are excellent as compared to other programming available to networks. Here is what UFL President, Russ Brandon said according to USA Today:
“People would give their eyeteeth for the amount of eyeballs that are watching our games on TV.”
Here is a companion statement from one of the main owners of the UFL, Dany Garcia:
“Our first-year merge was murky for us to understand; what does the market actually think of us, and who are we? This is the year that we got the clarity, and now we know who we are, and now we push forward.”
The good news for the UFL is that it has TV deals in place with FOX and with ABC/ESPN. Will that be sufficient good news?
Finally, this from Will Rogers:
“There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.”
But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………