One of the more complex team sales in recent sports history is now turning combative as Timberwolves and Lynx owner Glen Taylor (above, left) abruptly called off Thursday a planned transfer of controlling interest in the teams to Alex Rodriguez and Marc Lore, prompting a sharp rebuke from the prospective buyers that suggests the matter could be headed to litigation. 

Taylor, who has owned a majority stake in the Timberwolves since 1994, plus the Lynx since its ’99 debut, took the teams off the market after claiming Rodriguez and Lore failed to meet a Wednesday deadline to buy a 40% equity stake in the teams, adding to a separate 40% the former MLB star and his business partner already own. The 82-year-old Taylor added that “under certain circumstances, the buyer[s] could have been entitled to a limited extension. However, those circumstances did not occur.”

Rodriguez and Lore quickly responded, accusing Taylor of “seller’s remorse.”

“We have fulfilled our obligations, have all the necessary funding, and are fully committed to closing our purchase of the team as soon as the NBA completes its approval process,” the pair said, adding that Taylor’s statement is “short-sighted and disruptive to the team and the fans during a historic winning season.”

The Timberwolves, currently just a half game off the best record in the Western Conference, are enjoying their best season since 2004, in which they reached the conference finals. That on-court success has fueled a surge in team attendance and local television ratings. 

The NBA has yet to comment on the matter, specifically whether there is still an active approval process in this deal. Before this latest episode, multiple reports suggested there has been a deteriorating relationship between Taylor and the pair. 

Long Road 

Rodriguez, who has long sought to be a majority pro team owner, and Lore have been working on this deal since 2021. And given continually escalating team values, the $1.5 billion price set at the deal’s inception now represents a significant bargain. The Timberwolves are estimated to be now worth $2.5 billion, with more growth widely anticipated once the next set of national TV deals are completed. Values of every WNBA team, meanwhile, are soaring given that league’s rapid rise, and the Seattle Storm were valued last year at $151 million in a minority stake sale of that franchise. 

Most recently, there were concerns about Rodriguez and Lore being able to secure the needed financing to acquire this third tranche of equity. Just last week, those worries appeared to be fading; it was strongly expected the pair would complete the deal and become the teams’ new controlling owners. For now, Rodriguez and Lore will remain minority team owners with the equity they already have. 

With Taylor offering a very different accounting of events than Rodriguez and Lore, the saga appears far from over.

Chiefs president Mark Donovan (above) described himself as “cautiously optimistic” that a scheduled April 2 public vote would pass on a ⅜-cent sales tax for 40 years, which would help fund $2 billion for the renovation of Arrowhead Stadium and a new downtown Royals stadium. But, speaking to a small group of national reporters over Zoom on Thursday, he reiterated that “all options” are on the table if the voters turn the tax down.

Asked whether that meant relocation elsewhere in Missouri or farther afield, Donovan declined to delineate what he meant by “all options.” If the public money falls through, he said, Chiefs owner Clark Hunt is unwilling to sell a slice of the team to raise capital for the renovation. Wearing a Royals sweater to celebrate Opening Day (Chiefs coach Andy Reid is throwing out the first pitch), Donovan also did not rule out severing the long-term venues partnership with the baseball team.

The Royals and Chiefs have worked together since the early 1970s when their respective stadiums were built in the same complex.

“We’d have to look at all of our options, and that may include, you know, separate paths. We’ll see,” Donovan said.

Donovan says the Chiefs are making progress in convincing voters of the merits of the tax, which he described as investments in the community, more favorable leases for the municipalities, and the teams’ economic impact.

“And the reality is last year, just last year, this organization, the Chiefs’ organization, had a $993 million economic impact on this region,” Donovan said. (Economists often dispute economic impact estimates from leagues and teams.) “So we’ve been good partners; for a long, long time this partnership has worked. We have a massive economic impact. We have a really bright future. And we’ve just negotiated deals [the leases] that are unprecedented. We’re hopeful that it gets across the finish line. That’s what we’re focused on. That’s all we’ve been focused on. If that doesn’t happen, then we can look at our options and see exactly where we stand.”

The package would tie the Chiefs to Arrowhead through at least 2050, and possibly through ’65, depending on a series of five-year options.

While many new and renovated venues are part of mixed-use development projects, that is not the plan for the Chiefs (it is, however, for the Royals’ downtown prospects). In fact, business entities in the city of Independence, where the Chiefs and Royals currently play, don’t want the football team to develop the areas adjacent to Arrowhead, Donovan said.

“The former mayor of Independence and the Chamber [of Commerce] has come to us and asked us not to develop it, around it right now,” Donovan said. “They want to focus their time on downtown Independence and really growing that. And they feel like if we develop it competes with that.”

Asked about a letter sent Monday that complained about Jackson County executive Frank White to the county legislature, Donovan described the politician as disengaged.

“Unfortunately, a lot of our time delays, a lot of the deadlines missed in the process, more so on the Royals’ side than on the Chiefs’ side but affected both of us, were due to just a lack of engagement,” he said. “You know, honestly, we had multiple meetings with Frank’s team. … I literally only had, I think, two meetings in this whole process where Frank was in the room. So … it’s been a little frustrating … it’s been very eye-opening for me.”

The Diamondbacks, Padres, and Rockies are back on local TV, just in time for Thursday’s full start of the 2024 MLB season. But doing so required a last-minute scramble by the league and the trio of clubs, leaving plenty of long-term questions regarding the critical source of team revenue, and they could be joined by additional teams. 

The three clubs are on the front lines of historic disruption unfolding all across sports media, as they are each without a traditional regional sports network home. The Padres and Diamondbacks were dropped last year by the bankrupt Diamond Sports Group, while the closure last year of AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain in Denver left the Rockies in need of a new local broadcast plan. 

Following a series of distribution deals, some completed just this week, the teams’ 2024 local broadcast plan includes:

• Arizona: Charter, Comcast, Cox, DirecTV, Fubo, and MLB.TV streaming
• Colorado: Comcast, DirecTV, Spectrum, Fubo, and MLB.TV streaming
• San Diego: AT&T U-verse, Cox, DirecTV, Spectrum, Fubo, and MLB.TV streaming

MLB, which is handling game production duties, has developed online channel finders for each of the three teams to help fans find the games.

Broadly speaking, the patchwork of distribution deals is similar to what the Padres and Diamondbacks offered last year. But, in the future, they could be joined by additional teams—as well as teams in other sports—particularly depending on what ultimately happens with DSG’s efforts to emerge from bankruptcy and which team rights that company retains. DSG is currently set through the current MLB, NHL, and NBA seasons, but questions remain after that. 

Revenue Worries

The financial terms of the newly struck MLB deals were not disclosed. But they are not believed to match the large-scale, lucrative, and multiyear RSN deals the teams previously enjoyed.

“If you’re a fan of the Diamondbacks, it was pretty seamless. What we end up doing this year, I think, will be the same for fans,” team owner Ken Kendrick said last month. “The challenges on our side of the table [are] the economics of what the revenue streams that [local] television will create for us, which is not an insignificant part of our [overall] revenue.”

Despite that concern, the Diamondbacks are heading into the 2024 season with a record payroll of nearly $170 million following last year’s unexpected trip to the World Series. On the other hand, the club has less than half that figure in future salary commitments in any season beyond the current one.

Meanwhile, the in-market MLB.TV streaming of the Diamondbacks, Padres, and Rockies also is serving as something of a test case for a far larger offering involving more teams that league commissioner Rob Manfred is seeking to develop and introduce as soon as next year.