The Grousbecks agreed to sell the Celtics for a record $6.1 billion Thursday, with a group led by private equity executive and Massachusetts native William Chisholm taking over near the end of the decade.
Steve Pagliuca, Wyc Grousbeck’s longtime partner in owning the team and the former co-chairman of Bain Capital, criticized the deal in a pointed letter Thursday morning.
Pagliuca has been a co-owner since the Grousbeck family bought the team for $360 million in 2002 and was considered a contender to become majority owner since the Grousbecks announced a sale in July 2024, shortly after the team won the NBA Finals.
Pagliuca laid out why he felt his offer was superior and alluded to Chisholm’s being potentially loaded with burdensome debt.
“We made a fully guaranteed and financed offer at a record price,” Pagliuca said in his post. “We had no debt or private equity money that would potentially hamstring our ability to compete in the future.” (Sixth Street, a private equity firm, is reportedly putting a billion dollars toward the purchase of the Celtics. Pagliuca himself made his fortune at Bain, one of the best-known PE companies in the world, and is now a senior advisor there.)
The Celtics currently carry the two richest contracts in NBA history in Jaylen Brown’s and Jayson Tatum’s extensions, which both exceed $300 million. This season, the Celtics’ payroll is roughly $200 million, which is fifth in the NBA, according to Spotrac, and a hefty luxury-tax bill will be due in the coming years. Irving Grousbeck, Wyc’s father, reportedly forced the sale because the 90-year-old didn’t want to fund losses any longer. Irving Grousbeck owns a fifth of the team while his son holds only 3%, according to the New York Post.
Pagliuca acknowledged the team’s upcoming tax situation in his letter and said he would not cut costs as owner.
“I recruited new partners with deep resources and expertise in technology and international markets to maximize the Celtics’ successes to ensure we can always compete for Championships, luxury taxes be damned,” he wrote.
The 70-year-old suggested the sale may fall through and said his ownership group is prepared.
“I will never stop being a Celtic, and if the announced transaction does not end up being finalized, my partners and I are ready to check back into the game and bring it home, to help continue what the Celtics do best—win,” he wrote.
The NBA’s Board of Governors is slated to meet later this month, and it would have to approve the purchase, which will be interesting in light of another item on its next meeting agenda.
When the Celtics were announced for sale, Wyc Grousbeck said he was seeking a buyer who would acquire the team in two phases and let him run it until 2028; it appears he’s found that in Chisholm’s group.
It’s a similar setup to what Glen Taylor agreed to when he sold the Minnesota Timberwolves and Lynx to Alex Rodriguez and Marc Lore only to take the team off the market over an alleged missed payment, which Rodriguez and Lore said was in fact merely Taylor changing his mind. That led to a nearly year-long legal battle that Rodriguez and Lore finally won in arbitration in February. They are awaiting final approval from the league’s owners to get control of the team.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver said the drama of the T-Wolves deal had owners looking at changing rules. But less than a year later, he has another team seeking to do a complex, multiyear sale.
“It’s certainly not ideal to have a stepped transaction like this,” Silver said of the Wolves sale last spring. “It met our rules from that standpoint, and it’s what Glen Taylor wanted and it’s what they were willing to agree to at the time. But I think once the dust clears on this deal, it may cause us to reassess what sort of transactions we should allow.”
Spokespeople for the NBA and Taylor did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
“Bill is a terrific person and a true Celtics fan, born and raised here in the Boston area,” Wyc Grousbeck said in a statement. “Quite simply, he wants to be a great owner. He has asked me to run the team as CEO and Governor for the first three years, and stay on as his partner, and I am glad to do so.”
