Who's going to buy the Chicago Cubs, and for how much?
With Tribune Co. saying Monday that it was putting the storied franchise on the block to raise cash, speculation centered around several big names, including Jerry Colangelo, chairman of the NBA's Phoenix Suns and a former owner of that team and baseball's Arizona Diamondbacks, and Mark Cuban, owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks.
Some Chicago-area businessmen, including Don Levin, owner of the Chicago Wolves minor league hockey team, also are believed to be interested in the Cubs, who haven't reached the World Series since 1945 and haven't won it since 1908.
Colangelo told the Associated Press in November that he would have "great interest" in buying the Cubs, and that he'd already initiated preliminary discussions with others who might join him in a bid. Cuban has in the past expressed interest. Neither could be reached Monday. Levin was traveling, but a spokeswoman said his interest had not waned.
There will be no shortage of bidders for the Cubs, said Marc Ganis, president of Chicago-based Sportscorp Ltd., a sports marketing and consulting firm.
"If Mark Cuban does decide he's interested, he'll prove to be a very formidable competitor," Ganis said. "He's a very serious player. And Jerry Colangelo is pretty much looked upon as the gold standard in Chicago because of all that he's accomplished."
Tribune purchased the franchise in 1981 for $20.5 million. Late last year, a high-ranking baseball official said a Wall Street acquaintance told him that Tribune was valuing the Cubs at about $1 billion. The highest price ever paid for a Major League Baseball franchise was $700 million for the Boston Red Sox in 2002.
One investment banker who has looked at the franchise said its pretax value could be as high as $800 million. At that price, the Cubs would bump up against the U.S. record for a sports property sale -- the $800 million that the NFL's Washington Redskins sold for in 1999.
In November, Merrill Lynch analyst Lauren Rich Fine said the most relevant figure was the value of the franchise after taxes had been paid on a sale, which she estimated at $450 million.
Part of the Cubs' value will be driven by the club's partnerships with media companies. Broadcasters demand a constant flow of programming, and baseball provides plenty of game action, along with pregame and postgame shows, in which to embed commercials. The value of media partnerships was evident in the Red Sox sale, which included an 80% stake in NESN, the cable channel that carries the team's games.
