David Blitzer, partial owner of the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers and the NHL’s New Jersey Devils, is acquiring a large minority stake in the Cleveland Guardians, tweets Jon Heyman of the MLB Network. Perhaps of more interest, Heyman further reports that the deal gives Blitzer an option to become the majority owner around five to six years from now.
Eben Novy-Williams and Scott Soshnick of Sportico reported this morning that Blitzer was in talks with the Guardians about acquiring a significant minority stake. Those reports come on the same day that Zack Meisel of The Athletic published his own report indicating that Guardians majority owner Paul Dolan has enlisted investment banking firm Allen & Co. to assist him in finding a buyer for a share of the team that could be as large as 30 to 40 percent. In a statement to reporters (Twitter link via Mandy Bell of MLB.com), Dolan confirmed that he and Blitzer have held “meaningful” discussions but chose not to comment any further on the negotiations.
Dolan’s search for a new investment partner comes in the wake of John Sherman’s departure from the ownership group back in 2019. Sherman held a significant minority stake himself when with the club, but he divested his interest in order to purchase a majority stake of the Kansas City Royals from then-owner David Glass. Sherman paid more than $1 billion in his purchase of the Royals, and his former shares of the Indians/Guardians franchise have been sitting in escrow since his departure, per Meisel.
Forbes’ most recent franchise valuation estimates (back in March) pegged Cleveland at $1.16 billion. Sportico’s most recent valuation was a $1.375 billion sum. Meisel, meanwhile, suggests that Dolan has placed a slightly more aggressive $1.4 billion valuation on the team. It’s not clear how amenable Blitzer has been to that $1.4 billion sum, but Sportico’s report indicates that he’s currently negotiating over what would be a 35 percent stake. That’d mean something in the vicinity of a $490MM investment (based on that $1.4 billion figure) from Blitzer, who’d be buying up Sherman’s former shares as well as some of Dolan’s stake.
This isn’t the first time that Blitzer has sought to expand his portfolio into the baseball world. Many fans may recall that Blitzer and Sixers/Devils majority owner Josh Harris were at one point seeking to purchase the Mets from the Wilpon family before being outbid by current owner Steve Cohen. At present, there’s no indication that Harris is a part of the negotiations that have taken place between Dolan and Blitzer, however.
Any sale and/or ownership change can bring about relocation concerns among the fanbase, but it seems quite unlikely any such plans would be in the works even were Blitzer to eventually take control of the club. The Guardians recently inked a 15-year lease extension at Progressive Field, guaranteeing that to be their home site through the 2036 season. The extension also came with the “potential for 10 additional years” to be added onto the agreement, per the team’s announcement at the time. That agreement called for $435MM worth of renovations and upgrades to the stadium, which has been the team’s home since the 1994 season.
The other pressing thought for Guardians fans in the wake of the report would be one of potentially increased payroll capacity, though it should be stressed that a five-year transfer of majority ownership would in no way guarantee a sudden payroll spike. Cleveland’s payroll has plummeted to among the lowest in MLB as they’ve traded away various recognizable names, including Mike Clevinger and Corey Kluber, while simultaneously eschewing any notable spending in free agency. The result is a payroll where Jose Ramirez’s $11MM salary is now the only guaranteed money on the books for Cleveland in 2022, though subsequent arbitration agreements and a smattering of free-agent pickups and/or trade acquisitions will surely boost that figure a bit.
An eventual ownership change could, of course, bring about new spending habits for an organization that has typically been one of the league’s lowest-payroll clubs. That said, the primary drivers of payroll upticks for any team will always be increased revenues through television/streaming rights, gate revenue and/or real estate holdings surrounding the park. It’s unlikely that transitioning to Blitzer or another majority owner would catapult the Guardians into the top third of Major League payrolls at any point, but a new majority owner/control person could certainly impact various organizational spending philosophies (e.g. willingness to spend on rare extensions for key players).
In before “They’re still the Indians to me!”
I am still sad they aren’t the Spiders.
The Spiders made the most sense. Then again I am also still irritated the Nationals aren’t called the Senators. Throw it back, owners. Where are the Houston Colt .45 jerseys that have .45 spelled out in gunsmoke?
The new name is fine. The logo…yikes.
I thought that the name Houston Colt 45’s was so cool back in the day. It was fitting being a western theme in Texas. I recall watching on the big screen, the bull preparing to charge, with nostrils flared and smoke bellowing from them, during a run scoring rally. Marketing that team must have been fun.
Expos were never the Senators? Spiders made so much sense for the Cleveland baseball team? Guardians is lame? What are they guarding?
@Champs64
An MLB team named after a malt liquor. They were ahead of their time.
“What are they guarding?”
Besides the galaxy?
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2015381/
I like the Spiders too but some greedy scoundrels filed trademark rights to the name and tried to hold it for ransom.
I’m ok with the Nationals. I read the Senators were referred to as the Nats during the dead all era.
What are the Yankees yanking?
Dolans’ Credit Card
The Expos were never the Senators but Washington had an MLB team previously named the Senators. Washington fans would be able to bust out their old jerseys and hats and still root for the same team if the kept that name. I think the Rangers or Twins own the rights to that name but I’m sure they would be willing to sell it as it doesn’t do them much good. The Senators we’re also called the Nationals but that was just a nickname back then. I don’t think they ever put it on the merchandise or anything. It’s probably just a name an announcer started calling them.
What are they guarding? Well I’ll tell you what they are guarding. They are guarding the fort against those dayum Indians!
That logo though.
Are the Red Wings suing them for the blatant rip-off? Because if they did, they would have a pretty compelling argument.
& if I refer to them by their former name, it’s only because I still say things like “California Angels”.
The logo is based on the Guardians of Traffic figures on Cleveland’s Hope Memorial Bridge, dating from 1932.
https://thenewswheel.com/guardians-of-traffic-clevelands-kingly-roadside-attraction/
I’m familiar, @Person.
Pretty good example of the difference between statue & sculpture. Regardless, I think they should have derived their logo directly from those images as opposed to just buying something from the store of Generic Sport Stuff.
Aesthetically, their choice is Dullsville.
The Dali Museum was originally located in Cleveland. They could have worked some Surrealism into Baroque gothic & killed the logo game. Alas, we are stuck with work done by the lowest bid.
I dunno. I’m fond of low-tech and low art. I like the artwork on the store brands at the grocery store. There’s something about it that I find appealing. I guess you could say it’s humbly charming. This Guardians logo looks very retro to me, and I like that.
For what it’s worth, the positioning of the tops of the two G’s looks rather like the grip on a splitter.
Ducky, it does appear to be clip-art inspired!
I kind of get it, @Person.
My version of that; my favorite still lifes are the one’s I drew/painted in college. Still have a couple of them hanging in my den. & they are decidedly *not* high art. I’m also a sucker for those Cubist & Impressionism wall calendars. Unlike the originals, they are bright, glossy, & miniaturized.
Does look like a split fingered FB grip doesn’t it.
I still think the logo really kinda sucks though. & it represents a lost chance to do something pretty unique. Although that is apparently not nearly as universal a criticism as I had previously thought.
Chief Wahoo will never die!
Wahoooooooo!
Dolan & Blitzer aren’t Donner & Blitzen, this is a match made in hell. Good luck with this nonsense Indian fans. Ahahahaha!
I want to see a new owner buy Cleveland, and restore the Indians monikor. All this politically correct garbage, needs to be flushed down the toilet!
Hopefully now they spend, and give Tito something to work with
No, no, no. Now he pushes even harder for a MLB salary cap, similar to the other teams he owns, so he can keep the payroll lower and profits higher. Then he can buy more stake in ventures and repeat.
Wrong, a salary cap will bring a full as well as a ceiling. Teams like Cleveland, Pittsburgh and all the other penny pinchers will have to raise payroll to get to the floor.
Floor, not full.
Exactly! If you’re an owner, you should be trying hard to win, not bank roll cash, and fielding losing teams. Be in it to win it, or get out!!!
There is no way a new minority owner will have any sway over the CBA negotiations. The union will never bend over and give in to a cap or a floor. The majority of owners, if not all, would love a cap so the teams make more off the fans, while paying out less all while having a salary cap to blame which they are negotiating for. But I agree with you that he will leverage it for more capital/credit for other ventures…
Don’t see Cleveland increasing spending until Blitzer takes over full time. This could be similar to the Mets situation when Cohen was a minority investor.
It should be noted that last time Cleveland had a minority owner between 16’-18’ they broke multiple franchise spending records and had a consistent payroll of $130 million dollars
I had my time frame off-the seasons were 17’-19’
Does this mean they will probably spend more on improving team? Maybe extending Ramirez and others?
This guy hired Daryl Morey.
I think Morey’s done a good job. Sixers are at least relevant now
The minority can be a majority some day.
Yep. Happened in SoCal.
I don’t know much about Blitzer. Is he the type to look to expand the revenue base by developing areas adjacent to the ballpark? Is that even possible in Cleveland? What could he do to increase revenue?
He obviously sees opportunity here.
Opportunity is buying into sports ownership as it seems the prices continue to climb at ridiculous rates and nobody ever seems to lose money.
There’s a huge difference between equity and cash flow, though. If Blitzer is just looking gain equity for a long term investment that won’t impact the payroll of the baseball team.
Some owners see winning as a way of increasing equity. See Guggenheim and the Dodgers
Blitzer is an investor with no ties to Cleveland. Be grateful that Dolan signed the lease extension or you’d be seeing the Guardians shopping for a new home. That has been put off for at least 15 years.
Because he has no ties to Cleveland he’d move them? There’s no room in Philly or Jersey for another MLB team.
Sixers and Devils have been terrible under him. Not sure the Guardians would be any different. But hey he makes more money at least.
Well, your local tri-state area
Ohio… Pennsylvania… New Jersey
Blitzer Evil Inc.
Oh, there you are, Perry
shame Perry works for the Angels. new rivalry?
Jimmy Olson hasn’t gotten in yet?
Not yet Clark
Should they change their name again to the Wolf’s? You know, Wolf Blitzer?
Or maybe the Donners? You know, like Donners and Blitzer?
It’s been a long year…..
I’m sorry but wouldn’t a “significant minority” be an oxymoron?
Not really. He’s still a minority shareholder but he owns more than the rest of the minority owners which would mean he is buying a significant minority stake in the team.
Fair enough, I just think a better word than significant could have been used there
Owning 49% makes you a minority, but that is significantly higher than a few %s as part of a token ownership deal.
Hopefully to change their name.
To what?
..ROCKS. Generic. Boring. Safe for sissy ears. And they could play the song after each win. Bam. Done. Took me longer to write it
Great, maybe now they will lose that ridiculous Guardians name and pick a real one.
Hi, Theo? How would you like to do your thing one more time?
How can this guy not be involved in football?
I think it’s because you can’t own a team outside of your state rule. Something like that.
Ugh, his comment flew over your head.
The Cleveland All Out Blitzers yeah
Go Tribe!
This
They went. Away. They’re now the Guardians.
Ok first order of business is please bring back Bill Fecht disco records give away nights and time to get those mules back on the team planes again
No matter WHO takes majority ownership of the team…at the end of the day the team STILL plays in CLEVELAND for crying out loud.
Nonsense.
Not that it could have been avoided but what strange times to be selling a large chunk of a sports franchise.. dealing with the fallout of covid and now the lockout.
It’s been in the works for awhile, the previous minority owner put his stake aside while he bought the Royals and they’ve been trying to complete this ever since.
Exactly. All that happened with Sherman right before Covid.
They should have been named the Steamers
@Cosby –
LOL. HILARIOUS!!!
So Dolan is selling to eventually get out of baseball AFTER changing the name of the team?
No scruples with that guy
Can’t tell if this is a joke
Still convulsing over the team’s name change. “How can I go on? This has never happened to my team before!”
Except for the three other times:
“In the game’s wild and tumultuous early decades, names tended to be quite fluid. Cleveland itself is an example of that, with the franchise known as the Blues (short for Bluebirds) in the inaugural season of the American League in 1901, then briefly the Bronchos and then the Naps, in honor of Hall of Famer Nap Lajoie, who played for the club from 1902-14 and also managed it for part of that time. It wasn’t until Lajoie’s departure that Cleveland became the Indians. (There also was a separate National League franchise known as the Blues and then the Spiders, between 1887-99).”
They’d have to be ancient for them to remember that happening to their team.
Then perhaps they should learn the history of their team. It seems somehow incongruous to be crying about preserving tradition if you don’t know your team’s history. Know what I mean?
Yes, because they once had a couple brief names back around the turn of the century over a 100 years ago, they should forget preserving the tradition of the name they’ve had in that other brief era from 1915 to 2021. Brilliant!
@Polish Hammer
Let’s do a thought experiment.
If the name of the team had been the Naps since 1903, and the name were changed to the Cleveland Guardians this year because the owner and a majority of the fans thought the Naps name was an embarrassment that had invited endless mockery about a sleepwalking team, would you be as upset about the violation of “tradition”?
Three? They have nothing on the Brooklyn/LA Grays, Superbras, Grooms, Bridegrooms, Cardinals, Trolley Dodgers, Dodgers with a couple repeats of a few names thrown in.
Actually, I think they were the Superbas … although, the Superbras would be a very provocative name for a girls’ team, I must admit.
*Indians
said Jack Nicholson in “Easy Rider.”
*Spiders
said Dwight Frye in “Dracula.”
Getting away from Dolan is always going be a good thing. At least the tribe is locked into Progressive field and Cleveland, so he can’t try to move them.
What has Dolan done to indicate he was looking at moving the team? In terms of keeping the team in Cleveland, he always seemed to be true to that.. which is probably a terrible business decision. Let’s face it, Cleveland isn’t a baseball town. The Browns are consistently terrible and fans love them anyways. The Indians have been consistently good for about the last decade and fans do not care at all.
you can bet Dolan is talking about the team’s financials in glowing terms to the buyer (and showing them financial records to prove it), directly the opposite to what he tells his fan base in Cleveland.
Reindeer making team decisions.
please change the name and logo to something better.
The Cleveland Something Better?
Edgy.
Not crazy about this name I agree something like the Naps or Spiders was by far a better option if not the Indians. All that set aside they honestly could have put a little effort into this ridiculous logo..
So there is still no momentum to name them the Pilgrims? Weak
The new name is pretty bad, but hey, at least they have a nice stadium and a new owner with a similar name of a famous reindeer.
Cleveland Rocks
Get Betty White and Valerie Bertinelli to be co-owners, and rename them ” Hot in Cleveland”!
Or Charlie Sheen as owner, and call them the Cleveland “Wild Things”.