Major League Baseball has sold its 15% stake in the BAMTech streaming platform to the Walt Disney Company, the Associated Press reports. Disney paid the league $900MM to buy out MLB’s final share in BAMTech, according to filings with the SEC. Disney now owns the service completely.
BAMTech has its roots in the MLB Advanced Media platform, which was created back in 2000. MLB’s digital media arm has long been regarded as an industry leader that has generated strong revenues for the league. Disney had increasingly invested in BAMTech in recent years, purchasing a 75% share by 2017 in a deal that saw each MLB team receive roughly $50MM in additional revenue. The corporation bought out a 10% share owned by the National Hockey League last year for $350MM and completed the process with this month’s purchase from MLB.
The proceeds of the sale are expected to be distributed evenly among teams. As Bob Nightengale of USA Today writes, that represents a roughly $30MM windfall for each club. Whether that’ll lead teams to more freely invest in player payroll remains to be seen, although it’s a notable bump in revenue for organizations that could theoretically serve as a catalyst for an uptick in free agent spending.
At the end of October, commissioner Rob Manfred told Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times that MLB earned just below $11 billion in revenue this year (Twitter link). That’s presumably slightly above pre-pandemic levels, as the league reported $10.7 billion in revenue back in 2019. MLB did not announce a revenue figure in either 2020 or ’21.
Great. More money to be pocketed by the owners. What are the odds that average team payrolls go up?
I would say 100%
jonbluvin;
You got a link showing us how many don’t go up?
Can’t link something that hasn’t happened yet. You’ll have to wait until after next season to get it.
@jonbluvin team payrolls did dip in 2019-21, but were at an all time high in 2022 and the 10 year growth of 31% is huge. Not too many industries grew wages 31% in the past 10 years. https://www.thebaseballcube.com/content/payroll/
Ben Clemens of Fangraphs in his latest chat mentioned that every signing so far has exceeded their salary projections both internal and crowd-sourced so early returns suggest that teams have known about this extra revenue for a while and have already started the process of spending it.
I see a lot of luxury suites being remodeled!
Its the owners league, genius
You do understand that it’s is capital not operating budget? Not a good idea to dip into your capital to subsidize operating budget.
It would appear that folks who know literally nothing about corporate finance feel no hesitation whatsoever in opining here “owner rich, so owner bad” without a scintilla of self awareness.
But I thought owning a baseball team wasn’t profitable lol
Far from an owner apologist, but I did some quick math and the numbers are interesting.
I’m using averages to make this easier – obviously operations for the As are far less expensive than the Yankees. And obviously overall brand revenue is much higher for Yanks than As. You get the point.
$11B among 30 teams is $367M each team. Again, average here. The Mets player payroll for 2022 according to sportrac was $287M. That’s a delta of $80M which I’m assuming doesn’t include stadium or team operation costs or payroll.
Obviously profits are being made, but my assumption is that the bigger payroll teams rely heavily on brand value (hats, apparel, logo usage, etc.) more so than baseball operations revenue.
And then the opposite being true for the smaller market teams.
Every point you make you then concede the obvious counter like it’s a footnote. How is the information interesting if it tells nothing?
“Obviously profits are being made, but my assumption is that the bigger payroll teams rely heavily on brand value (hats, apparel, logo usage, etc.) more so than baseball operations revenue.”
dirk, that’s a commonly held belief that I’ve heard expressed often in fan forums, but I believe that all team merchandise sales are pooled and shared equally by all 30 teams.
If you want an unofficial breakdown of MLB’s finances (because MLB — i.e., the owners –jealously guard their financials from the public eye), consult “The Business of Baseball” on the Forbes site.
One example: John Fisher, heir to the GAP fortune and billionaire owner of the Oakland A’s, enjoyed revenue of $208 million in 2022. The total payroll of his team was $61,017,600 — and the cheap scammer still wants the taxpayers of Oakland to pay to build him a new stadium to house his for-profit enterprise.
You need never feel sorry for an MLB owner.
Bottom line is billionaires wouldn’t be lining up to buy franchises if there wasn’t lots of money to be made.
@Fink
That’s revenue. What were the costs? Gotta know both to determine profitability. This is not to say they took a loss, but they didn’t make $208mm either. For those that think, in a capitalistic society, that MLB franchises should act like a non profit entity, you will forever be disappointed.
Billionaires have massive egos. MLB teams are a status symbol. Just like a Corvette, they would line up to buy them regardless of profit.
What’s the operation costs? transportation, MiL players, stadium costs, legal fees, security, insurances etc etc etc
the cheap scammer still wants the taxpayers of Oakland to pay to build him a new stadium to house his for-profit enterprise.
You need never feel sorry for an MLB owner.
================================
Sure, and why not? The team provides employment and some huge tax revenues. IMHO, this is like any other financial transaction. Both sides have something to offer, and something to gain. Why wouldn’t both sides push their own interests?
And oddly enough, I don’t feel sorry for the players or the owners.
that 30 the phil’s owners are getting is the price paid for the team in 1981.
I wonder how many of the people slamming taxpayer funded stadiums understand how often tax dollars are used to subsidize giant corporations all the time.
Ex. For about two decades southern states (AL, TN, SC) have used tax payer money to subsidize car manufacturing plants so companies could pay workers $14 an hour instead of $30 an hour.
Compared to those schemes, stadiums and arenas that support many local businesses are a great deal for the public.
stymeedone, name one MLB owner who ultimately lost money on his ownership of a franchise in the last 30 years. And don’t bring up the 1993 Orioles bankruptcy or the 2010 Texas Rangers bankruptcy, because in both cases the owners defaulted because of their failed investments in other ventures that incurred massive losses they couldn’t cover.
Even when these teams lose money, the increased valuation of the franchises allows the owners to sell the teams at a profit.
Tom Hicks bought the Rangers for $250 million in 1998. After declaring bankruptcy, he sold the team for $593 million in 2010.
Eli Jacobs, the principal owner of the Orioles who, along with a small ownership group including Larry Lucchino (later of Red Sox fame, who coined the “Evil Empire” name he applied to the Yankees) bought the team for $70 million. In 1993, only four years later, after declaring bankruptcy, Jacobs sold the team for $173 million, then the highest price ever paid for a professional sports team in the United States.
“Compared to those schemes, stadiums and arenas that support many local businesses are a great deal for the public.”
Nope.
‘A 2016 report from the nonprofit Brookings Institution stated that since 2000, a total of 36 professional sports stadiums have been constructed or revamped under financing provided by federal tax-exempt municipal bonds, costing taxpayers over $3.2 billion dollars.
‘However, the study also found that despite billions of dollars of federal funding flowing toward these projects, the new stadiums have limited to no impact on local economic development.’
https://patch.com/new-jersey/livingston/bill-would-end-federal-tax-break-new-sports-stadiums
OK, now do a Hyundai factory where they pay no taxes and pay half as much for labor paid for with tax dollars.
It’s a net loser race to the bottom that we pay for…
Never said they lost money. Some had bad years during covid. But you present Revenue like its Profit. Grocery stores have high revenue, but are lucky to pull 3% profit. Not comparing the two, just saying high revenue does not always indicate high profit, like you imply. If you have to sell the team to make a profit, that would be a good reason to limit payroll. Jacobs did not have that $173mm until after he no longer had the team, so it had no effect on payroll (His creditors probably took a lot).
No, I didn’t. I pointed out the amount of revenue taken in and the amount spent on the A’s payroll, which would be taken from the team’s revenue (unless Fisher is guilty of malfeasance like the former Mets owners who financed the Mets’ payroll off the vigorish — the team president’s own term — from their investment in two ponzi schemes, the first with Samuel Israel III and the second with Bernie Madoff, both of whom landed in federal prison).
Certainly the A’s had expenses other than the team payroll, but do you want to tell me they amounted to $146,982,400, the amount left over from revenue after paying all their players?
The Coliseum was jointly owned by the City of Oakland and Alameda County. In 2019, the County agreed to sell its share in the property to the A’s franchise:
“The A’s have also agreed to pick up the operating costs for the Coliseum and arena, which are estimated to run $15 million to $20 million a year. In return, the team would agree to stay in Oakland and not pursue a possible relocation deal with another city during the six months of negotiations.” – San Francisco Chronicle
Only $15-20 million annually to operate the stadium — and the A’s weren’t paying that while the owners were the City and County.
Don’t forget that MLB has to pay TAXES on the gain from that sale! That’s going to take a big bite out of that “windfall!”
MLB franchises routinely get huge tax breaks, especially on the stadium-building scam:
https://www.brookings.edu/research/why-the-federal-government-should-stop-spending-billions-on-private-sports-stadiums/
BTW, what do you mean MLB has to pay, fermier? The seller wasn’t MLB, it was, respectively, John Hicks and Eli Jacobs. And you’d probably be safe in assuming that between the relief afforded by their bankruptcy filings and the creative accounting that the rich can afford to buy, the tax burden after the sale was substantially reduced.
Yankees98;
Got a link showing who said that?
It was Rob Manfred who said it in February during the lockout. His quote was “If you look at the purchase price of franchises, the cash that’s put in during the period of ownership and then what they’ve sold for, historically the return on those investments is below what you’d get in the stock market, what you’d expect to get in the stock market, with a lot more risk.”
Owners are always bellyaching about that, then refusing to open their books to prove it.
What is going to be telling is that the Teams like the Pirates, etc, spending the absolute minimum required to receive the share allocation funds again.
There’s simply no reason they cannot go after FAs and be more economically competitive. Unless…. They desire a specific profit margin and this cuts into that. But they’ve got fans absolutely convinced they’re destitute.
Agreed. I did an article looking at payroll vs competitive balance payments and it is clear Nutting prioritized pocketing other owners money while equally small Milwaukee and Minnesota actually spent their allotment.
Basically, in the years prior to the pandemic (the last with data) teams averaged about $115 million per year from that pool. Meaning every team could have afforded a $115 million payroll and still kept about half of their local revenue.
Some did, others blatantly pocketed fellow owners money.
But they’ve got fans absolutely convinced they’re destitute.
==========================
New poll. Does a single person in the entire world think the Pirates are destitute?
I would love this. Many of Their fans do, as well as other smaller market teams’ fans.. If you look at the arguments throughout the threads it’s consistently about capping larger markets because these teams can’t afford to spend any more than they’re already spending.
Many also argue they’re not making a decent profit margin despite clearly pulling in a minimum of 25-50% more in fund allocation than their roster payroll. Many have argued how much it cost to keep the lights on, hire attorneys, hire staff, or whatever. It’s all because they’re buying the small market excuses of not having money.
When you look at the breakdown of what they receive, what they spend, and what they make on top of that in generated revenue, there’s no way they can’t afford it.
Gee, a business planning to be successful and make a profit! How un-American!
Well, the thing about that is it’s not a Profit Allocation Fund. It’s a Competitive Balance allotment. The name and designation of the money, as well as the original concept of the design, intended it to be to balance competition.
Thus, owners saving money from the *competitive balance allotment & share revenues* is precisely not what was intended.
So, while I agree that owners of corporations deserve profits and to make money, I disagree that ,while they’re arguing for a cap under auspices of competitive balance, they are justified in keeping the money allocated *from other organizations to them for that competitive balance purpose.* Meanwhile, they graciously tank year after year.
It seems to me to be a blatant misuse of funds and in any other business structure, it would be criminal. The worst part is that they’ve convinced fans they cannot afford to pay more into their own foster, which is laughable.
Give it a read. I try no to pimp my own stuff too often here, but it is on topic. And, again, if Steve and the hosts here want me to stop just let me know.
https://crashingthepearlygates.com/2021/12/13/my-plan-for-a-new-cba-part-one-salary-floor/
This will be the extra $30 mil that pushes the Yanks over the finish line when bidding on 99!
Arte is selling at the perfect time. He’ll cash this $30 million on his way out the door and let the next guy(s) deal with the stadium fallout.
I think somehow someway Arte will have to pay the City of Anaheim for the repairs needed to keep the Big A operational until the new Owners decide how and where they’re going to build a new stadium.
After all Arte should have been investing more than he has in keeping the stadium from falling apart. He knows it. And the City of Anaheim knows it.
Hahaha I love this post Winslow. Angry Arte would scream at you and jump up and down if he read that.
I see it as a possible holdup in the sale. I’d want that $150-$300 million number finalized and I’d take it off the purchase price.
I think you’re right and that’s how Arte ends up paying.
Arte should have been investing more than he has in keeping the stadium from falling apart.
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Does Arte own the stadium? I thought that deal fell through?
There is a maintenance agreement between Arte and the City that the City feels has not been kept.
Arte leases the stadium and some maintenance is apparently his responsibility.
Huh, interesting. Disney brings back old CEO after “replacement” CEO oversees 1 billion Quarterly loose on Streaming platform, Disney Plus.
So the new boomerang CEO buys more streaming?
This happened in August according to Disney… no idea why its news TODAY. So that actually wasn’t part of it.
And yet espn had a very successful quarter so…
NHL gotta feel bad after this, $350 m for 10% then just a year later $900 m for 15%?
Yep that jumped off the page at me as well
Disney is so dumb..par for the course
You realize this is what they run Disney+ on right? They have more subscribers to their services than Netflix. I think they know what they are doing.
However, even before this deal, *IF* I remember right, disney lost in the neighborhood of $1.5 Billion in JUST the most recent quarter reported on their streaming platforms.
So *DO* they know best? Not sure. While Iger is back it throws a bit of a wildcard into future vs recent performance where they self inflicted damage with numerous poor decision making. Chepeck was a hand picked successor, and, Iger did indicate he supports the left-leaning policies/direction which are at the crux of a large market share alienation
@GASoxFan,
Clearly your brain is bolted on backwards as Disney hasn’t had a losing quarter since the pandemic started in 2020.
So, you should have stopped your nonsensical statement after the first paragraph. Next time verify that you’re wrong before continuing on.
Disney, in fact, did report a 1.5B loss for the Read This Part Closely This Time –Streaming Division– this quarter.
The company overall did report a profit in the quarter, mostly thanks to a record Parks Division profit, goosed by rising admission prices, added services, inflation and raging post-Covid demand.
Streaming is a boat anchor for them at this point, but as a mature business with other revenue streams and not a pure play with gobs of VC money and share issuance to fund an expected large loss for years of ramp up/market penetration, they can handle it…but also are pretty pissed about the loss and Iger will be “rightsizing” costs in Streaming and elsewhere, like most Techs have been doing in response to and anticipation of a difficult economy continuing that trend.
You seem like a pleasant person to be around. Let’s all give him a big internet hug.
This is hilarious….
A business invest time, and money in a business. They sell at a profit after 22 years. And what should they do with the profit? Give ever more money to current players that made no investment, and did no work.
It’s like saying the owners of a warehouse made money in a restaurant that they ran for 22 years and they just sold the restuarant….so they need to give a pay raise to the people that work in the warehouse.
LOL
Spot on samual. Let me help clarify what all are friends are meaning to say but haven’t found the words yet…..
What we want as fans is for team owners to submit a plan of competition to Major League Baseball. As in – this is what we are going to do to compete in division and to compete for playoffs. Or if a team is rebuilding – then layout where they are at in rebuild and next steps. Then the teams have to live out what they project. Those who don’t – go on probation and face fines and loose other revenue streams. So owners put their word up and if they baulk at their word – they pay dearly. That’ll fix teams like reds and pirates who never care to compete and teams like As who cry about being broke all the time. Might even fix Braves and Cardinal fans perspective of their teams finances but probably not as those brain washed friends are likely too far gone.
What won’t fix baseball – is a floor on payroll. If payroll goes up several hundred million dollars – how does that make teams better when they are still signing from same player pool ? It will only make players worth 7 million get 20 and players worth a million get 5. And worse, players getting a 120 mil will get 240.
Could u image if you where a pirates fan and to compete and meet payroll requirements – they gave someone like Brandon nimmo 240 million over 6 years ?? Or they pay 30 mil for a season of pujols to hit the floor for season – how could u ever be a fan of that ?!?
The whole thing is a bit silly.
The same posters that believe the players should earn as much as they can get (I agree) somehow don’t believe the owners should earn as much as they can get.
And I am willing to bet that the same people will want everything they can get.
I mean I got a bonus when the owners of the restaurant I worked at got sold… is that not common?
Either the NHL got hosed, or, bidenflation is even worse than many feel.
10% last year = $350m
15% this year = $900m
Even accounting for the stake difference, it’s paying $35m/1% vs $60m/1%.
Also, this wasn’t a business world difference in a control premium as they were already well above 50% cutoff.
But this deal was worked out a long time ago so that purchase price was probably based on that deal way back when they started buying MLB’s shares 5 years ago. Plus while this doesn’t take them over 50, it removes EVERYONE ELSE which is also a big deal.
@GASoxFan
Yeah dude make it political for no reason at all. Or ya know realize that the final 15% is worth way more than the first 15%. Dingus.
So are we still going to see FTX on umpires gear next year? lol
A show of financial strength by the company. All for stockholders and investors to feel safe-ish.
The old, we’ll buy more, when we need too. But we own your butts already.
I love all these dudes trashing the owners making a profit while they say nothing about players making $30 million for playing a freakin game for 6 months a year. So owners are just supposed to be a piggy bank for players—most of which are overpaid and some don’t deserve a fraction of what they are paid?
Where have you been? The owners pay the players and they have final say on that number. Owners make a ton so do the players, and 30 mil a year(your number) only encompasses few of the top end players. Some owners, have done better than others but none are taking game losses every time the team trots out on the field. As far as i know all other owners have other investments they make money on everyday.
@Redstitch108* 2
Commenting just to let you know you have a really awful take here. Why do you hate seeing guys get paid what they are worth? Why do you enjoy watch pre arbitration guys get paid next to nothing compared to their true value? Why do you enjoy seeing owners line their pockets year after year while refusing to put a competitive product on the field? Bad bad awful take. Instead of watching baseball players play you should go to your favorite owners house and watch him.
You watch players or owners? that’s why players are worth the money
and why I wish we had a system like euro soccer so teams actually have to try.
You watch players or owners? that’s why players are worth the money
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Actually, you probably watch neither. You watch the brand. If the owners could magically swap out all their pro players with minor leaguer players, without anyone knowing, I think most fans would still show up to watch their favorite team. It’s a bit like going to a concert with a band you liked in the ’60s.
Does anyone stop going to games because their favorite player(s) have become FAs, or retired? They probably just start cheering for the guy that takes hi place.
No
It was majority owned by MLB Advanced Media (which is, in turn, a consortium of MLB’s principal team owners), with minority stakes held by the NHL and other investors. Disney acquired a minority stake in the company in August 2016 for $1 billion, and the following year, announced its intent to increase its stake to a 75% controlling stake for $1.58 billion. The deal was approved by regulators in September 2017.[6][7] With the acquisition of BAMTech by Disney, the company began to develop two subscription streaming services aligned with Disney properties: the sports-oriented service, ESPN+, and the global family entertainment service, Disney+; United States general entertainment service Hulu and Latin America general entertainment service Star+ were later transferred into the company in August 2021. Disney had acquired sole ownership by November 2022.
Seems like they low balled themselves pretty good if this is the technology Disney+ is built on
“Yesterday’s price, is not Today’s price” Fat Joe..
Extra 30Mil! Dump it into player payroll Braves!!!!!!
Other than possible payroll implications how does this sale impact fans? What does this sale mean to us?
It doesn’t mean ANYTHING. Just one more thing for people to argue about. Likely wouldn’t even have made this site except basically nothing happened in baseball yesterday. This didn’t even happen yesterday, it happened in August according to Disney.
Doesn’t this mean that some games previously available to fans on local tv channels will now be moved to Disney-associated subscription streaming?
And those of us who watch on MLBTV will also see more games blacked out.
I’m having pizza for dinner.
I’m sure MLB can build a completely new network for far less money than they received for this one. Eventually all regional sports networks will be available for local streaming.
MLB should have made it mandatory that it be invested in the team such as payroll. It gives Bob Nutting more reason to just pocket the money.
Basically this was a company owned by MLB and I think NHL that was founded over 20yrs ago and was the underlying tech that MLB’s early streaming of games. MLB and it’s partners sold the whole company to Disney in stages over I think the last ~ decade.
Because MLB teams are private partnerships we only see select transactions like this in the news. The $30M final installment payment is NOT pure profit, consider BAMtech a startup company funded by MLB via each team equally. It’s a final 1 time payment that in the big scheme of things is a 3yr deal on a 7/8th RP when you factor in benefits, pension costs, etc.
I will say this, the timing of the cash is optimal for clubs, MLB teams cash flow is highly seasonal and this is the off-season, I presume all of the teams have revolving lines of credit with their banks at rates that are commonly prime + #.#% Last year this time prime was 0% and now it’s 7%, I would speculate their short term borrowing costs are ~10% this offseason. I know the team whom I have season tickets has been giving me incentives left & right since the season ended to both 1 renew and 2 pay earlier to get a discount because they want that $ cash.