The Lerner family is no longer pursuing a sale of the Nationals, Mark Lerner tells Andrew Golden of The Washington Post. “We have determined, our family has determined, that we are not going to sell the team,” Lerner said, adding that the decision was made “a while ago.”
It was almost two years ago, in April of 2022, that Lerner first revealed that the club would be exploring the possibility of a sale. “Nothing has really changed,” Lerner said today. “We’ve just decided that it’s not the time or the place for it. We’re very happy owning the team and bringing us back a ring one day.”
In the interim, it seemed like little progress was made towards the club changing hands. In late 2022, it was reported that their dispute with the Orioles over the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network was something of an obstacle. When the Montreal Expos were moved to Washington and into the territory of the O’s, the former club’s TV rights were given to the latter club. The two clubs jointly own MASN but the O’s having a larger share.
TV revenue is a significant factor in the finances for a baseball club, as has been quite clear this winter. The ongoing bankruptcy of Diamond Sports Group has put a dent in the spending capacity of various clubs throughout this offseason. The Nats are at a disadvantage in that department as they don’t have control over their own rights and have been battling the O’s over MASN revenue for years.
As of about a year ago, the reporting still indicated that little progress was being made in terms of selling the Nats. The most likely buyer, Ted Leonsis, owns NBC Sports Washington and likely wanted to put the club on that channel. But the aforementioned complications would make that difficult and seemed to stall the possibility of anything getting done.
It recently seemed possible there was some light at the end of the tunnel with the developments surrounding the Orioles. The Angelos family, who have owned the O’s since 1993, recently agreed to sell the club to a group led by David Rubenstein. That group is going to also acquire the Orioles’ share of MASN if the deal is ultimately approved by Major League Baseball. Some observers speculated that Rubenstein might sell MASN to Leonsis. It was also reported that the league could make the O’s give up the Nationals’ TV rights as part of approving the sale, though it’s unclear if they had any intent to do so. That arguably opened a path for a sale of the Nats to become unclogged but it seems that won’t be coming to fruition, with the Lerner family deciding to hold on.
Now that the Lerners are sticking around, questions will be raised about the club’s path forward. Despite winning the World Series in 2019, the club’s fortunes turned after that and they have been in a deep rebuild for a while now. They traded Max Scherzer and Trea Turner at the 2021 deadline and then Juan Soto one year after that. That’s naturally led to modest activity in recent offseasons but they’ve been fairly quiet even by the standards of a rebuilding club.
Last year, they mostly gave out one-year pacts to bounceback candidates like Jeimer Candelario and Dominic Smith, though they did give a two-year pact to Trevor Williams. This winter, the activity has been even more muted, with their $5MM deal for Joey Gallo the biggest expenditure of the winter. General manager Mike Rizzo recently stated that the club was unlikely to make any more moves of significance.
It had been assumed by some observers that the lack of activity was a reflection of the fact that the club was for sale. The Lerner family could have used the fairly clean payroll outlook as an attractive feature to market to prospective buyers, offering interested parties a chance to put their own stamp on the future of the franchise. Now that the sale is not happening, the spotlight will turn back on the Lerner family and how they plan to get the Nats out of their recent slide. They have finished below .500 in the past four seasons and most projection systems calculate them as likely to be one of the worst clubs in the league in 2024.
WHAT?!!
Translation they didn’t get the price they wanted.
Just like Moreno and his proposed sale of the Angels.
I imagine this is just a temporary development
Do the same 10 people have to comment on every post? Take a break from the internet bro.
Sounds like you’re a Hader
And he’s a Stros fan…well isn’t that just typical ??? Haha.
@Stros Exactly. And they’re always trying for a thumbs up
Well, Stros isn’t pitching for the Nats anytime soon. He is cooked. But because of Scott Boras, Little Steven and the Disciples of Gold are still banking his money and taking up a 40 man roster spot.
Lerners please don’t buy the Boras BSstory of long-term contracts. He has saddled many dopey owners with dead weight.
This site has a feature so you can block seeing posters that you don’t want to read. Enjoy!
Agreed.
All of us are temporary developments.
With the MASN problem likely put to bed, maybe it’s not as pressing?
“Likely put to bed”…Hopefully the MASN problem goes away. We’ve been hearing about for a decade. Only the lawyers did well and got rich off the MASN dispute.
I think fans can fully expect the MASN issue to be put to rest either in conjunction with or immediately after the sale of the O’s. I’d wager that Manfred and MLB made sure all sides understood that to be the case or the deal gets delayed unnecessarily.
I believe Manfred even said we can make it a condition of approving the sale.
Who cares when we’ve got the Dodgers. Everything else is just fodder
It hasn’t been “put to bed” yet and MLB cannot unilaterally end the agreement. it was not with Peter Angelos, it was with the Orioles and MASN. As much as Manfred would LIKE to end the agreement, his predecessor Bud Selig made a dumb decision and MLB is bound by it.
This is true, but he can possibly use it as leverage for approval of the sale. Whether that would hold up in the courts…
Most underrated stadium and fanbase in sports.
Pirates have a very underrated stadium, and their fan base is great, when they are winning.
I’m not sure PNC is underrated. It seems to be top 3 according to everyone I’ve ever talked to.
Anything you (not you personally, Owen) like more than most everyone else is underrated.
This is the second time a potential sale of a baseball franchise has not happened. Perhaps these franchises aren’t really worth what is put out there and the buyers balking at paying those crazy price tags?
Seems like it, although the Nationals might be more enticing since they have a lot of young players, won a World Series championship in 2019, and are poised to be competitive sooner rather than later.
When you’re talking about a multi-billion dollar business transaction, I don’t know how much the status of the team’s roster plays into it. Perhaps it does, to an extent, but I’m sure the much larger attraction would be the potential profitability of the team and mlb in general. That said, I suppose if a team is set up to win, then it follows that this will lead to greater attendance, postseason money and more eyeballs on TV. I think I ended up arguing against my original point a13.
It’s possible the Lerner family just did this for estate purposes after Ted passed away, to determine a market price for the team. Which they can use to divvy up his overall liabilities and assets, of which majority ownership in the Nationals was just one part.
I’d much rather have the Lerners keep the team than sell to Ted “Mediocre” Leonsis. The Nats deserve better than Leonsis has done for the Wizards and Caps.
Didn’t the Caps win a world title 6 years ago.
It could also be a case where the on-field product of the Nats has suppressed sale values and the Lerners want to wait another season in the hopes that things look stronger after 2024.
So Spending $100 million with $350 million in revenue is more fun than spending $200 million with $350 million in revenue – will next winter mark a change in strategy or will Nationals continue to corner the market on fringe MLB relievers as they shed Patrick Corbin’s contract and lower their commitments to embarrassingly low levels in accordance with the profitable but non-competitive MLB business model
The Lerners’ goal was to win a WS. Now that they’ve accomplished that, it seems they’ve little incentive or desire to do it again, so I have no expectation they will put up payrolls anywhere close to those they had pre 2019.
Must not like that orioles sale price.
Someone in DC please correct me, but if I remember right, the Lerners and the new Orioles owner Rubinstein are decades long arch-enemies in the world of the rich & famous of DC. It’s possible the Orioles sale may have motivated the Lerners to keep ownership and continue this fight in yet another battlefield. If I remember right.
I’ve followed the Nats closely from the beginning and have some ties to the DC real estate community. I’ve never heard anything about the Lerners and David Rubinstein being enemies of one another. I hope you don’t start one of those baseless rumors that gets endlessly repeated based on nothing.
Rubenstein was part of the Ted Leonsis buyer group two years ago, so no.
Quite the opposite. Most stories circulating have Rubenstein and Leonsis as better than just acquaintances. Many reports label them as good friends.
It sounds like the old days when the homeowner takes their house off the market to de-list it before re-listing again. It’d be nice for Nationals fans to have ownership which is committed to the business.
Heh, I think you’re right.
I would rather have ownership committed to trying to win. If there were no curse word filters, I would have dropped a lot of F-bombs and other colorful metaphors in response to Darragh’s post.
I am really looking forward to having Ted Leonsis own the team and fix the Nats. After winning the World Series, for which I am grateful for, and Lerner the Elder passing, ownership appears to have stopped caring.
If you think Leonsis would fix the Nats, you are sadly mistaken. Exhibit 1, Washington Wizards.
Amen! Under the Lerners the Nats spent big to win. They were a consistently high payroll team in the 2010s.
I meant just in general. Not specifically committed to winning. An owner with one foot out the door probably doesn’t have much passion for the business. Not in marketing. Not in fan experience. Not in game performance, etc.
Not caring is losing Turner and Soto for nothing to chase 75 win seasons instead of doing the hard thing and rebuilding.
Mark cares. He cares deeply about the team making a profit. With $350-$400 million in revenue and a $100-120 million payroll he is raking in the profit hand over fist.
Yeah I am not the type to demand a team sign every free agent every year but this rebuild is troubling. If too many prospects bust they’re back to square one. I question the younger Lerner’s commitment to winning.
Lerner Family No Longer Pursuing Sale Of Nationals
Well, I am glad, because i think they are terrific owners!
We’re not gonna sign any more major league players. We’re not gonna invest in the team. we’re not gonna sell the team. Nobody’s getting anything.
Mark and the rest of the family are getting $$$. Large, deep stacks of $$$.
The fans are getting more losing. More last place finishes.
if they knew this “a while ago”, why haven’t they made any remotely serious investment in improving the 2024 roster? It’s been a frustrating off-season for us Nationals fans
Because the team is 1-2 years away from even WC contention… Crews, Wood, House ect havent even debuted yet.. and Corbin is off the books following 2024.. With Strasburg not long after… Ya know accumulating talent and clearing payroll before ramping up spending again….. What every rebuild does…
the problem is that we won’t know for 3-5 years whether these prospects are all we hope for, or busts. Either is possible and it’s not realistic to think they all are going to be all stars. Having hope as your only strategy is not smart if you’re trying to compete.
No kidding rebuilds arent guaranteed.. those 3 and a few others are going to be in MLB by next season… if not before..
They chose to rebuild and will spend following their promotions with a reset payroll when the core improves… like every rebuild..
Being in the majors and being any good are two different things.
Less than 20% of MLB Overall Top 100 prospects become 2.0 WAR or MLB average in their career.
Just getting to the majors doesn’t guarantee that they will make a positive impact on the team.
Thank you. Everything you said is spot on.
I guess Leonsis really low-balled them.
Thought this said “Lesner family” at first.
Scott Boras can keep the family in his speed dial on his phone. Still have spots open for his free agents? I’m sure they could use a Snell, Montgomery and Chapman.
Ben’s Chili and a half smoke please
Good thing I didn’t buy season tickets. Again.
In other words, no offers for what he was told it was worth.
Nationals aren’t at a disadvantage. They are getting $60 million a year from MASN. Plus they are part owners of MASN. The other teams out there getting $20 million from Amazon or less.
This turn of events shows Angelos to be smart to hold out for some of the Nats TV money when relinquishing the territory. If the Nats get hot, the Orioles make more money. If MLB requires a new Orioles owner to give up that TV money it’s going to be a negotiating point, not a given.
MLB cannot require a new O’s owner to give up that money because its an agreement with the franchise and MASN, not the Angelos.
As much as Manfred WANTS to be rid of Selig’s 2nd biggest mistake, he is stuck with it unless Rubenstein and his partners agree to give up those rights and its doubtful they will without a fight or huge compensation.
I think they just give the Nationals their rights back. Better than paying them $60 million a year for them. Comcast Deal with MASN is coming up for renewal and I think Comcast plays hardball.
MLB signed an agreement with the Orioles franchise. They can’t just give the rights to the Nationals. They acknowledged in the agreement that the Orioles own those rights.
COMCAST has nothing to do with the rights. They don’t pay the Orioles and the Nationals and they stand more to lose by not having them on their cable than the teams do.
According to Wiki, MASN is available on approximately 23 cable and fiber optic television providers in Maryland, the District of Columbia, Virginia, eastern and central North Carolina, West Virginia, south central Pennsylvania and Delaware. Providers such as Comcast, Cox Communications, RCN, Mediacom, Charter Communications and Verizon FiOS, covering an area stretching from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to Charlotte, North Carolina); it is also available nationwide on satellite via DirecTV.
Here is the page on MASN that shows exactly what channels they are on masnsports.com/find-masn
Not on Spectrum cable because a decade long dispute.
Do you see Spectrum mentioned in my post? I didn’t either.
You just got Arte’d *puts on sunglasses and losses publiclally and agressively
Much like with Angelos this is purely an estate tax decision. Once the old guy dies the team will be back up for sale.
The old guy already is dead.
They will never “lern” their lesson!
Think what DYLAN CREWS is thinking?
Dylan Crews just accepted the 2nd highest draft bonus ever from this ownership.
As an Angels fan I feel your pain. Owner won’t sell and won’t spend anymore. Yet we still suck.
Arte spends, just unwisely.
Which means they will be sold the moment that the Orioles sale is complete.
Nothing says commitment like, “we couldn’t find a buyer for the price we wanted.”
That about sums it up.
Mark Lerner’s word is worthless.
In 2018 he said the family would never sell the team.
But that’s what they’re saying right now, too… and he didn’t sell
….and so far they haven’t.
As Tom Boswell always came back to: everything depends on everything. It could be “the sale” was for estate asset evaluation, could be they have something going with Rubenstein who is not known to be adversarial for the sake of it (an Angelos hallmark); could be they will put it back on the market the second the O’s deal closes. Can’t imagine anyone posting here knows which it is. I certainly don’t.
The Nats rebuild has been slow, but not out of line with a usual timetable. I recollect we had the oldest roster in baseball at our peak success and a weak farm system. It takes time to get better and its also true that mistakes have been made.
Everybody wants to be the O’s right now….they were bad for 25 years. There is no possibility of that for the Nats.
The MASN TV rights situation is truly unbelievable. How many clubs don’t have 100% of their TV rights? I’m no expert, but my guess: None.
Once MLB makes the O’s relinquish the rights, the Lerners will most likely change their tune.
How many other teams were allowed to move into another team’s territory and signed an agreement that gave the other team control of those broadcast rights?
None.
MLB CAN’T make the Orioles relinquish the rights. they can compensate the Orioles for those rights and give them to the Nationals after paying the Orioles, but they cannot unilaterally end the agreement.
Contractual law and Rubenstein and his group are certainly not stupid enough to give up rights worth hundreds of millions over the next couple of decades. If Manfred even tried it would be held up in court for decades.
MLB does have leverage over the Orioles that they’ve never had before.
Reportedly, Selig did the deal that resulted in MASN completely without the involvement of MLB owners. He then presented it to them for their rubber stamp approval. Some of them did *not* like that deal at all. The reason they approved it is there wasn’t any other option. None of them wanted MLB to continue owning the Expos.
MLB has tried offering Baltimore at least one, if not multiple, All Star games to get the Angelos family to tear up the deal Selig made. They’ve always said no because tying Baltimore’s TV rights with DC’s larger TV market makes financial sense.
The issue for the Orioles now is the other owners get to decide who gets to own a MLB team. Unlike the NFL, NBA and NHL, MLB has full antitrust protection. If the Angelos family doesn’t structure the deal in a way Manfred and the other owners like, the deal’s dead.
. Unlike the NFL, the owners don’t think of their team as merely one piece of a larger whole. They care about their financial interests first, as can be seen in MLB’s pathetic revenue sharing compared to the NFL. I agree that the O’s likely don’t *want* to tear up or significantly alter the deal they did with Selig, but they might not have a choice. Manfred and the other owners wouldn’t lose sleep over sticking it to the Angelos family for defying what they want.
Selig was the commissioner when the deal with the Orioles was signed.
Yes, the other owners do get to decide who the majority partner is of a team, but nothing prevents the Angelos from selling a minority share of the team to Rubenstein and his partners, which is exactly what they are doing. Right now, all the other minority partners have sold their shares and the Angelos have sold 10 % giving the Rubenstein group a 40% ownership stake in the team. Until Peter Angelos dies that is all that will happen.
There will be no transfer of ownership to the Rubenstein group. As of right now john Angelos is still the control person as far as MLB is concerned.
There is a contractual agreement. The other owners can try to block the sale to the Rubenstein group when Peter Angelos dies if the Orioles are unwilling to transfer broadcast rights, but that is collusion and collusion is a crime.
As I said, Manfred may WANT the Rubenstein group to transfer the rights to the Nationals when he takes over after Peter Angelos death, but he cannot FORCE them to do so legally. He can give Rubenstein and his partners compensation that entices them to do so, but that is FAR different from forcing them to by collusion between the other owners.
It is entirely 100% untrue that the MLB owners don’t get to vote on this deal until Angelos is dead.
si.com/mlb/orioles/news/baltimore-orioles-ownershi…
They CAN vote on transferring controlling interest in the team, but to say there are CONDITIONS on voting in favor makes it collusion. That is against the law. That the other MLB owners cannot do.
They CAN offer Rubenstein’s group compensation for giving up those broadcast rights. The Lerners have said in court cases that the value of their broadcast rights is $110 million per season and the Orioles control the Lion’s share of that. A conservative estimate is that its worth $60 million per season to the Orioles. Multiply that by 20 years and you are probably close to fair compensation for giving up those broadcast rights.
They do NOT get to vote on minority partners and that is all that has been agreed upon so far.
Did you even bother to read the article? You are completely, 100% WRONG. Per MLB, the deal is being reviewed by an owners committee and the full vote of MLB owners is expected to happen by the All Star Break.
Rubenstein has agreed to purchase a controlling stake in the Orioles for $1.725 billion. The Angelos family doesn’t own 100% of the Orioles. The 40% stake being purchased by Rubenstein is *controlling interest* in the team. The Angelos family has minority partners like author Tom Clancy, retired tennis player Pam Shriver, and businessman David Bernstein as minority investors.
In this deal, Rubenstein’s group will *immediately* get 40% of the team. The Angelos family, Clancy’s estate, Shriver and Bernstein split the remaing 60%. None of them will own more than Rubenstein’s 40% of the team! The agreement stipulates Rubenstein’s group can buy out the Angelos family and the remaining minority investors after Peter Angelos death.
You are clearly under the mistaken belief that someone has to own 60% of a company to be a controlling owner.
Less reason to sell, at least immediately, if the family believes the MASN situation is about to be fixed.
Sounds like a negotiating ploy for a higher price. It’s always the Nationals or the Athletics..
To me, this is good news. Naive me but IMO, it’s an indication that Rubenstein and the Lerners get along. And maybe even the 2 sides have already discussed a and agreed to a fair and equitable solution to the MASN issue to the point where the Lerners are comfortable continuing on with ownership
Having said (above) that nobody knows, I am inclined to your view.
Angelos was a combative lawyer doing class action law suits. He took pleasure in sticking it to people.
The Rubensteins and the Lerners made their fortunes as dealmakers.
Dealmakers know there is always a next deal . You want a reputation for being reasonable, so people come to you with deals. Get a reputation for squeezing the last dollar, nobody want to deal with you if they have other choices. ..
As a Nats fan since they moved to DC, I am not surprised at this announcement. When the Lerners put the Nats up for sale, I thought their alleged/reported $2 billion asking price/valuation was absurd because the Nats, per Selig’s mistake, would only ever own 33% of their broadcast/streaming rights..
I am skeptical that this means anything about either the Nats payroll or MASN. In fact, IMO if the Lerner family were confident the MASN issue would no longer be a problem in the near future I don’t think they make this announcement. Monumental Sports, Caps and Wizards owner Ted Leonsis dropped his interest in buying the Nats when he learned from discussions with the Angelos family the MASN situation couldn’t be worked out. If the Lerners had inside knowledge that would change, why take the team off the market? Leonsis and other potential buyers are still out there.
. I don’t think MLB is going to be successful in its effort to convince the Orioles to give up tying the two teams media rights together. An unidentified source inside the O’s front office told the Washington Post in 2022 Baltimore was concerned that without the DC market, they wouldn’t get a broadcast deal worth the $60 million a year MASN pays both teams now. That has *nothing* to do with how good or bad either team is on the field. Baltimore is a much smaller TV market. The RSN market has imploded, why would the Orioles give up a guaranteed $60 million a year?!? For that matter, what guarantee do the Nationals have they’d get a TV deal worth more than $60 million a year?
As for the Nats payroll, even though Corbin’s contract ($35 million in 2024) is off the books after this season, Strasburg’s owed $35 million for the next three years, and then $80 million in deferred money from 2027-29. Max Scherzer is owed $15 million a year in deferred money from 2024-27. Unless their TV deal improbably gets *much* better, they might be able to afford paying Scherzer and Strasburg’s deferred $ with that TV deal but not much else..
In fact, the Nats are being so tight with money, there’s a major disagreement between the team and Stephen Strasburg over the terms of his retirement.
theathletic.com/5280722/2024/02/16/nationals-steph…
The second reason I don’t think this means the Nats will start spending big $ in free agency again is they’ve made a deliberate choice to put a much bigger focus on building from within. The Nats knew they couldn’t afford both Trea Turner and Soto. They chose Soto and traded Turner. When they couldn’t get Soto to sign a long term deal before free agency, he was traded for prospects rather than watch him walk away with only draft pick compensation. The Nats are now back to the Braves model brought over by former team President Stan Kasten…who hired GM Mike Rizzo after Jim Bowden resigned. The Nats aren’t going to be big free agent spenders.