Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is selling a majority stake of the franchise to Miriam Adelson and her family for a valuation in the range of $3.5 billion, league sources said. Cuban, however, will retain shares in the team and full control of basketball operations.
Adelson, the largest shareholder of Las Vegas Sands, announced Tuesday she was selling $2 billion worth of stock in the company. This is approximately 10 percent of her stake.
“We have been advised by the Selling Stockholders that they currently intend to use the net proceeds from this offering, along with additional cash on hand, to fund the purchase of a majority interest in a professional sports franchise pursuant to a binding purchase agreement, subject to customary league approvals,” Las Vegas Sands said in the SEC filing.
Cuban purchased the Mavericks for $285 million in January 2000.
This arrangement is so unusual that I’m assuming it’s part of a plan to get gambling made legal in Texas. Like, he’s keeping control of basketball operations despite not being the majority owner. Meriam Adelson is Sheldon Adelson’s widow and is herself a major Republican donor. Now she has a positive community connection and a place to entertain Texas legislators.
Maybe she just really likes basketball but doesn’t want to run the team. But would anyone be shocked if Texas suddenly has a change of heart about casinos and Mark Cuban ends up investing a chunk of the $3.5bn in a Dallas Sands Resort and Casino? Otherwise, why sell the team at all?
Pretty plausible theory. My theory is that the new owners are looking to move the team to Las Vegas so that every major league is represented. They already have NFL and NHL, MLB will be there shortly with the approval of the Oakland A’s to be moved. This is just the last piece of the sports entertainment puzzle.
Dallas is the forth largest metro area in Northern America and had the third highest attendance in the league last season; it doesn’t make much sense for the NBA to let a successful team with a long history in a coveted market move to Vegas. If they did they’d then have another move on their hands as at least half a dozen teams scrambled to move to the vacant arena sitting in Dallas.
Thought it was all but confirmed that Las Vegas was going to be one of the 2 new expansion teams?
What’s up with Oakland losing all of their sports teams lol
I think it’s mostly just that they were usually the neglected Bay Area franchise compared to the San Francisco teams. Like the Mets and Clippers to the Yankees and Lakers. When the leagues and TV people all suddenly decided Vegas/gambling were ok, the Oakland teams were kind of the obvious candidates to move from a business standpoint.
They only had one basketball team and they left to lol
And the “San Francisco” 49ers play in Santa Clara now. The Raiders were the closest team to San Francisco.
Yeah think that’s a good theory, the arrangement is so odd there’s gotta be something else here.