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Baseball Takes Over Control of Los Angeles Dodgers
Frank McCourt, the owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, has burdened the once prestigious franchise with more than $400 million in debt.
Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said Wednesday that he would appoint someone to oversee all operations of the Los Angeles Dodgers because of his “deep concerns” about the state of the marquee franchise.
But two people with knowledge of the situation said that he was also strongly considering forcing the sale of the team by invoking his “bests interests of baseball” powers to wrest the team from Frank McCourt, the owner since 2004, who he believes has mismanaged the franchise while enriching himself.
Selig said in a statement that he informed McCourt of his decision, which he said was made to “protect the best interests of the club, its great fans and all of Major League Baseball.”
Selig added that his office would “continue its thorough investigation into the operation and finances of the Dodgers during the period of Mr. McCourt’s ownership.”
McCourt has burdened the once prestigious franchise with more than $400 million in debt, and been embroiled in an ugly and lengthy legal fight with his wife over the terms of their divorce.
Earlier this month, a San Francisco Giants fan was severely beaten outside Dodger Stadium in an incident that McCourt conceded exposed a lack of adequate security at the once venerable ballpark.
If Selig invokes his extraordinary powers, he would seek to gain the support of three-quarters of the sport’s 30 owners, and then sell the Dodgers on McCourt’s behalf.
The two people with knowledge of Selig’s thinking would not be identified because they had not been authorized to talk publicly about the commissioner’s possible plan of action.
They said Selig believes that McCourt has badly damaged the value and reputation of the Dodgers while concerned only with his own profits and perks.
McCourt, a Boston real estate developer who previously tried to buy the Red Sox, has not sought to sell the Dodgers himself, despite his financial troubles and very public fight with his wife, Jamie.
Selig took a stand already against McCourt earlier this year when he rejected McCourt’s request to borrow $200 million from Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Entertainment Group, which previously owned the team.
But Selig refused to let McCourt add more debt to the $433 million he already owes. Selig has approval rights over all team loans. But earlier this month, McCourt got a $30 million personal loan from Fox, which was not within Selig’s powers to deny, The Los Angeles Times reported.
McCourt bought the team seven years ago for $430 million from Fox, a subsidiary of News Corporation. There were a few other bidders, including Malcolm Glazer, the owner of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers; Alan Casden, a real-estate developer; and, to a lesser extent, Dave Checketts, the former president of Madison Square Garden who is now selling his stake in the St. Louis Blues.
But McCourt emerged as the winner despite the financial structure of his deal that included a $145 million loan from Fox, which was eager to unload the Dodgers. Although the overall transaction was viewed as highly leveraged, it satisfied baseball’s debt rules and mollified Fox, which carries baseball nationally and the Dodgers locally on its Fox Sports West regional sports network.
The divorce trial and the publicity surrounding McCourt’s divorce have displeased Selig. The McCourts took $108 million in personal distributions from the team between 2004 and 2009, almost half for personal mortgages and real estate, according to court documents cited by The Los Angeles Times.
And the beating of the Giants fan outside Dodger Stadium raised concerns that McCourt had not been paying enough attention to safety at the aging ballpark or putting enough money into its upkeep.
Although McCourt is not part of Selig’s inner circle, like Fred Wilpon, the principal owner of the Mets, another troubled franchise, it might not be easy to force out even an unpopular owner.
“It would be messy and might establish a precedent that other owners might not want,” said Marc Ganis, a sports-industry consultant. He said it might better wait for McCourt to fail to pay his debt and then step in to run and sell the team. Selig helped orchestrate last year’s sale of the Texas Rangers by Thomas O. Hicks, who had defaulted on his loans, to a group Selig preferred, led by Nolan Ryan.
Through suspensions and strong persuasion, Selig and other baseball officials pushed Marge Schott out as the lead owner of the Cincinnati Reds in 1999, largely for her insensitive remarks about ethnic groups.
Source: New York Times
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