The San Diego Padres, who play in photogenic Petco Park, will soon be sold at a record price for any baseball franchise. (Photo by Donald Miralle/Getty Images)
Getty Images
In San Diego, a city where sails are common, a sale could bring a record price.
According to The Athletic, four groups are bidding for the San Diego Padres – pushing the potential price beyond the record $2.4 billion Steve Cohen spent to buy the New York Mets six years ago.
Ownership of the club has been in a state of flux since the death of Peter Seidler just before Thanksgiving in 2023.
Brother John Seidler is the current control person after approval by the other major-league owners. But he entered that role only after protracted legal battles involving Sheel Seidler, Peter’s widow, and two of her brothers-in-law, Matt and Bob Seidler.
Bidders for the ballclub include Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores, Golden State Warriors owner Joe Lacob, and English Premier League owners Dan Friedkin of Everton and Jose E. Feliciano of Chelsea.
A fifth potential buyer dropped out when the sale price zoomed in February.
At age 27, versatile Fernando Tatis is the face of the franchise in San Diego. (Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images)
Getty Images
MORE FOR YOU
Despite the uncertainty, the Padres have been baseball’s hottest team, winning eight games in a row through Thursday night. In their division, the National League West, the only team with a better record is the World Champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
The Padres began life as an expansion team in 1969 but have never won a World Series. Although they won pennants in 1984 and 1998, they lost both Fall Classic meetings, against Detroit in 1984 and the New York Yankees in 1998.
Long considered a small-market team, the Padres surprised the baseball world with a spending spree under Peter Seidler, acquiring Manny Machado, Xander Bogaerts, and Michael King while extending the contract of homegrown Fernando Tatís, Jr.
The Face of the Franchise, Tatís, Jr. signed a 14-year, $340 million extension in February 2021 that carries through the 2034 season. The deal included a $10 million signing bonus, a full no-trade clause through 2028, and deferred dollars, with his annual salary rising to $36 million from 2029-34.
Whomever wins the franchise will inherit a payroll estimated by Spotrac at $255,992,138, ranking seventh among the 30 teams. Whether the Padres will continue their free-spending ways remains to be seen, however, especially with major changes likely in the next Basic Agreement between owners and players.
That agreement expires in December, when owners are likely to push for a salary cap – an idea players despise even though the other major sports leagues all operate that way.
Sportico places the value of the Padres at $2.3 billion, slightly higher than the Forbes estimate of $1.9 billion, according to Dennis Lin of The Athletic.
With four wealthy bidders involved, the sale price of the Padres is virtually certain to be higher – even with a lockout looming. When the last Basic Agreement expired in 2021, a lockout by owners created a nuclear winter for baseball that wiped out the winter meetings, froze trades and free agency, and erased part of the spring training exhibition game schedule.
The Padres entered play Friday with a record of 13-6, a game-and-a-half behind the Dodgers.
此内容由惯性聚合(RSS阅读器)自动聚合整理，仅供阅读参考。 原文来自 — 版权归原作者所有。