The Washington Commanders have agreed to sell their NFL team to the Josh Harris organization.
Josh Harris’ bid to purchase the Washington Commanders has not yet been approved by the NFL, but it is sufficient for Commanders owner Daniel Snyder.
Snyder and Harris announced late Friday afternoon that they had agreed to sell the legendary NFL franchise — from Snyder to a big group of investors lead by Harris, an asset-management billionaire who also owns the NHL’s New Jersey Devils and the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers.
According to reports, Harris and his partners will spend $6.05 billion buy the club, its home stadium FedEx Field, as well as the team’s headquarters and practice facilities in Ashburn, Virginia. That would break the North American record for the most expensive pro sports franchise sale.
Steve Apostolopoulos, a Toronto real estate billionaire, also made a $6 billion bid for the club. According to sources, Apostolopoulos’ firm had only five limited partners, including brothers Jim and Peter, compared to Harris’ 17.
The league permits up to 25 individual investors in an ownership bid group, but the fewer the better. Indeed, 17 of the last 18 successful principal bidders on NFL franchises dating back to the 1990s were individuals who could have written a cheque for the entire sale price. But with franchise values skyrocketing to so many millions of dollars, that no longer is realistic.
Among Harris-group investors identified in reports so far are former basketball superstar Magic Johnson, billionaire Colombian-American beer heir Alejandro Santo Domingo, billionaire businessman Mitchell Rales, and billionaire and businessman David Blitzer, who with Harris owns part of Crystal Palace FC of the English Premier League.
The Harris group’s bid, presented in March, was rejected, and it was not forwarded to league owners for approval. That could be significant or not.
It was unclear whether Harris changed his proposal late this week in the hopes of passing all NFL requirements.
For the proposed deal to become official, three-quarters of the 32 owners must vote in favor of it. Ownership transfers are always done in person, and the transfer of Commanders ownership from Snyder to Harris is unlikely to be presented to a vote by owners at their annual spring meeting on May 22-23. The owners will not meet again until October.
Apostolopoulos founded Six Ventures Inc., a private equity venture firm in Toronto; is managing partner of Triple Group of Companies, a commercial real-estate firm in Toronto; and co-founder of Triple Properties, another privately owned real-estate investment, development, and leasing firm in one of North America’s most populous cities.
Apostolopoulos reportedly is considering a bid on the NHL’s Ottawa Senators, expected to sell for upwards of $1 billion.
“On behalf of our entire ownership group,” Harris said in a statement, “I want to express how excited we are to be considered by the NFL to be the next owners of the Washington Commanders, and how committed we are to delivering a championship-calibre franchise for this city and its fan base.
“We look forward to the formal approval of our ownership by the NFL in the months ahead, and to having the honour to serve as responsible and accountable stewards of the Commanders franchise moving forward.”
“We are very pleased to have reached an agreement for the sale of the Commanders franchise with Josh Harris, an area native, and his impressive group of partners,” Snyder and his wife Tanya said in a statement. We look forward to the transaction being completed quickly and pulling for Josh and the team in the coming years.”
Snyder might be one of the most despised owners in North American pro sports history.
On the field, the team most years has been dreadful since he bought the club in 1999 — what with only six playoff berths and only two playoff wins, most recently in 2005.
Off the field, Snyder has proved a huge embarrassment to the league. Last year the NFL began pressuring him to sell the club, following years of allegations he was to blame for a toxic, decades-long workplace culture of rampant sexual harassment, which triggered both league and U.S. congressional investigations. The latter probe concluded Snyder interfered in both reviews. The NFL’s own probe concluded in summer 2021, and although its findings remain sealed, the league fined the Commanders $10 million.
