Golden State Warriors Rumors
Chamath Palihapitiya: We flew to NY and approached Allen&Co to be our banker and broach a meeting with the then commissioner, David Stern. Specifically, we had our eye on the Sacramento Kings with the goal of moving them to either Seattle or Las Vegas. The meeting rolls around and Stern sits and listens patiently about our ideas and desire to buy the Kings. At the end of our monologue, he asks one simple question: “How much do you think the team is worth?” We answer and float an admittedly low number (less than $300M). He looks around, slams his fists on the table and says: “Then you’re in the wrong f***ing meeting!” My friend and I fly home dejected. I’m now all-in on venture capital with no diversification to speak of and 100% anxiety ridden.
Chamath Palihapitiya: When I land, I call my friend Phil Hellmuth (@phil_hellmuth) He listens to my sob story and says, hey, let’s go and have some pizza and watch basketball with my friend Joe Lacob. So the next day, a Saturday, we go to Joe’s house to eat pizza and watch some basketball. At the end of the pizza, he tells me that he’s close to buying GSW. At the time, the news was that Larry Ellison was going to buy the team and I didn’t think it likely that Joe would win the bid. But he was confident and says to me: “I have 10% of the team you can buy for $25M if you want to join our bid.” I shook his hand, wired the money and at 34, became a co-owner of an NBA team. Pretty nuts! Joe’s obviously done an amazing job building the best franchise in sports and I’ve been extraordinarily lucky to be along for the ride.
Anthony Slater: Steph Curry on James Wiseman: “Keep giving him opportunities. Understand they’re all learning lessons…@Marcus Thompson, you know, I used to get benched for Acie Law. You gotta be able to take those lumps in stride and learn.”
Drew Shiller: Draymond on James Wiseman: “Just continue to teach him. He’ll be fine. Nobody’s really worried about it. The game needs to slow down for him. And that will happen over time … I just want him to stay aggressive.”
Knicks, Warriors and Lakers each projected to be worth more than $5 billion
The average NBA franchise is worth nearly $2.4 billion, according to data compiled by Sportico. That is down 2% as a direct result of the pandemic, based on our modeling. Collectively, the fair-market value of the NBA’s 30 teams, including ownership’s stakes in real estate, regional sports networks and additional team-related holdings, is more than $71 billion. Three franchises—the New York Knicks, Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers—are each worth more than $5 billion. (For context, each of those teams has a greater fair-market value than any National Football League team except for the Dallas Cowboys, based on Sportico‘s assessment of football team valuations last August.)
To be sure, the cumulative revenue for the NBA’s 30 teams, $8.3 billion, was down from the previous, non-COVID-impacted season by nearly 10%. However, a closer look reveals that national revenues (accrued predominantly from the league’s broadcast and sponsorship deals, as well as its licensing program) dipped only 2%. That, in large measure, is because of the NBA’s audacious plan to salvage the season with a playoff bubble at Orlando’s Walt Disney World. In a disrupted COVID environment, such single- and low double-digit declines represent remarkable stability.
