Marc Lasry and Wesley Edens’ deal to buy the Milwaukee Bucks basketball team for a reported $550 million is the latest in a string of purchases of professional sports teams made by executives at hedge funds and other alternative investment firms.
In Lasry’s case, it is his second foray. Now that he is leading the group buying the Bucks, he must unload his minority stake in the Brooklyn Nets basketball team, which he has owned since the team played in New Jersey.
Lasry — who founded his hedge fund firm, Avenue Capital Group, with his sister, Sonia Gardner — and Edens, co-founder, principal and co-chairman of the board of directors of private equity and hedge fund firm Fortress Investment Group, form one of five alternative investment-affiliated ownership groups of teams in the National basketball Association, according to Alpha’s analysis.
Altogether, Alpha counts at least 18 teams in the four major sports leagues that are partially or fully owned by nearly 30 individuals from the alternative investment industry. In the National Basketball Association alone, two of the minority owners of the Boston Celtics include James Pallotta, chairman and managing director of the Raptor Group and a former vice-chairman of hedge fund firm Tudor Investment Corp., and Stephen Pagliuca, managing director of Bain Capital, the private equity and hedge fund firm.
Joe Lacob, who led the group that bought the Golden State Warriors in 2010, has been a partner of Menlo Park, California–based venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers since 1987. He is still an active partner in the firm but has relinquished his managing partner role. Tom Gores, who founded Platinum Equity, a private equity firm, in 1995, is the owner of the Detroit Pistons.
Two of the owners of the Philadelphia 76ers are David Blitzer and Joshua Harris. Last year, the pair also bought the New Jersey Devils National Hockey League team, which plays about 90 minutes north of the 76ers. Harris is a co-founder of alterntive investment firm Apollo Global Management. Blitzer is head of the tactical opportunities group at asset management giant Blackstone. Meanwhile, Marc Leder, who founded the private equity firm Sun Capital Partners, is part of the investment group that owns the 76ers.
The Devils are among at least five teams in the National Hockey League that count individuals from a hedge fund or private equity fund among their owners. The other five are the Tampa Bay Lightning, Minnesota Wild, Nashville Predators and the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Last year, hedge fund manager Cliff Viner III sold the Florida Panthers to Vincent Viola, who is the executive chairman of Virtu Financial, a major high frequency trading firm, and former chairman of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Jeffrey Vinik, the owner of the Lightning, shut down his hedge fund last year to focus full time on running the team.
Philip Falcone, a minority owner of The Wild, had run hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners. But in 2013 he was banned from the securities industry for five years as part of a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which charged him with civil securities fraud.
At least six teams in Major League Baseball also count hedge fund or private equity managers among their owners — including Steven Cohen, formerly of SAC Capital Partners, who also recently shut down his hedge fund to outside investors as part of a settlement with the government. He is now a minority owner of the New York Mets.
And individuals from the alternatives industry are part owners of two teams in the National Football League, including Appaloosa Management’s David Tepper and Discovery Capital Management’s Robert Citrone, who each own a piece of their hometown Pittsburgh Steelers.
