The Lakers' pending minority-stake sale values the franchise north of $7 billion, a number that would have been dismissed as fantasy five years ago. The buyer pool is deep. The seller pool is not.
Billionaire entry into team ownership has accelerated over the past eighteen months across every major league. NBA franchises are trading at 28-32x revenue multiples, up from 22x in 2019. Premier League clubs follow a similar arc. Manchester United's current enterprise value sits at roughly $6.5 billion despite uneven on-field performance and infrastructure needs at Old Trafford. The Glazer family entertained bids north of $7 billion in 2023 before opting to sell a minority position to Jim Ratcliffe at a $6.3 billion implied valuation. The baseline keeps rising. Phoenix Suns sold for $4 billion in December 2022. Washington Commanders fetched $6.05 billion six months later. Chelsea FC cleared $5.2 billion in May 2022 under forced-sale conditions. Each transaction resets comps for the next seller.
The valuation support comes from three compounding factors. First, supply is fixed and demand is global. There are thirty NBA franchises. Twenty Premier League seats. Thirty-two NFL teams. New money from family offices in the Middle East, India, and Southeast Asia is chasing the same inventory that drew Ballmer, Cohen, and Tepper a decade ago. Second, media rights are still climbing despite cord-cutting anxiety. The NBA's next domestic deal will likely exceed $75 billion over eleven years, nearly triple the current package. Even underperforming franchises collect $250-300 million annually in league distributions before selling a single ticket. Third, betting integration is creating a revenue layer that did not exist in 2018. DraftKings, FanDuel, and the sportsbook arms of MGM, Caesars, and Fanatics are paying teams for data, branding, and access. Some clubs are booking $15-25 million per year from gambling partnerships alone. These are not cyclical income streams.
The question is not whether prices are high. They are. The question is whether scarcity justifies the multiples. Operators close to recent deals say yes, with caveats. One family-office allocator involved in a 2023 NFL bid noted that the hurdle rate for franchise ownership is now 8-10% IRR, down from 12-15% a decade ago, because the asset class has shifted from speculative to strategic. Buyers are treating teams the way they treat Manhattan real estate: appreciation is assumed, cash flow is secondary. The Lakers deal illustrates the shift. The minority stake being sold carries no operating control and limited governance rights, yet it priced at a valuation matching full-control transactions in other leagues. The premium for scarcity is baked in.
Risk lives in two places. If interest rates stay elevated, the debt cost of leveraged acquisitions rises. Steve Cohen bought the Mets for $2.4 billion in cash. Most buyers are not Steve Cohen. They are assembling consortiums and layering debt at 6-8% to close. Second, if the next generation of fans does not engage with linear broadcasts or stadium attendance the way Boomers and Gen X did, media rights could plateau. Early data is mixed. NBA viewership skews older, but betting engagement skews younger. Formula 1 cracked the U.S. market by building Netflix fandom before selling race-day tickets. The playbook exists; execution varies by league.
Watch the NBA's expansion decision, expected by mid-2025. Seattle and Las Vegas franchises would price at $4-5 billion each, creating immediate comps for existing teams and pulling forward the next wave of capital. Meanwhile, Manchester United's stock is trading at a 30% discount to the Ratcliffe-implied valuation, suggesting public-market investors remain skeptical that private-deal multiples will hold if a full exit materializes. The Glazers have not committed to selling. They have committed to listening.
The franchise market is not frothy. It is behaving exactly as scarcity economics predict. Twenty years ago, owning a team was a rich person's toy. Today, it is a billionaire's inflation hedge with global brand optionality and a revenue floor backed by media contracts extending into the 2030s. The Lakers deal is not an outlier. It is the new floor.
The takeaway
Franchise valuations rising on scarcity, media rights, and betting—new capital treats teams as strategic holds, not yield plays.
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