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Nets minority owner to buy Liberty
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Bob Lamm



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 12:53 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

I will be absolutely ecstatic if this deal happens and we are forever rid of Hideous Lord Jimmy and sexual harasser Isiah.



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toad455



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 9:43 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Why Tsai buying the Liberty is a big deal.

https://highposthoops.com/2019/01/09/brooklyn-nets-minority-owner-adds-new-york-liberty-to-his-portfolio/amp/?__twitter_impression=true



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Nixtreefan



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 10:40 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

This is great news and we just need a few more, come on Bucks and Warriors!


toad455



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 11:06 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Nixtreefan wrote:
This is great news and we just need a few more, come on Bucks and Warriors!


Milwaukee and San Francisco for 2020. Portland(MLS' Timbers) and Nashville(NHL's Predators) for 2021. We got 16!!

Let's get this announced first, then get a new CBA after the season.



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toad455



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 11:06 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Nixtreefan wrote:
This is great news and we just need a few more, come on Bucks and Warriors!


Milwaukee and San Francisco for 2020. Portland(MLS' Timbers) and Nashville(NHL's Predators) for 2021. We got 16!!

Let's get this announced first, then get a new CBA after the season.



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toad455



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 4:49 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

NY Times article.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/10/sports/new-york-liberty-sale-joseph-tsai.html#click=https://t.co/saGj5gAAbq



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Rock Hard



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PostPosted: 01/11/19 5:25 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Nixtreefan wrote:
This is great news and we just need a few more, come on Bucks and Warriors!

I don't know how to respond to having a team in my hometown. I have been a faithful Sky fan from the beginning.



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sportsfan48



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 2:51 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

This is good news. I don't know much about New York or surrounding areas, but I would think that a business man like Tsai would want to hit the ground running as soon as the deal is made. If he is serious about developing and growing the Liberty, I would think he would want them in a venue that is more impressive than the WCC. Of course there are probably contracts and things that would keep them there this season but I would think he would want to move them ASAP if there are other options.


Bob Lamm



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 3:06 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

If Tsai is willing to take a significant loss for some number of years in the hope of building the Liberty as a franchise, then he could arrange some 2019 home games in the Barclay Center and a permanent Liberty move to Brooklyn beginning in 2020.

I live on the Upper West Side, so having the Liberty at the Garden was ideal for me. But I'll be thrilled if the Barclay Center can become the team's new home.

If Tsai's deal goes through soon, it'll be interesting to see if any big move is made regarding who runs the franchise. I suspect he'd stand pat this season in terms of the front office and coaching staff--not a lot of time to start over--but you never know.



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Luuuc
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PostPosted: 01/12/19 4:33 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

I'm staying optimistic about this one as well.
I just don't think anyone with serious money would buy the team with a long term plan of keeping them in White Plains.



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root_thing



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 12:49 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

People have to remember that the Nets and Barclays Center are separate entities. Joseph Tsai has nothing to do with Barclays Center. Both Barclays and Nassau Coliseum are owned by Mikhail Prokhorov through his company, Onexim Sports and Entertainment. Tsai and his group would be just another prospective renter of the facilities. Now, maybe because Prokhorov and Tsai are technically business partners the former might give the latter a price break. But I wouldn't bet on it. Remember, MSG owns the Liberty and they wouldn't give their own team a price break, at least not anymore. There is a reason why Prokhorov is bailing out on the Nets (Tsai has an option to buy him out in 2021) but keeping the facilities. The arenas are what he cares about now.



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Bob Lamm



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 4:58 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

root_thing wrote:
People have to remember that the Nets and Barclays Center are separate entities. Joseph Tsai has nothing to do with Barclays Center. Both Barclays and Nassau Coliseum are owned by Mikhail Prokhorov through his company, Onexim Sports and Entertainment. Tsai and his group would be just another prospective renter of the facilities. Now, maybe because Prokhorov and Tsai are technically business partners the former might give the latter a price break. But I wouldn't bet on it. Remember, MSG owns the Liberty and they wouldn't give their own team a price break, at least not anymore. There is a reason why Prokhorov is bailing out on the Nets (Tsai has an option to buy him out in 2021) but keeping the facilities. The arenas are what he cares about now.


This is all true, but I stand by what I wrote. Seems very likely that Tsai can afford to rent some 2019 dates at the Barclay Center for the Liberty, to fully move the team (as a renter) to the Barclay Center beginning in 2020, and to take the financial hits from doing so. Would he do this? I have no idea. But I strongly suspect that he can afford to do so, with or without a price break from Prokhorov.



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root_thing



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 9:51 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Bob Lamm wrote:
root_thing wrote:
People have to remember that the Nets and Barclays Center are separate entities. Joseph Tsai has nothing to do with Barclays Center. Both Barclays and Nassau Coliseum are owned by Mikhail Prokhorov through his company, Onexim Sports and Entertainment. Tsai and his group would be just another prospective renter of the facilities. Now, maybe because Prokhorov and Tsai are technically business partners the former might give the latter a price break. But I wouldn't bet on it. Remember, MSG owns the Liberty and they wouldn't give their own team a price break, at least not anymore. There is a reason why Prokhorov is bailing out on the Nets (Tsai has an option to buy him out in 2021) but keeping the facilities. The arenas are what he cares about now.


This is all true, but I stand by what I wrote. Seems very likely that Tsai can afford to rent some 2019 dates at the Barclay Center for the Liberty, to fully move the team (as a renter) to the Barclay Center beginning in 2020, and to take the financial hits from doing so. Would he do this? I have no idea. But I strongly suspect that he can afford to do so, with or without a price break from Prokhorov.


I agree it's likely they'll spend some kind of money upfront. I'm just not convinced it's necessarily going to be full-blown big arena money for years to come. If that were the case, why not just go back to MSG? If you're going to spend big, might as well go all the way. The only reason to use Barclays is if they do give him a much better deal. By the way, I just learned that Prokhorov does not actually own Barclays Center. It's usually described that way in the press because the structure is really complicated (arguably a tax giveaway), and Prokhorov is able to function like he owns it.

If you look at the bigger picture, it's hard to figure out what Tsai really expects from his sports investments. First of all, he is supposedly head of a group so in theory he has to answer to other partners. Right now, they own 49% of the Nets (a historically bad franchise), a lacrosse team, and they're buying a Liberty franchise that is struggling both on and off the court. These assets all look like fixer-uppers, to use real estate parlance. In the case of the Nets, they're not even getting in at a cheap price. It was a record price at the time. So, from a business point of view, they have a pretty risky portfolio.

It's also interesting to note that Tsai is not Mainland Chinese like his Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma. Tsai was born in Taiwan, raised in Canada, and educated in the USA. He supposedly bought the lacrosse team because he loves the sport from his playing days at Yale. So, that one purchase sounds personal. If he is also buying the Liberty for personal reasons, then yes, he'd probably be willing to absorb losing money for a while. However, if he is running the team as a true business, then losing money becomes more of a problem. Again, he supposedly has partners -- what are they thinking? The group needs to come up with at least another $1.2 billion to eventually buy out the Nets. So that could cause some financial stress down the road. For what it's worth, right now Alibaba stock is down 29% from it's high. Things can change quickly if Trump ends his trade war, so probably no one is panicking yet. It just underscores that this is a complex situation with bigger considerations that nonetheless may affect the Liberty.



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Randy



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PostPosted: 01/12/19 10:08 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Bloomberg says he is worth $9.2 billion. Seems like he can afford most anything.


Bob Lamm



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PostPosted: 01/13/19 12:29 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

root_thing wrote:
I agree it's likely they'll spend some kind of money upfront. I'm just not convinced it's necessarily going to be full-blown big arena money for years to come. If that were the case, why not just go back to MSG? If you're going to spend big, might as well go all the way. The only reason to use Barclays is if they do give him a much better deal. By the way, I just learned that Prokhorov does not actually own Barclays Center. It's usually described that way in the press because the structure is really complicated (arguably a tax giveaway), and Prokhorov is able to function like he owns it.

If you look at the bigger picture, it's hard to figure out what Tsai really expects from his sports investments. First of all, he is supposedly head of a group so in theory he has to answer to other partners. Right now, they own 49% of the Nets (a historically bad franchise), a lacrosse team, and they're buying a Liberty franchise that is struggling both on and off the court. These assets all look like fixer-uppers, to use real estate parlance. In the case of the Nets, they're not even getting in at a cheap price. It was a record price at the time. So, from a business point of view, they have a pretty risky portfolio.

It's also interesting to note that Tsai is not Mainland Chinese like his Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma. Tsai was born in Taiwan, raised in Canada, and educated in the USA. He supposedly bought the lacrosse team because he loves the sport from his playing days at Yale. So, that one purchase sounds personal. If he is also buying the Liberty for personal reasons, then yes, he'd probably be willing to absorb losing money for a while. However, if he is running the team as a true business, then losing money becomes more of a problem. Again, he supposedly has partners -- what are they thinking? The group needs to come up with at least another $1.2 billion to eventually buy out the Nets. So that could cause some financial stress down the road. For what it's worth, right now Alibaba stock is down 29% from it's high. Things can change quickly if Trump ends his trade war, so probably no one is panicking yet. It just underscores that this is a complex situation with bigger considerations that nonetheless may affect the Liberty.


Thanks for sharing all this. Quite interesting.

I always come back to the fact that a good number of sports team owners are very rich guys who are doing this for the ego high of owning a team rather than as a serious investment. And have so much money that any losses really don't matter. I'm not saying this is true of Tsai and his partners; I have no idea. But it's possible.



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root_thing



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PostPosted: 01/13/19 12:41 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Randy wrote:
Bloomberg says he is worth $9.2 billion. Seems like he can afford most anything.

His net worth and liquid assets are two different things. Most of his fortune is probably tied up in Alibaba stock. Besides, even if you're rich, people don't part with 10%-20% of their fortune without giving it serious thought.



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 1:12 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

What he should do is build a separate state of the art arena just for the WNBA team the way the Washington Mystics have done.


Luuuc
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PostPosted: 01/14/19 1:26 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

goofy2 wrote:
What he should do is build a separate state of the art arena just for the WNBA team the way the Washington Mystics have done.

I was thinking a similar thing.
The whole WCC shitshow revealed the surprising lack of a decent mid-size arena in NYC.
Wouldn't it be great if this was addressed and the Libs were given a new multi-purpose home that seats 10-12k.

(Yeah I know I'm dreaming a bit in this case, since in the USA it seems that the way to get decent arenas built is to blackmail the city with threats to remove popular sports teams unless they cover most of the cost, whereas most people would probably either laugh at the threat of the Liberty moving or just shrug and ask who they even are)



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 8:03 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Luuuc wrote:
goofy2 wrote:
What he should do is build a separate state of the art arena just for the WNBA team the way the Washington Mystics have done.

I was thinking a similar thing.
The whole WCC shitshow revealed the surprising lack of a decent mid-size arena in NYC.
Wouldn't it be great if this was addressed and the Libs were given a new multi-purpose home that seats 10-12k.

(Yeah I know I'm dreaming a bit in this case, since in the USA it seems that the way to get decent arenas built is to blackmail the city with threats to remove popular sports teams unless they cover most of the cost, whereas most people would probably either laugh at the threat of the Liberty moving or just shrug and ask who they even are)


I think the DC model would be to build a practice facility for the Nets that also has a 5000 (or less) seat arena.....


Luuuc
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PostPosted: 01/14/19 8:52 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Randy wrote:
Luuuc wrote:
goofy2 wrote:
What he should do is build a separate state of the art arena just for the WNBA team the way the Washington Mystics have done.

I was thinking a similar thing.
The whole WCC shitshow revealed the surprising lack of a decent mid-size arena in NYC.
Wouldn't it be great if this was addressed and the Libs were given a new multi-purpose home that seats 10-12k.

(Yeah I know I'm dreaming a bit in this case, since in the USA it seems that the way to get decent arenas built is to blackmail the city with threats to remove popular sports teams unless they cover most of the cost, whereas most people would probably either laugh at the threat of the Liberty moving or just shrug and ask who they even are)


I think the DC model would be to build a practice facility for the Nets that also has a 5000 (or less) seat arena.....

Yeah, it would be. Which would not be ideal for a team that has proven it can draw more people than that. (actual people visibly occupying seats, as opposed to the invisible people that the Mystics include in their attendance numbers)



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toad455



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 9:36 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Nassau Coliseum doesn't have a high capacity, so 10k would probably be too big. But to have an arena that could hold 7-8k in NYC would be a huge asset for NYC.



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root_thing



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 11:58 am    ::: Reply Reply with quote

I've seen articles about Major League Soccer where they cite building their own stadiums as one reason for the league's success. However, the situation with soccer is a little different because they were previously playing in arenas built for other sports so the configuration wasn't optimal. For the most part, WNBA teams play in facilities that are built for basketball or at least partly for basketball. WCC appears to be an exception. Conceived in 1924 when basketball wasn't that popular, it sounds like WCC was constructed more for music, theater, educational events, and trade shows. Consequently, it is both too small and badly configured for a pro basketball team.

Maybe if Tsai and his partners are serious about developing a package of sports businesses, then it would be worthwhile to build a mid-sized arena. Right now, the 17 to 25 dates (including playoffs and preseason) for the Liberty wouldn't justify building a new facility. However, if he has other teams and they mix in some non-sports events, then maybe the idea could work. I also think going into partnership with another organization -- such as a university -- would make the undertaking more viable.



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 12:41 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

If there genuinely isn't anywhere in New York for music acts to play when they're reasonably well-known but not big enough for MSG or Barclays, I could imagine that a mid-sized multi-purpose arena might be a decent investment even regardless of the Liberty. But then, even if someone like Tsai decided that, we'd be talking years before they could get the thing built and ready to play in.



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root_thing



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 1:12 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

It does beg the question why there aren't 10,000 seat arenas in New York already. Perhaps you are either a star (1,000-5,000 seats) or a superstar (15,000-20,000 seats) or a megastar (stadiums). Maybe there are no 10,000-seat level talents. Smile



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PostPosted: 01/14/19 1:32 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

The formidable problems with building a 10,000 seat arena in New York City including finding a site and the cost of buying all that land. Sadly, we've seen two major projects in Manhattan in recent years where perhaps a new arena could have been part of the plan: the redevelopment of the Hudson Yards and Columbia's creation of a second campus in Harlem. But no arena in either.



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