The list of prospective Broncos owners has narrowed to five, according to Troy Renck of Denver7. An NFL-record bid should be expected here, and the winning price is set to smash the previous mark David Tepper set four years ago when he bought the Panthers for $2.275 billion.
Rob Walton is believed to have submitted an opening bid of more than $4 billion, according to Josh Kosman of the New York Post. A Walmart heir worth more than $70 billion, Walton, 77, is the favorite to acquire the AFC West franchise, per Kosman and Renck (Twitter link). The highest bid must be accepted, with the sale then going to a league vote.
The Broncos are only accepting bids north of $4 billion at this point, with Kosman adding the price is expected to be between $4.5-$5 billion. Even a $4 billion price would exceed the cost for any American sports franchise by a wide margin. The Brooklyn Nets were sold for $3.3 billion, representing the current high-water mark. The prospective buyer list has been narrowed to five, Renck adds. New Jersey Devils owner and Philadelphia 76ers managing partner Josh Harris remains in the running, with Lakers and Dodgers investor Todd Boehly heading a third ownership group that remains in contention, according to Sportico.
The Broncos went on the market in February; they are set to begin hosting candidates by early May, Renck adds. Team CEO Joe Ellis has said he wants a new owner in place before the 2022 season starts. Both John Elway and Peyton Manning have been linked to interest in being part of separate ownership groups. The latest reports have not mentioned either Hall of Famer, but Ellis said at the owners meetings the two are not out of the mix altogether.
“They’ve inquired is what I would tell you,” Ellis said, via Mike Klis of 9News. “Certainly, I think either one would be well-accepted by a group if a group or a potential owner would want to include them in the group. We’ll see where that shakes out.”
77 years old? Has to be buying to pass along to family eventually
Probably looking to circumvent estate taxes.
Good. Estate taxes are unethical.
Walmart is unethical.
Both of us are right.
No, you’re wrong, unless you’re not at all concerned about the creation of a permanent aristocracy based on inherited wealth and living not off of their own labor but the rents and returns earned on feudal-like fortunes.
It is unethical to tax money that’s already been taxed. A death tax is straight up theft. Doesn’t matter what I think about the wealth being passed down to children. It is their money, that’s already been taxed, not the government’s. It is morally wrong to tax money twice.
No, it is not. And it happens all the time. My income gets taxed, and then if I spend some of the remaining income while shopping, it gets taxed again under the sales tax or value added tax. Said income is also what allows me to pay my property taxes.
Besides, after my income gets taxed, if I leave it to my estate, it’s new income for them, and they should be taxed on it, just like the retailer is taxed on my money when I transfer it to them the next time I buy a couch.
Complaining about double taxation is how the economic right has obfuscated the purpose of the estate tax in the first place, to prevent the rise of an hereditary aristocracy, which is death to a republic. As the Waltons, Kochs, Rockefellers, DuPonts, Hiltons, Gates, Musks and Co. are proving.
This is probably the dumbest comment I’ve ever read online. The mental gymnastics required to believe that junk you just typed is astounding.
Musk is buying the team.
Lol
He would never get approved.
Nah. He just bought Twitter. He won’t go after the Broncos.
He bought them? Or he made an offer they’ve refused to accept so far?
Rams owner Kroenke is his brother in law. If Walton is the highest bidder in the auction I doubt the NFL denies him.
My only concern is that these buyers might want to pack up the Broncos and move them to another State. It almost happened once. We might have ended up being the Poughkeepsie Broncos.
Don’t think they are going anywhere, as newer stadium a great fan base and a strong team should keep them there. I would like to see Manning involved with new owner.
I read an article earlier that was talking about the Stadium being already considered outdated? Would suck that we would have to build a new one every 25-30 years. The recent fire didn’t help, either. I think they should have built a domed Stadium. Too little, too late.
Stadiums are outdated when the owner decides they are.
Which usually means they tell the fans to pony up or they will move the team. That’s what happened last time. Uncaring Elitists.
Dave, the fire was at the off site practice facility.
Incorrect. It was at the Stadium, 3rd level. It also burned 14 Suites.
I’d like to see Manning and Elway together as owners
I doubt it will happen. Not enough money and other backers. Would love to see it, but unlikely.
Which usually means they tell the fans to pony up or they will move the team. That’s what happened last time. Uncaring Elitists.
Big head can be the valet. F him
Very unlikely they move the team. His sister owns the Avalanche and the Nuggets. Their family seem pretty entrenched in the area.
That would be his brother-in-law Stan Kroenke who owns the LA Rams and therefore couldn’t also buy the Broncos. Other interests:
Occupation Chairman and CEO of Kroenke Sports & Entertainment
Founder of The Kroenke Group
Chairman of THF Realty
CEO/Owner of the Los Angeles Rams
Owner of Denver Nuggets
Owner of Waggoner Ranch
Owner of Arsenal F.C.
Owner of Arsenal W.F.C.
Owner of Colorado Avalanche
Owner of Colorado Rapids
Owner of Colorado Mammoth
Owner of Los Angeles Gladiators
Owner of Los Angeles Guerrillas
Owner of Screaming Eagle Winery and Vineyards
Stan Kroenke’s wife is the managing partner and owner of the Avalanche and Nuggets who happens to be Rob Walton’s sister.
Wal-mart?…Seriously?
Great, we’ll build a logo statue right next to Pat Bowlen.
Walmart destroyed a lot of small towns. Built their store, putting small businesses out of business. Then they closed the Walmart and moved, leaving the town a ghost town. Over and over again. Screw Walmart. No loyalty, just money.
And Wal-Mart also provides low income people a viable place to shop. I don’t deny anything you’re saying because it’s true, but it’s a double edged sword.
The combination of Wal-Mart, other generic chain stores, and especially especially especially mass advertising have rendered small no-name businesses a thing of the past. And Amazon has done even worse. It’s too bad, really.
Everything in life seems to be a double edged sword. KMart was forced out, along with Sears, because of Walmart. I still occasionally buy at Walmart (not their produce; it’s horrendous), but I buy mostly at Smith’s. I use the points at the end of the month for .20 to .30 cents off a gallon of gas (Uber driver). I also shop at Cardenas and use the Get Upside app for 15%-20% off groceries and Get Upside at my local Circle K for gas savings. But I try to avoid Walmart as much as possible. I will say that their sneakers are inexpensive. Cheaply made, but they work in a pinch. Get my jeans there, also. I try to avoid buying anything made in China. Principles. Not saying I can be perfect at everything, far from it, but I can at least make the attempt to follow my beliefs. Walmart mostly rubs me wrong.
While driving down wages and stocking their shelves with goods mostly made by grossly underpaid foreign workers.
Yeah, Amazon is even worse.
It’s interesting that Woolworth’s was Wal-Mart before Wal-Mart, driving small businesses out of the market.
“driving down wages”? if the wages are poor you dont need to take the job, and if you’re angry they can offer that little that’s on the politicians.
And their parking lots smelled like drug crap from 2014-2016. They have underground foundations for FEMA situations. Tell me they didn’t know about it.
I was homeless living in my truck because of other people’s activities during those times. I know.
Yep, just money.
David Glass once CEO of Wal- Cheap bought the Royals in a under the table move by MLB. Didn’t spend .10 to help the club. Did win a WS Thanks to drafting correctly by the front office and no thanks to the cheap skate. Can’t imagine an actual Walton spending .3 cents on a team. Denver fans who are terrific don’t deserve a cheap skate owner like this.
Would you consider the Rams a cheap organization? Kroenke owns the land of most Wal-Marts and leases it back to the company. HIs wife is a Walton. The seem to spend hand over fist the team. His wife owns the Avalanche and the Nuggets.
I would, yes, based off their time in St. Louis. Kroenke only began to spend after he moved the team to L.A. He’s hardly a shining example of good ownership. If Rob Walton takes advice from Kroenke (he who lied about “discovering Kurt Warner in one of his few interviews), I would be pretty opposed to having him as an owner.
Kroenke’s plan was always to move the Rams back to LA. It never made sense to move out of the 2nd largest media market to go to one outside the top 20. It was a terrible business decision by the previous owner.
He still refused to improve the team and purposefully extended Jeff Fisher to keep the team terrible. There wasn’t enough money in it for him to try to be good in St. Louis, even though it was, at the time, the place where his team had won its only Super Bowl. Business decision or not, Kroenke was purposefully cheap so he could make more money later, and screwed his fans over to do so. Not to mention the fact that St. Louis and Missouri were the only two locations to come up with a competitive offer for rebuilding the stadium out of the three teams that moved that year (Raiders, Chargers, and Rams). They offered $350 million in public funding, Kroenke said that it wasn’t enough, and then built a $6 billion facility in L.A.
It’s his business, but it’s supported by appealing to the loyalty of his consumers. Kroenke obviously doesn’t care about any of that. I wouldn’t want that in Denver.
I don’t care for many of the rich elitists. I would be less concerned if we could get someone as an owner who isn’t a complete tool. Just don’t see that happening, though.
“Heir” is a really popular job among sports teams owners.
It’s always funny to me when pawns lick the owners’ boots by saying they got rich by being smart or understanding business, etc.
About half of all US pro sports team owners inherited their teams and/or their wealth.
The extent of their business savvy is literally not dying before their fathers.
Totally agree. Look at the Bowlen brats. Rather than group together, work together, to keep the team, they bickered with each other like childish, over- privileged brats.
The Bowlen thing was really all just Beth Bowlen Wallace, who screwed her sister and family over because she got passed over for the owner job. If she couldn’t have it, no one could. What she did was, in my opinion, completely selfish and disgusting. It erased any doubt that she was actually unfit for the job.
“The highest bid must be accepted, with the sale then going to a league vote”.
If the highest bid must be accepted, why even bother with the voting? Surely, the owners wouldn’t create a “upon further review” situation. They don’t seem to get many of those right.
Gives them an out when say The Bin Laden family or Kim Jong-un throws their bid in.
Please not the Dodgers ownership, sincerely a fan of a rival
Does it matter? Pretty much every NFL owner is despicable in one way or another – but most of them are good at hiding it.
I hear Steve Cohen wants to buy a football team to watch from his getaway home in Aspen.