Big news broke late Tuesday that the Angelos family has agreed to sell the Orioles to a group fronted by David Rubenstein, and including Cal Ripken Jr., for over $1.5 billion – and maybe, finally, the Nationals might benefit?
As you surely know, the Orioles own the majority of MASN, and there has been dispute over payouts and things when it comes to compensating the Nats for the network monies – and while a sale of either team doesn’t nullify that agreement, maybe it’s a bridge to a new era?
“We don't know for sure what happens. The agreement that these teams signed 20 years ago to kind of compensate the Orioles for the Nationals coming says very clearly that if either team is sold, this agreement will still hold, and the Orioles would still have the rights,” WaPo’s Chelsea Janes told Grant & Danny. “The Angelos family does not seem like they would be willing to just hand those rights back to the Lerners, and they'll obviously still be involved in the Orioles for the foreseeable future, so it's probably a lot to expect that they would voluntarily change anything – but that said, if there's ever been a time where MLB can convince everyone to come to some sort of new arrangement, this is it. I just don't know how realistic that is, but I would say if it's ever gonna get changed, this is probably the time.”
Perhaps, if Rubenstein’s group cares less about the territorialism, given his past with trying to work with Ted Leonsis – who is one of the potential suitors for the Nats – the time is now to ‘grease the skids’ as GP says, and maybe, if Leonsis does buy the Nats, they get out of the MASN deal and move to Monumental Sports Network?
“Absolutely, and I don't know if that is contingent on Ted Leonsis buying the Nationals or if this makes it easier for that to happen, but we know Rubenstein was involved with Leonsis on a potential Nationals bid for a while,” Janes said. “We also know that people pretty high up in MLB have talked to Leonsis; they know he wants TV rights and they have thought all along maybe there was some way to trade TV rights with the Angelos family to get the Nationals on Monumental. I think how that was gonna happen has not always been clear, but it's been in the back of everyone's minds for few years now, including people that can control those things, so I think it's a fair connection to draw. I don't know how realistic it is, or if that's something that's been talked about, but since Rubenstein came to this agreement, it's really hard to sort of ignore that connection and safe to assume that if we've thought of it, they've probably thought of it.”
It’s going to take someone on the Orioles’ side to budge on that, but maybe some quid pro quo?
“When I say this is the time that it will happen, you know, that could mean there's a really low chance it would happen and it just would never happen any other time, but one of the things that to consider is that you don't have to abolish the deal to make a better arrangement,” Janes said. “If everybody wants the Orioles to keep these rights, maybe they negotiate something where we say, hey, we'll give you, Ted Leonsis, the rights to Nats games, contract it out so that they're not on MASN, if you give us Wizards games or whatever it is. I think there's a lot of ways you could do this, and I don't quite know what they're thinking or if they're thinking, but I would say that this feels like the most maneuverability anybody's had in since the Nats came here.”
Given the cable landscape, all things could be fluid, but one thing for sure is the Angelos family is selling 40 percent of the team immediately, with the new group to take over as control soon as the deal is finalized, and the other 60 percent can be bought when Peter Angelos dies – a deal structured to minimize capital gains taxes for the seller.
And while that makes sense, it’s still an interesting structure, but could be beneficial to the Orioles’ future if it holds right.
“I was surprised to just kind of see the format of all this because yes, it requires John Angelos to say ‘you take the reins, you're in charge now,’ which usually doesn't happen until somebody owns the majority stake in the team, which Rubenstein will not,” Janes said. “So it’s gonna be interesting, but I would assume the guy who plans to pay the bills long-term will have say over what they do, especially with those young guys that everyone hopes they'll lock up.”