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Bill Foley, owner of the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights, and Walmart scion Nancy Walton Laurie and her husband, Bill Laurie, are believed to be two of the leading contenders to get the team in Las Vegas, the sources said, along with another yet undisclosed bidding group. It is believed that other bidders remain. A group including legendary NBA executive Jerry Colangelo, former LA Clippers head coach and player Vinny Del Negro, ex-Turner Broadcasting president David Levy and a group of finance executives are bidding as well and have indicated they can raise up to $13 billion for a bid and new arena. Several sources said they believe the Laurie group is the front-runner, though that is not a consensus view. Sportico was the first to report that group’s interest in a Vegas franchise.
Bill Foley, the owner of the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights, has already brought one franchise to The Strip and is looking to add another. Foley publicly declared his intent last month and is rounding up a group to bid on an NBA expansion team. The demand to join him is running high, he said in an interview with The Athletic after he got off the phone with Morgan Stanley, his bankers. The interest is strong enough for him to believe he’ll have to lower the amount he originally planned to take from institutional investors. Foley is no stranger to an expansion process. He brought a new team to Las Vegas in 2017 and had immediate success with the Golden Knights. Now, he believes he can surpass that with an franchise in the world’s best basketball league. “We did a couple things really well,” Foley said. “We’re going to do it on steroids with an NBA team.”
Rocket Arena now has the largest lighting rig in an NBA arena, according to the Cavaliers. The team entered the NBA postseason as the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference and armed with a new in-game presentation toy that was installed during the arena’s four quiet days ahead of the Cavs’ playoff opener against the Heat (those days were left open in the schedule in case the team was in a play-in game). Shine Entertainment -- founded by former Golden Knights Chief Experience Officer Jonny Greco and his wife, Amanda, who was the Cavs’ Senior Dir of Game Presentation for a decade -- consulted the Cavs on the system (the cost was undisclosed) and how best to utilize its 310 FX lights and 238 robotically movable lights. The lights “amplify everything that happens in a game,” said Cavs CMO Chris Kaiser. “Once you get in the bowl, this will impact every aspect.”
Vegas Golden Knights owner Bill Foley said building a new arena is a “waste of time” for a potential NBA team in Las Vegas and that he has a $300 million plan to facelift T-Mobile Arena for any new NBA franchise. “T-Mobile Arena is the perfect place for an NBA team to play,” Foley told Amber Dixon, who hosts Nevada Week on Vegas PBS. “We have a plan in place to spend about $300 million to improve T-Mobile, add seats, add hospitality, add suites, in particular, and upgrade the park.”
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Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James, alongside Boston Red Sox owner Fenway Sports Group and RedBird Capital Partners, owner of the AC Milan Italian soccer club, have expressed interest in owning an NBA franchise in Las Vegas. So has Bill Foley, the owner of the National Hockey League’s Las Vegas Golden Knights. “We have a very powerful group — I can tell you money is not a problem,” Foley said. He added that his group includes “several well-known basketball players and a couple very wealthy people, people who can buy me and sell me 20 times over.” A person familiar with the matter said James “continues to be interested and in discussion with his partners at Fenway about the opportunity.” Fenway Sports Group declined to comment.
A $7 billion price tag would top the current high of $6.05 billion that a group led by Josh Harris paid last year to acquire the NFL’s Washington Commanders and the team’s stadium. One big variable on cost will be where the Las Vegas NBA franchise plays. The NHL’s Golden Knights play in the T-Mobile Arena, co-owned by MGM Resorts International. Bill Hornbuckle, CEO of MGM, said earlier this year that he also wants a shot at hosting an NBA team.
Will people be unable to watch games? No. The NBA insists that, like Major League Baseball did with San Diego and Arizona, it will make sure games remain on the air for fans to watch. Teams across the league are already beginning to plan for the possibility that they might need an alternative to their RSN deal, depending on how things play out with Bally's, in particular. One example of a potential alternative is Scripps Sports, which has signed deals in recent months with several teams, including the NHL's Los Angeles Kings, Vegas Golden Knights and Arizona Coyotes.
Assemblyman Tony Simone said he was originally invited to attend a Hockey is For Everyone event at the Garden in which the Rangers were being used for a community outreach program by the NHL to help broaden the games appeal. He was supposed to drop a ceremonial puck at the Jan. 26 game when the Rangers are scheduled to play the Las Vegas Golden Knights and the Rangers had invited members of the LBGTQ community to the game.
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In the midst of Utah Jazz fans being frustrated over the lack of ability to stream games during the upcoming season, the team on Monday announced a second option to do just that. “In the coming days,” fuboTV, a streaming service that emphasizes sports, will start carrying AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain, the television home of the Utah Jazz, NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights and MLB’s Colorado Rockies. The announcement said it will first launch in Utah and Nevada and “the surrounding areas” and expand in the future.
Milwaukee Bucks co-owner Wes Edens is one of a handful of people trying to lure a Major League Soccer team to Las Vegas as the city emerges as the most likely location for the league’s 30th franchise. Edens and Vegas Golden Knights owner Bill Foley are part of separate groups hoping to bring an expansion franchise to Allegiant Stadium, the $2 billion home of the Las Vegas Raiders, according to multiple people familiar with the plans.
When reached for comment, Jay Bloom said, “While it is most certainly too preliminary to comment on our group’s efforts, Bill Foley’s extraordinary success with the Vegas Golden Knights, together with Mark Davis’s Las Vegas Raiders’ incredibly warm reception by the community and his exceptional world class facilities, and further, the addition of the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces, clearly demonstrate that Las Vegas is already a major player in the world of professional sports.” Jay continued, “Be it ultimately our group or someone else, Las Vegas is clearly the most deserving city in the nation for an NBA expansion franchise team.”
Schwartz isn’t the only one we spoke to who doubted the league could command $5 billion in expansion fees for a pair of new teams. A sports banker, who asked to remain anonymous to speak openly, said, “If no one is pitching Glen Taylor within a billion dollars of $2.5 billion for Minnesota, why would you think someone would spend $2.5 billion to go to Las Vegas? It’s not a better market.” Remember, in Las Vegas the owner would either have to share stadium revenues with the Golden Knights or build his/her own venue. The banker also noted it is not as if there are “a lot of people who can write a $2.5 billion check”—a problem the NFL has come to realize.