MLB teams are worth billions.

The beginning of any sports season whether it is baseball, football, basketball, hockey or soccer brings with it an annual financial evaluation of teams. It generally is an exercise in futility as the truth is this. A sports franchise is worth whatever a potential owner thinks it is worth. For what it is worth, Sportico put out its annual Major League Baseball individual team evaluation list and the Steinbrenner family-owned New York Yankees franchise remains king of the hill, top of the heap. According to Sportico, if Hal Steinbrenner and his partners wanted to sell the Yankees business, Steinbrenner and his partners could get $7.9 billion. Meanwhile if Miami Marlins owner Bruce Sherman wanted to dispose of his business, he could only get $1.2 billion in return. Steinbrenner’s Yankees business comes complete with a piece of the YES Network while Sherman’s business is merely that of a baseball franchise.

The Los Angeles Dodgers franchise comes in second at $6.3 billion. When Brooklyn Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley left New York for Los Angeles in 1957, the New York Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers franchises were the top two revenue producers and with Dan Topping’s Yankees the most valuable baseball team and O’Malley’s Dodgers as the second most valuable baseball team. Four teams are worth more than $5 billion, Steinbrenner’s Yankees, the Dodgers, John Henry’s Boston Red Sox business which comes in at $5.9 billion and the Ricketts’ family Chicago Cubs business at $5.3 billion. The top ten is rounded out with San Francisco at 5, Atlanta sixth, Houston at number 7, Philadelphia is eighth. It is very hard to believe that Steve Cohen’s New York Mets business is worth five billion less than Steinbrenner’s Yankees at $2.9 billion at 9 and St. Louis is 10. According to Sportico franchise values are up, but that’s just on paper.

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