The Celtics franchise is worth billions of dollars.

If and when the National Basketball Association decides to add teams, just how much money will the league charge for the franchises? The days of charging $100 million to enter the business are long gone. The Boston Celtics franchise apparently is for sale but will a minority investor step up and purchase the majority share of the team or will there be an outsider? The franchise just won the NBA title but winning a championship isn’t really going to set the price for the Celtics franchise. There is the matter of TV and corporate money and the Celtics’ ownership just leases out the Boston arena that it uses for games. That means whoever gets the team is not getting money from others who rent out the building.

It is expensive to join the owners’ club. Mat Ishbia purchased the Phoenix Suns and the Women’s National Basketball Association Phoenix Mercury franchises for a reported $4 billion. Mark Cuban sold most of his interest in the Dallas Mavericks franchise to the Adelson and Dumont families who run Las Vegas Sands Corp for a reported $4 billion. Joe and Clara Wu Tsai sold a 15% minority stake in BSE Global, parent of the Brooklyn Nets, WNBA’s New York Liberty and the team’s arena to members of the Koch family, led by Julia Koch for about $900 million. It is going to cost billions of dollars for expansion teams to enter the NBA lodge which will enrich present owners as they do not have to share that money with the players. If the NBA expands by two teams and charges a minimum of $4 billion per team, each of the 30 NBA owners would get around $267 million. Las Vegas and Seattle are frequently mentioned as the leading contenders for teams. Can those markets afford NBA prices?

Boston Basketball Partners L.L.C.

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