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Citing “unfinished business,” Los Angeles Angels owner Arte Moreno has decided that his team is no longer for sale, a change of heart that shocked the industry and surprised many throughout the organization.
On Monday afternoon, five months after essentially announcing plans to move on, Moreno released a 132-word statement that read, in part: “[A]s discussions advanced and began to crystallize, we realized our hearts remain with the Angels, and we are not ready to part ways with the fans, players, and our employees.”
Moreno, 76, purchased the Angels from The Walt Disney Company for $183.5 million in 2003, the year after the first and only championship in franchise history, and watched the team skyrocket in value over the ensuing years. Forbes valued the Angels at $2.2 billion in March of 2022. A potential sale was widely predicted to net somewhere in the neighborhood of $2.5 billion. Golden State Warriors majority owner Joe Lacob and Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong had been rumored to be among those interested, with a sale expected in the coming months.
But a source familiar with Moreno’s thinking said that as the process continued to play out and a potential sale moved into the late stages, Moreno found it increasingly difficult to part with a franchise he has presided over for two decades. It’s also possible that prospective buyers didn’t meet Moreno’s asking price, though the source disputed that notion.
In a statement, Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred wrote: “Despite strong buyer interest in the Angels, Arte Moreno’s love of the game is most important to him. I am very pleased that the Moreno family has decided to continue owning the team.”
Back on Aug. 22, Moreno announced that the team had retained financial advisers at Galatioto Sports Partners to aid in a potential sale. Although it was initially billed as exploratory in nature, the perception throughout the sport was that the Angels would indeed be sold….
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