Miami’s alleged professional baseball team is for sale, and the owner of the local NFL team might want in on the action, at the right price.
According to Douglas Hanks of the Miami Herald, Dolphins owner Stephen Ross has displayed some interest in buying the Marlins, but only if owner Jeffrey Loria were to drop his asking price.
Ross wouldn’t be a trailblazer there, as Wayne Huizenga once owned the Dolphins and the Marlins as well. The NFL allows owners to have multiple properties, but only in the same town. Rams owner Stan Kroenke had to transfer ownership of his hockey and basketball teams in Denver to his wife before he was allowed to move the Rams to Los Angeles.
Bids for the Marlins are expected to be in the $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion range, but that gets you a $600 million publicly funded stadium that nobody goes to, and a team that hasn’t finished over .500 since 2009. Loria has spent money on the team previously and they’ve won two World Series titles, but he sold off players after winning funding for the stadium and isn’t regarded as what you’d consider a good steward there.
Of course, there are plenty of other buyers for such a distressed property, and the headlines in Miami surround former Yankees star Derek Jeter and former Florida governor Jeb Bush joining forces in an effort to buy the team.