The $2 billion sale of the Los Angeles Dodgers was finalised Tuesday, ending the tumultuous era under former owner Frank McCourt, who took the team into bankruptcy and made his private life public through a nasty divorce battle with his ex-wife.
The closure of the deal was announced in a terse statement. The Dodgers were sold to Guggenheim Baseball Management, a group that includes former Los Angeles Lakers star Magic Johnson.
Mark Walter, chief executive officer of the financial services firm Guggenheim Partners, will become the controlling owner, and the team will be run by former Atlanta Braves President Stan Kasten.
McCourt met with Dodgers employees Tuesday, expressing his appreciation and introduced Walter, said Howard Sunkin, a spokesman for McCourt.
"The Dodgers move forward with confidence in a strong financial position as a premier Major League Baseball franchise and as an integral part of and representative of the Los Angeles community," the new ownership group's statement said.
The timing couldn't have come at a better time for Dodgers fans, who are excited about having their team leading the National League. The Dodgers had a 16-7 record going into Tuesday night's game in Colorado. The Dodgers have won six World Series titles but none since 1988, when they were still owned by the O'Malley family that moved the team from Brooklyn to California after the 1957 season.
Fox bought the team in 1998, then sold it to McCourt.
The sale was part of a reorganisation plan after McCourt took the team into bankruptcy last June. A federal judge approved the deal last month.
The sale was supposed to close Monday, the day McCourt was to make a $131 million payment to former wife Jamie McCourt as part of their divorce settlement. The team's statement said all claims will be paid. Jamie McCourt did receive her payment on Monday.
McCourt paid $430 million in 2004 to buy the team, Dodger Stadium and 250 acres of land that include the parking lots from the Fox division of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.
Despite the Dodgers making the playoffs the first four out of six seasons under McCourt's ownership, the off-the-field saga took attention away from the team as he and his ex-wife were in a protracted divorce battle during which their lavish spending habits were revealed in court documents and testimony.
Major League Baseball assumed control of the club's day-to-day operations in April 2011 amid concerns by MLB executives that McCourt couldn't make payroll.
The team filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after baseball Commissioner Bud Selig rejected a proposed broadcast rights deal with Fox Sports that McCourt said would have alleviated worries about covering payroll.
The team's debt stood at $579 million as of January, according to a court filing, but McCourt stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars.
The sale price set a record; Stephen Ross forked out $1.1 billion for the NFL's Miami Dolphins in 2009, and Malcolm Glazer and his family took over England's Manchester United soccer club seven years ago in a deal then valued at $1.47 billion.
The previous record for a baseball franchise was the $845 million paid by the Ricketts family for the Chicago Cubs in 2009.
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