The Boston Red Sox are one of Major League Baseball’s most precious jewels, as well as Boston’s pride and joy. Each spring, Sox fans convince themselves that this is the year their championship-starved team will win back the pennant they haven’t held since 1918.
And so it should have come as no surprise that sale of the team with an 83-year-old monkey on its back was a long, drawn out, time-consuming and controversial process.
Yesterday, Massachusetts Attorney General Thomas Reilly settled his dispute with those involved in the sale, accepting a $660 million bid from the group led by financier John Henry and media mogul Tom Werner after they agreed to allot another $30 million to state charities. The baseball owners approved the sale to Henry-Werner an hour after the agreement was made. The Henry-Werner group was originally chosen a month ago by the Yawkee Trust and limited partners that formerly owned the club, though shortly after and amidst weeks of financial finger pointing, the group was out-bid by New York lawyer Miles Prentice and billionaire Charles Dolan.
While kinks existed in the dealings of the sale, going about the decision differently would have been an even longer and more complicated procedure. Sox CEO John Harrington, whose job it was to represent the fiduciary interests of the Yawkee Trust, said all along the original plan was for the team would go to the highest bidder.
Though Harrington, reportedly under the watchful eye of MLB, did not stick to this idea, in the end, they chose the best — and fastest — possible option. Both Prentice and Dolan would have had great difficulties clearing the last hurdle in the process, gaining the approval of the other Major League owners, so if the team had gone to one of them, it is possible the sale would still be unresolved.
The attorney general should be commended on his work on the investigation into whether or not an adequate amount of money was going toward charities. Reilly went into the situation, demanded answers and compromised to make the outcome positive for everyone involved. By gathering the additional $30 million for charities, he did his job notably.
The Boston Red Sox is just one part of a large company that is very important to the United States: namely, Major League Baseball. To keep the fans and players content, this company had to finish the sale in the most fair and quick way possible, and it succeeded in doing so. Now, if the Red Sox could only win the World Series…
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