For the first time in 23 years, Mark Cuban will no longer be majority owner of the Dallas Mavericks.
Instead, that title will belong to the families who run the Las Vegas Sands casino company, as we relayed here. But Cuban is expected to retain control of the basketball operations side.
The deal was approved Wednesday, about a month after the families of Miriam Adelson and Sivan and Patrick Dumont announced intentions to buy the team. Per Tim MacMahon of ESPN, the purchase is at a valuation of more than $4 billion.
“Nothing’s really changed except my bank account,” Cuban said. “I feel really good. I think it’s a great partnership. It’s what the team needed on the court and off. I’ll still be overseeing the basketball side of it, but having a partner like Patrick and Sivan and Miriam and their ability to build and to redevelop the arena and whatever comes next beyond that just puts us in a much better position to compete. That’s all. That’s what it comes down to.”
Cuban will still maintain a 27 percent stake of the team’s ownership and remain as the official alternate governor.
He added that he doesn’t expect Dumont to be heavily involved in basketball-related decisions.
“He basically said, ‘Just do what you got to do. I want to win,'” Cuban said. “I mean, financially, we’re in a far better position this afternoon than we were yesterday afternoon to be able to compete like that. So what did [Houston Rockets owner] Tilman [Fertitta] say about being a middle-class billionaire? Those are facts in this day and age. It really matters. So having the partnership and having eventually new and deeper revenue sources allows us to compete better. I talked to Patrick a lot and Miriam and Sivan, and they’re committed to winning.”
All this excitement and the Mavs blew a 20-point lead to the Cleveland Cavaliers at home after Cuban addressed the media.
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