Nike founder Phil Knight makes $2 billion bid for NBA's Portland Trail Blazers team

Yahoo Finance's Josh Schafer reports on how billionaire Phil Knight is making a play to own an NBA team.

Video Transcript

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SEANA SMITH: The Portland Trail Blazers responding to the report that Nike founder Phil Knight and Los Angeles Dodger part-owner Alan Smolinisky offered more than $2 billion for the team, confirming that Knight did make the offer, but the team isn't for sale. A little bit of a catch there. Josh Schafer is here with the latest on this. So Josh, Phil Knight wants to buy the team, but the team is saying, hey, we're actually not up for sale. What's going on?

JOSH SCHAFER: Yeah, it doesn't seem like the Blazers are ready to sell the team just yet, right? So Paul Allen was the former owner. He passed away in 2019 now-- or 2018, I should say. It's been almost four years, Seana, that we've been waiting for them to sell because it was in his will that they had to sell the team. That hasn't happened yet. We're still kind of waiting there. Phil Knight comes in, and what really stuck out to me is the number-- $2 billion.

When we're talking about that number, that's what Steve Ballmer paid for the Clippers in 2014. And now the Blazers are worth $2 billion. If we can pull up a full screen here that I have with the chart of showing how much these have gone up. And it's pretty crazy to see the average value of a franchise go up from $207 million in 2001 to $2.48 billion in 2021. Huge numbers. And then to think about Nike getting involved is the other exciting piece of this, right?

SEANA SMITH: Yeah, so that's actually what I want to ask you about because that is impressive growth. Obviously, a massive uptick there, as we could see on the screen. But Phil Knight getting involved with the Blazers, so lots of questions about what that would potentially look like. Nike maybe becoming a sponsor of the team. How do you see this potentially playing out?

JOSH SCHAFER: It has to be advantageous for an NBA player, right? We know how the NBA works, right? The modern NBA is, what's your pitch for me? Why am I going to come to this random city and play? It's the big free agency stuff we all love to talk about in the summer. Well, if Phil Knight owns a team, I'm going for that shoe deal. I'm probably getting a custom shoe. I might get a custom shoe if I'm the sixth man.

I think to be a star on the Trail Blazers on a team that is owned by Phil Knight, is such an advantageous pitch to have in the modern NBA. And I really think it would change things for the Blazers, who, right now, not the best season this year.