New York Developer Aims to Buy Baseball’s Expos
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New York developer Mark Broxmeyer, best known for erecting sprawling multifamily developments in Long Island, is trying to buy the Montreal Expos.
The team has been tentatively renamed the Nationals and could play in Washington, D.C., next season. Major League Baseball’s 29 owners bought it in February 2002 for $120 million. And having reportedly lost millions on the purchase, the league is anxious to unload the Nationals by January.
“The last time I checked, the Yankees and the Mets weren’t up for sale, so Washington, D.C., is about the closest thing you can get to a New York franchise,” said Mr. Broxmeyer, a native New Yorker and chairman of the think tank the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.
Mr. Broxmeyer has so far convinced Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly’s lawyer, Ben Morelli, and the chairman of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, Fred Zeidman, to join his investors. Steve Forbes has also said he “wants to participate,” and Mayor Giuliani is “definitely interested,” said Mr. Broxmeyer.
Within the next month, Mr. Broxmeyer expects Major League Baseball to publish an acceptable minimum bid for the Expos purchase, which rumors have put at $300 million. After the minimum has been set, the potential buyers have 30 days to examine the Expos’ books before putting in their official bid.
Investor groups do not have to be finalized until the official bids are made. Mr. Broxmeyer is still hammering out his final list of investors and continues to meet with wealthy individuals in the hopes of raising more funds, including a meeting today in Washington with an unnamed vice presidential candidate who has expressed interest in investing in the team.
Mr. Broxmeyer plans to finalize his investors in the coming days and submit his application, which includes detailed questions about the investment partners, their net worth, and how they plan to finance the purchase, this week. A $100,000 deposit, a portion of which may be refundable, must accompany the application.
Mr. Broxmeyer, who, as a “pioneer” fund-raiser for President Bush, raised more than $100,000 for his presidential campaign, served as the finance chairman for the Suffolk County Republican Party before becoming chairman of JINSA. He started his real estate firm Fairfield Properties 30 years ago.
“I started to become interested in other investments and began thinking, why not buy a major league team?” he said.
Other potential bidders for the Expos include the William Collins-led Virginia Baseball Club, which tried unsuccessfully to lure the Expos to Northern Virginia, and the Washington Baseball Club, led by businessmen Jeffrey Zients and Fred Malek. Former New York Yankees slugger Reggie Jackson has also expressed some interest in buying the team, as has a group led by Memphis businessman and Howard University graduate Brian Saulsberry. Former Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks President Stan Kasten is also interested in leading or joining an ownership group, according to reports.
A Major League Baseball spokesman did not return calls as of press time.
Meanwhile, the sale of the Expos may take longer than anticipated after a wrench was thrown into the plan to bring the Expos to Washington last week. The D.C. City Council chairwoman, Linda Cropp, announced an alternative plan to build a stadium near the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium, which she claimed would cost taxpayers 20% less than the plan proposed by Mayor Anthony Williams to build a stadium along the Anacostia River at an estimated cost of $440 million to $530 million. The council is scheduled to vote tomorrow on the mayor’s plan, which he made with Major League Baseball under the agreement that if the stadium were built, the Expos would move to Washington.
“I’m going see what happens,” Mr. Broxmeyer said. “A stadium along the Anacostia River is more attractive because it is a blighted area and is an opportunity for redevelopment, and we had planned to start buying up real estate there,” he said. If the stadium is moved, however, Mr. Broxmeyer said he would likely still bid for the team.