San Diego Padres nearing deal to be sold for $3.9 billion: The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the San Diego Padres are nearing a deal to be sold to private-equity billionaire José E. Feliciano for an MLB record of $3.9 billion.

The deal for the Padres is expected to be announced early next week, according to the Wall Street Journal publication.

So, who is José E. Feliciano?

Feliciano co-founded investment firm Clearlake Capital in 2006. It currently manages more than $90 billion in assets across technology, industrial, and consumer companies. He’s had professional sports ownership on his radar for a while now.

In 2022, he attempted to buy the Denver Broncos and was in the bidding to acquire a minority stake in the Chargers that ended up going to Tom Gores, one of the other finalists to buy the Padres (along with Joe Lacob and Dan Friedkin).

Feliciano did successfully partner with investor Todd Boehly to buy Chelsea F.C., one of the English Premier League’s most successful soccer clubs and winners of last year’s FIFA Club World Cup, for $3.16 billion in 2022. Interestingly, Boehly is a co-owner and investor in the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Although nothing has been announced officially, any franchise sale must be approved by 75% of the league’s owners (22 of the other 29 teams), and they get plenty of time to do their own research on the new party, especially with a new collective bargaining agreement negotiation coming this off-season.

“When you bring in a new owner, you’re bringing in a new business partner,” says Corey Martin, a sports and entertainment attorney with two decades of experience in professional franchise sales. “They want to make sure they’re bringing in a new business partner that is philosophically aligned with them.”

The approval process could be expedited due to the fact that the Seidler family is well-regarded around the league, so the work they’ve already done will be taken into consideration.

“I think they give a lot of latitude to the sellers, that they know the sellers are going to do their own vetting, and they’re going to kind of piggyback on that vetting process that the selling family is conducting,” says Martin.

Once the league gathers to vote its approval, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission will do a review to make sure the sale meets legal requirements, and the City of San Diego will have to approve the 30% of Petco Park that’s also included in the acquisition. In recent sales of the Mets and Tampa Bay Rays, that part of the process took about a week.

The timeline is important with a midseason leadership change because it can have a massive impact on the team’s ability to compete for a playoff spot.

In the Padres case, the new owners could potentially have control before the MLB Trade Deadline, which is on Aug. 3, 2026. The deadline is when Padres President of Baseball Operations A.J. Preller is typically extremely active, attempting to improve the roster. But if the transition to new ownership is not complete, it could fundamentally change what he’s able to do based on who is making the final decision.

There is a mechanism that can make that process a lot less complicated.

“I can tell you a dynamic that I’ve seen in place in other sports franchise sales deals, specifically with who has authority to approve a trade,” says Martin. “So, if we get to the trade deadline before the ownership has officially changed hands, typically what happens is that the incumbent owners will be the ones who can approve a trade, but the incoming owners will have what they call a ‘meaningful consultation.’ The existing ownership will have final say, but they have to meaningfully consult with the incoming owners.”

That usually means the new owners will tell the outgoing group what to do because those moves will end up on their books.