A Bay Area Fan’s Perspective of the Larry Ellison/Golden State Warriors New Owner Fallout

Yesterday was the official day Warriors fans have been dying for. On July 15, 2010, the Golden State Warriors of the National Basketball Association was sold for a record $450 million by then-owner Chris Cohan to a group consisting of Joe Lacob and Peter Guber. Lacob, a minority owner of the Boston Celtics, definitely has an idea on what it takes to build a winner, something the Bay Area fans have not seen consistently for approximately 20 years. Guber, the CEO of Mandalay Entertainment, is a wealthy person in his own right and has had success in minor league sports ownership.

The move is one Warriors fans have been long yearning, yet there is still a torn reaction from the devoted fan base, although Lacob and Guber are suitable new owners. This is because there was a favorite going into this process to become the new team owner. Not just a financial favorite but a fan-favorite, which is perhaps just as important as the former.

Larry Ellison, CEO and founder of the company Oracle, was long rumored to be the favorite long before Lacob and Guber came into the picture. Ellison was even courted by the fans to buy the team after years of ineptitude in Cohan’s ownership style.

Ellison definitely has the financial backing to run the team as well. With a personal fortune of $28 billion, Forbes lists his as the sixth wealthiest individual in the world. To put it in perspective, Portland Trailblazers owner Paul Allen, who is known for his limitless pocketbook for funding his team, and the new Russian owner Mikhail Prokhorov, billed the richest man from his homeland, are two of the wealthiest owners in the NBA. Yet, combining their net wealth would still be less than Ellison’s.

Including Ellison’s Bay Area connections and love for winning (as seen in his domination of the America’s Cup), he seemed to be a perfect match. Heck, even Ellison’s company name (Oracle Arena) holds advertising rights to the facility Warriors call home. So why didn’t the man with all the money in the world win the franchise?

Apparently it was because his bid was late.

According to Sal Galatioto, the president of Galatioto Sports Partners, which advised and organized the sale of the Warriors, Ellison’s bid came in too late. Ellison even came out to say the following in a statement: “Although I was the highest bidder, Chris Cohan decided to sell to someone else.”

Apparently, there was a miscommunication or no quick way to get the bid in. No e-mail, text message, phone call, or fax. Couldn’t any of these methods been suitable to at least wait some time before finalizing the transaction? Or perhaps there is a conspiracy of Cohen not wanting to sell the team to Ellison. But that’s a whole other topic…

So as the Warriors are set to welcome new owners into the Bay Area, what does this mean to the future of one of the least successful franchise of recent memories. Why is their conflict although the new owners are definite improvements over Cohan?

As a native of the Bay Area all my life and a fan of the team since I understood basketball, I’m personally distraught by the series of events happening this past few days. All signs were pointing towards Ellison being the new owner and it meant limitless possibilities with him in charge.

While Lacob and Guber are rich men in their own rights, Ellison makes those two men look like paupers to the wealth he controls. Ellison has a win-at-all-costs attitude that cannot be matched by any other prospective buyer simply because of his wealth. He came out saying that he wanted to do whatever it took to change the losing prospects of the team and make the Bay Area a destination players would want to come to, not shy away from.

Mainly for this fact combined with Ellison’s competitiveness, Warriors fans have good reason to be disappointed by what has happened. Ellison could have drastically turned the Warriors into a playoff contender. Free agents would want to come here, not just because of the devoted fan base but because they know they would get paid.

Picture this scenario. While the Warriors were not the biggest players in the mega free agent bonanza known as the summer of 2010, what if the Warriors had the cap space of teams such as the Miami Heat, Chicago Bulls, or New York Knicks? If Ellison were the owner and the Warriors were at par in terms of being able to offer the money to superstars, Golden State would definitely have a case to being a desirable location despite being an (arguably) smaller market than those teams.

Well, what’s done is done and those fans wanting Ellison did not get what they wanted. However, one should not be discouraged, for primary owner Lacob has already made one statement that puts him leaps and bounds ahead of Cohen as an owner. Said Lacob: “The No. 1 thing (fans need to know): we’re going to do our damnedest to bring the Warriors to respectability on the basketball court.”

While I am like many others who would have preferred Ellison, I still have faith and wishes (after many years of bad luck and misfortune as a Warriors fan) that things will go positive for the Golden State Warriors.