FanHouse Sam Zell

What was supposed to happen by the end of May, er, in February, er, in December of 2008 -- you get the idea. The sale of the Chicago Cubs from Sam Zell's Tribune Company has been dragging along at a sloth-like pace for as long as anyone cares to remember. Judging by this past weekend, though, it appears the finishing touches of the sale are coming to fruition.

Zell's group has agreed to sell the Cubs to the Ricketts family -- who made their fortune through TD Ameritrade -- for what is reported to be close to $900 million. The only remaining steps are that the sale must be approved by the rest of the baseball owners and then by a court (because the Tribune Company is operating over Chapter 11 bankruptcy).

I honestly can't remember what it was like with the Cubs' ownership firmly in place. We've been dealing with talks of the ownership for the past few years, things ranging from Mark Cuban's involvement to Sam Zell trying to sell Wrigley Field and the Cubs separately to the situation handcuffing any possible trade talk with the Padres for Jake Peavy. Like the presence of Mark Prior for years, it's lingering without any positive returns.

Anyway, it appears the sale of the Cubs from the Tribune Company may be seeing a proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.

The Chicago-based media conglomerate has been evaluating bids since the beginning of December and could make a decision within a week to 10 days, sources said.

Just when we get our hopes up, however, there is a caveat.

But one source cautioned that the process of narrowing the auction to one bidder still could be derailed, and Tribune Co. could pull the team and its landmark stadium off the market.

Sigh. Can't we just get this crap overwith already and allow Jim Hendry to add payroll?

Over at The Politico, reporters Ken Vogel and Matt Lindsey did plenty of scout work to determine that when it comes to owners of major league sports franchises, Republican Senator and presumptive GOP Presidential nominee John McCain is doing far better than his Democratic Party counterpart Barack Obama in the fundraising department:

Through the end of June, team owners in the four major sports and their families have given to or raised as much or more than $3.2 million for McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, compared with as much as $615,000 for his Democratic rival Obama, according to a Politico analysis of data from the Federal Election Commission, the campaigns and interviews.

Not only did McCain raise more than Obama from the owners in each of the four major professional sports leagues analyzed, but McCain even raised six times more from the owners of teams in Obama's hometown of Chicago.

As you might expect, there are a lot of familiar names thrown about here. But the most stunning revelation isn't revealed until far deeper into the piece -- apparently, most of the team owners who were big donors to the presidential campaign of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, have yet to make a contribution to the Obama campaign, perhaps an indication of some lingering resentment after a bruising primary season. Just one example is New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, who donated $2,300 to Clinton's primary campaign, but has since made donations to McCain's join presidential campaign committee.

One notable exception to that seems to be Charlotte Bobcats owner Bob Johnson, who donated the $2,300 maximum to Clinton's campaign while "bundling" another $100,000 in contributions -- efforts that Johnson has since matched and then exceeded on behalf of the Obama campaign. And for those of you who might be wondering, Bobcats minority owner Michael Jordan donated $2,100 to Obama's primary campaign, but has yet to make a contribution to his general election bid.

In our country's history of bizarre endorsements, I don't think Peter Gammons calling Mark Cuban's purchase of the Cubs a "great fit" is quite as shocking as say, Hunter S. Thompson rising from the grave to declare the need for another four years of Dubya, but it's pretty bizarre.

Gammons is as old school as it gets in baseball, but according to his most recent blog post, he wholeheartedly endorses Cuban as Cubs owner, despite the possibility that there may be forces (the obviously evil and heartless Commissioner Bud Selig) working against him.

But there is increasing speculation that Sam Zell, the chairman and chief executive officer of the Tribune Company, is not going to allow the Commissioner's Office to puppeteer the sale, and that Mark Cuban is in this thing far deeper than Selig and White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf want to believe. NBA commissioner David Stern has told those associated with Cubs that Cuban is one of the NBA's best partners, and everyone appreciates that Cuban understands fans and marketing, and is one of the creative pioneers of the world of new media and would create a tremendous buzz throughout baseball that would be nothing but beneficial to the industry.

Nothing about Cuban is surprising anymore ... except perhaps that David Stern is giving him positive reviews. I kid, I kid. Kind of.

Cuban and Stern have gone head to head on plenty of stuff in his tenure as Dallas Mavericks owner, but the fact that he turned the team around and continues to be an innovative owner, desperately trading for Jason Kidd aside.

With the Cubs streaking and trading for Rich Harden and leading the National League and the All-Star break and all those good things, it's easy to forget the Cubs are for sale. Well, the Cubs are for sale. Today Inland Real Estate, which is based in the Chicago area, made an offer for Wrigley Field and the Sun-Times mentioned that there might be 30 offers for Wrigley, the Cubs, or the combination of the two:

Sources said Thursday that Inland Real Estate Group of Companies Inc., based in Oak Brook, has turned in the offer to Cubs owner Tribune Co. The amount of the offer couldn't be learned, but it is believed to be close to $300 million, the sum Tribune Chairman Sam Zell wants out of Wrigley if he sells the team and the property separately.

[...]

The company's size and prominence indicates the depth of interest in the investment potential of Wrigley Field. One source close to the Cubs sale process said the team has received 20 offers for the park and 10 for the team or the combination of the team and the stadium. Financial experts have said that the Cubs-Wrigley combination could command more than $1 billion.

Apparently Sam Zell hasn't decided if he's going to sell the team and the park as a package deal or separately. It's interesting that there's so many offers for the field itself. Would separate buyers result in a huge raise in the lease for the Cubs? Would it result in changing the name of the field? Actually, it probably wouldn't go that far (changing Wrigley's name would be some really bad press), but these are all things to keep in mind.

Us Cubs fans don't much appreciate billionaire Sam Zell attempting to turn our cute little multi-million dollar franchise into an actual, you know, business. Ever the rapacious capitalist, Zell has threatened to sell Wrigley Field's naming rights to the highest bidder, threatened to leave Wrigley Field altogether, threatened to swear at you in impolite fashion if you dare question him in an open forum. Because this arrangement is supposedly a short-term one, most (sane) Cubs fans I know are tolerating it. Barely.

Now, though, it appears Sam Zell wants Tribune Company, which he owns, to maintain a minority ownership in the Cubs. Oh noes! Invasion of the franchise snatchers!

Tribune Co. expects to retain a minority interest in the Chicago Cubs when it sells control of the major league ballclub. It also wants to talk to top-rated late-night comedian Jay Leno, whom NBC plans to replace next year as host of "The Tonight Show." "An asset like that is an extraordinary asset for ego gratification and identification, none of which the Tribune took advantage of ... nor do I think they were capable of doing that," he said. "It belongs in entrepreneurial hands and I think that would benefit the team, the city and, for sure, Tribune."

Frankly, I don't know what's worse: the fact that Zell wants to keep the Cubs close-in-hand in the name of entrepreneurism -- gasp! -- or that he thinks Jay Leno is funny.

While Sam Zell has "threatened" to do a lot of things with the Cubs that Cubs fans aren't too fond of, like sell the naming rights to Wrigley Field, he's yet to actually do anything. Zell was hoping that he'd be able to sell Wrigley Field and the Cubs as separate entities in hopes of maximizing his profits, but that doesn't look like it's going to happen anymore.

The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, led by former Illinois governor Jim Thompson, had put together a bid to buy the stadium that wouldn't have cost taxpayers anything. Unfortunately for Thompson and the ISFA, their new plan to finance a stadium just didn't sit well with Zell, and he rejected their offer.

But sources said Zell has rejected the state's proposed terms because it relies on a novel and untested financing plan: the sale of individual seats at Wrigley as if they were condominiums. The idea is called equity seat rights and has been advanced by Chicago area business executive Lou Weisbach, who has applied for patent rights on it.

Zell, Cubs Chairman Crane Kenney and their advisers have concluded that the equity plan and its tax ramifications would violate both the Internal Revenue Service code and the rules of Major League Baseball, the sources said.

As a result of all this, it seems that the only way somebody can own Wrigley Field now is to buy the team that plays inside along with it. While Zell may lose out on some money because of it, I wouldn't exactly shed any tears for him. According to some people with a lot more knowledge of this stuff than I, Zell will still pull in around $1 billion when he sells the team.

OK, so the Mavericks are out of the NBA Playoffs, which to Mark Cuban has to feel like the equivalent of ending a long, arduous work day. You know what's great after a long, arduous work day? The Cubs, and a cold beer:

On other visits to Wrigley Field, he sat in the bleachers. But on Wednesday night, Mark Cuban sat in Tribune Co.'s front-row seats next to the Cubs' dugout. He declined to talk with media before the game, except to say he wanted to enjoy the Cubs and a beer. [...]

"Major League Baseball doesn't need me," he said. "I'm just a fan."

See? Beer 'n a ballgame -- it'll cure what ails you. Of course, unlike most fans, Cuban can not only afford to sit in the Tribune Company's first-row seats, he can afford to put in a realistic bid to purchase the Cubs from that capitalist dog Sam Zell. Whether he will choose to do so is still up in the air. Whether anyone should care every time Mark Cuban shows up at a Cubs game is yet another (considerably more valid) story altogether.

I haven't really been all that concerned about the possibility of Wrigley Field changing it's name, because I'm a White Sox fan anyway, and really, who the hell cares what the place is called? It's still going to be Wrigley Field to anybody who cares.

Of course, much like White Sox and Cubs fans do, anytime the Chicago Sun-Times has a chance to give the Chicago Tribune a hard time, they jump at the chance. That's why they held a contest for Cubs fans to turn in protest videos to Tribune Company owner Sam Zell and his plans to sell the naming rights to the ancient stadium.

Little did the Sun-Times realize, a Chicago Tribune intern would win the contest.

Since Sam Zell decreed he'd have no problem selling off the naming rights to Wrigley Field, there's been a large faction of the fanbase upset with the decision. Certainly understandable. But if fans are looking for the Wrigley family -- who sold the stadium in '81 to the Tribune Company -- to come in and save the day by buying the names rights and thus keeping the name, one should not bet on it.

William Wrigley Jr.'s thoughts on the matter via the Chicago Tribune:

"Certainly I and my family have a great passion for the Cubs and the tradition of baseball in Chicago and Wrigley Field and the whole package," he replied. But he indicated the company lacked a compelling business reason to pay for naming rights because Wrigley's marketing focuses on individual gums like Orbitz or Big Red

"We try to put the spotlight on our brands, and not the Wrigley name, and that would be our bias in evaluating any opportunities," Wrigley said.

Translation: "We don't really market or use the Wrigley name on any of the products we showcase, so why in the hell would we spend millions of dollars to save the name? This makes zero sense. It's a waste of money. We're in the business of profit, not saving your precious tradition and name."

But hey, what about Orbitz Orbit Park, Cubs fan? Is has a nice ring to it, no?

(Also see: SbB. Thanks to commenter Dan for pointing out the Tribune's -- as well as my -- error. It's "Orbit" gum not "Orbitz.")