[SBNation] Pablo Torre’s Dodgers bombshell reveals real threat to every American: teased deepdive into financials of Walter & Dodgers, an alleged shell game of investments & insider deals which are now under scrutiny of federal government, which could wind up with Walter and Magic Johnson in prison

[u/f0urxio]

https://www.sbnation.com/mlb/1127272/pablo-torre-dodgers-bombshell-reveals-mark-walter-guggenheim

[u/randomrule]

I'll get downvoted because of flair but as of yet (I doubt Pablo at my own peril, who knows what he's cooking up), there's no implication that the Dodgers org itself is doing anything improper. This seems squarely on Walter & Johnson and their personal financial situations

[u/Knightbear49 → u/randomrule]

The Dodgers will be just fine…

[u/tristpa2 → u/randomrule]

Yeah but on top of the previously known sweetheart deal that exempts the Dodgers from revenue sharing on about half their TV deal, this report is claiming the TV contract itself is artificially inflated because the people responsible for negotiation on behalf of the TV station were/are part of the Dodgers ownership group. So the Dodgers might not be doing anything wrong but they are sure are hell profiting from it.

[u/randomrule → u/tristpa2]

Yeah, I'm mostly just saying that anyone who is hoping the Dodgers get Clippered might want to temper their expectations unless more info comes out soon

[u/AnotherPersonPerhaps → u/randomrule]

Does anyone think that? It doesn't seem to be alleging that the Dodgers violated MLB rules necessarily and this is a drastically different situation.

If anything the allegations appear to be that the Dodgers benefited from what may be fraud on the part of their owner but that fraud was external to the team right?

[u/usetheforce_gaming → u/AnotherPersonPerhaps]

I mean, yeah. Just take a look at the announcement thread of Pablo's expose lol

[u/CosmicMiru → u/usetheforce_gaming]

The one with 10x less engagement because it actually talks about the findings and not "the Dodgers are a threat to America"

[u/randomrule → u/AnotherPersonPerhaps]

I think there definitely was some hope from people that Pablo was what would topple the Dodgers in the same manner that he did with the Clippers, yes. (As I said before, there's still time and it seems like he's in the early process of this, so who knows).

[u/rugger87 → u/randomrule]

I mean this sort of does. The way they financed the TV deal is illegal. The Dodgers aren’t profitable without that TV deal.

(Which incidentally, was part of the reason for the DIRECTV blackout and why Dodgers fans couldn’t watch their team.)

[u/RealEmperorofMankind → u/randomrule]

I kind of got the sense that he's already done and is just presenting what he's found. But we'll see.

[u/tristpa2 → u/AnotherPersonPerhaps]

Most of the fraud seems to be external to the team, but there is a whole piece of this story related to potential improperties surrounding the Dodgers TV deal, which the sale of the Dodgers was contingent on. Specifically the company bidding on the TV rights for the Dodgers was made up of companies that had ownership stakes in the Dodgers, and the only reason MLB selected the Walters and Guggenheim as the new owners was because of the inflated TV deal their group was able to secure.

Although I do agree any consequences for the dodgers besides ownership being forced to sell (most likely by the govt, not MLB) are unlikely

[u/wrenwood2018 → u/AnotherPersonPerhaps]

If it is the owners doing the fraud and the fraud benefitted the team then no the team should be punished. The fraud directly gave the ownership group the ability to buy the team and leverage capital to fund the runs and the TV deal.

[u/AnotherPersonPerhaps → u/wrenwood2018]

But did they violate any MLB rules or is there any MLB way to punish them?

If they violated the law that's different and I agree they should be punished, but for it to be like the Clippers siutation it would need to be that the Dodgers organization broke the MLB rules

[u/wrenwood2018 → u/AnotherPersonPerhaps]

Well it gave them a giant financial advantage that led to success. So all of the contracts they entered into and signed off on by MLB could be voided.

[u/Hankerpants → u/randomrule]

Yeah I don't think they're apples to apples. But I do think there's a decent chance Walters has to sell (not forced by MLB, but forced to because he has to find the money to fix the hole and might still go to jail because of it).

[u/agentfox → u/tristpa2]

Which is entirely possible and IF TRUE the league should blow up the deal or at least remove the $2b protected that the dodgers don’t have to share.

[u/EnsignObvious → u/tristpa2]

Every owner that collects revenue sharing also profits from it, because even with the cap on the sharing and the ridiculous financial advantage it gave the Dodgers, all the smaller markets still got more money.

[u/dekrypto → u/tristpa2]

So punish the dodgers because Warner Bro’s signed a terrible contract?

[u/captain_ahabb → u/tristpa2]

Lots of teams have partial ownership of their TV partners now afaik

[u/wrenwood2018 → u/randomrule]

Except that this fraud allowed them to have shenanigans with the TV deal. You know that TV deal that gives the Dodgers a ridiculous financial advantage.

[u/bigz22 → u/randomrule]

Big "You guys owe the Clippers an apology" energy

[u/randomrule → u/bigz22]

I'll be the first person to admit the team deserves punishment if more info comes out tbh, right now this is just reiterating that Mark Walter sucks

[u/RunningonGin0323 → u/randomrule]

Lmao. Already starting with the copium. Bravo didn't think it would happen this early.

[u/ethanb473 → u/randomrule]

Lmaooo preemptively whining about nonexistent downvotes….. biggest victim complex I’ve ever seen

[u/randomrule → u/ethanb473]

I'm not even whining. Downvotes simply come with the territory based on the current Dodgers climate and I don't blame people for doing so lol

[u/dkinmn → u/randomrule]

That isn't exactly true. I question whether you listened to the episode.