Ted Leonsis was on with G&D the other day, and he said that he still has interest in buying the Nats. But, do we have interest in that?
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00:00Owner Ted Leonsis gave us nearly 30 minutes after Alex Ovechkin's record.
00:06And before we said goodbye, the idea of him buying the Nationals came up.
00:11Remember, Leonsis tried to buy the Nationals.
00:15The learners didn't agree to a price.
00:17That was a couple of years ago.
00:19And so we wanted to know, is he still interested?
00:21And he made no bones about it.
00:22He absolutely would still like to buy the baseball team.
00:25Of course, he owns the Caps.
00:26He owns the Wiz, the Mystics, and several other entities in town.
00:29The CEO of Monumental Sports and Entertainment.
00:32This is what Leonsis said on Grant and Danny yesterday about buying the Nationals.
00:37Yeah, I'm forever interested.
00:40The season started.
00:42And that should be a signal that the Lerner family is very committed.
00:47And the team's really not for sale.
00:50And I think where the Lerner family is, and we haven't had active conversations,
00:55is they're rebuilding the team.
00:57They're excited about the team.
00:59And the new season has started.
01:01They don't want any rumors, any hoopla about corporate developments.
01:06They want to focus on the team.
01:07And I totally understand that.
01:08I respect that.
01:09Mark Lerner came to the game when Alex scored two goals.
01:14Met Wayne Gretzky.
01:15I mean, we're close friends.
01:16I love the family.
01:18I'm going to be here.
01:19We'll keep the lights on.
01:21But there's nothing active going on.
01:23And, you know, I'm going to go out and buy season tickets for the Nationals.
01:27It's hard to go to games.
01:29You know, when Caps are still in season, Wizards are still in season.
01:32But I look forward to going and checking out the team.
01:35And, you know, I enjoy going to baseball games.
01:37So I'm interested.
01:38But it doesn't seem right now that they're that interested.
01:41And I totally understand why.
01:43It's a great answer.
01:45Absolutely.
01:45That is Newsy that made the rounds yesterday.
01:48And is certainly something that I'd say ends any speculation that Leontes wouldn't want to buy the team at this point.
01:56The cliff notes of that one-minute answer.
02:00Forever interested.
02:01His interest is not waning.
02:03They're not going to be talking about selling the team with him in season.
02:06So no reason really at this point to consider it.
02:10But he said, I'll be here.
02:12You know, we'll leave the lights on.
02:13Meaning, call me when you're ready.
02:15The instant you're ready to sell, I'll be forever interested.
02:17That's a pretty big tell.
02:19Forever interested.
02:20I'll be here whenever you need me.
02:22You just call.
02:23I want to buy the team.
02:25They don't want to sell it to me right now.
02:26It's kind of the last sentence there.
02:28Paraphrasing.
02:29He's interested.
02:30They're not as interested.
02:32But I posted those quotes.
02:34You know, what he just said.
02:35What you just heard.
02:36I tweeted them out yesterday.
02:38And I was pretty shocked by the response.
02:43What I mean by that is to say.
02:46There were several people.
02:48I would say half of the people whose response was something along the lines of.
02:53Oh, I wouldn't want Ted to buy the Nationals.
02:56Which I don't understand at all.
02:58To be honest with you.
03:00Now, if the argument is just.
03:02You don't want one owner to own all your teams.
03:04I do get that.
03:05Because as we've seen.
03:07With Leonsis as the owner of the Capitals and the Wizards.
03:09It can be really hard.
03:11At any given moment.
03:12Especially when the seasons conflict.
03:14To feel like.
03:15I know Wizards fans have long felt like they get the shaft or whatever.
03:18Like.
03:18You know, it's on.
03:19Everything is.
03:20Everybody's getting 100%.
03:22Whether that's perception or reality.
03:23I understand that that is a fear that fans have.
03:26Right.
03:26And just generally speaking.
03:27When one person in town owns everything.
03:31It's a, you know.
03:32Like any monopoly of sorts.
03:33I mean, there are drawbacks to that.
03:35So, if your fear is just the amount of things he'd own.
03:38I guess I could.
03:39Well, not my priority or something I care about.
03:42I could reckon that.
03:43But the current situation with the Nationals.
03:48Very, very clearly is.
03:50That there is no other suitor at this moment.
03:53There's nobody else publicly saying they want to buy it.
03:56The last time that they were on the market.
03:59By all accounts.
04:00The only person that was particularly interested in buying them.
04:03Was Ted Leonsis.
04:04So, to me, as of right now.
04:07It's a, would you rather the learners continue to own this thing in perpetuity.
04:12Or Leonsis swoop in and buy this thing.
04:14And to me, that's the biggest no-brainer ever.
04:17Two-fold.
04:18One, I desperately want a real television product.
04:21So badly.
04:22That's not to knock Bob and Franny.
04:24Who do a good job in game.
04:26But I want pre-game and post-game.
04:29See what they do for the Capitals.
04:31And the Wizards.
04:31They do real-life sports programs.
04:34They have shoulder programs.
04:35They have content all day long.
04:37I want that badly for my baseball team.
04:40And I think it's absurd that we don't have it.
04:42Agreed.
04:43The path to that, very clearly, is Ted buying the team.
04:46Very easily.
04:47Because he made the case on our show again yesterday.
04:49That he has no interest in buying the TV rights if he doesn't own the team.
04:53Which, yeah, he basically says there's not money in it at this point.
04:56I'll take his word for it.
04:57I don't know how the business part of that works.
05:00I'll bet he does.
05:01But how many off-seasons do you want to sit and watch them spend no money and do nothing?
05:09As an organization, I would love to just try something else.
05:13That's the other part of this, baseball-wise.
05:16Not just the TV part of it, with Masson being gone.
05:20But Leonsis' Capitals resume is pretty fantastic.
05:25Now, the Wizards' resume clearly is not.
05:28But I don't know, Danny.
05:30If it's really a two-horse race, which is how I view it, learners keep owning this thing for a long time.
05:37Ted Leonsis takes over.
05:38I badly want Ted Leonsis to take over.
05:41If that's the frame, or the framing, then you're right.
05:45It's a no-brainer.
05:45In other words, you're counting on, if you're team learner, for the sake of argument, just to set this conflict up.
05:52If you're team learner, then you're saying, at some point, it's going to change, not based on the last five years, not based on any statistical evidence, just based on what it was at one point, a.k.a. not a ridiculous spend, but a very competitive spend for the Nationals.
06:09There may have been times where there was some nickel-diming, but that's pro sports.
06:14No fan base thinks their ownership group is perfect.
06:17There's always going to be gripes in every sport, no matter what.
06:20But the Nationals had a competitive payroll.
06:22Their payroll now is, it doesn't look as bad as it actually is because they're still paying Steven Strasburg.
06:27It still counts.
06:28The payroll of the players that play is near the bottom of baseball.
06:31It's Marlins-y.
06:32It's ridiculous.
06:34It's pirate-y.
06:35It's unacceptable.
06:35Yeah, and the idea, if you say, well, I'd rather have the learners do it, is you're assuming or hoping, based on what I don't know, that it'll go back to what it was at some point.
06:47Maybe when all the money goes into their account from the back pay from Masson, or maybe something changes.
06:54I don't know what it would be, but maybe then they'll go and do what they're supposed to be doing.
07:00That's the argument.
07:01Other than that, I can't figure it out.
07:03There is nothing that has happened over the last several years that would make you think that that is the case.
07:09This offseason, it was the tell.
07:11Like, I had been very patient and just kind of like, hey, well, I don't know what I don't know.
07:15It's a rebuild.
07:16There's no real reason to spend.
07:18You know, maybe they'll flip the switch.
07:20This was the flip-to-switch offseason.
07:22You don't get to just keep, well, maybe in a year.
07:25Of course, it's so easy for you to keep me waiting when every offseason you can go, well, there's always next offseason.
07:31There's always another one where you might spend.
07:34But what they did this offseason, $9 million for Mike Soroka as a starting pitcher that most teams viewed as a reliever.
07:42And Nathaniel Lowe at first base, who you had to trade a reliever to go get to inherit a contract while the Rangers were trying to downsize financially at first base.
07:52So your baseball ops people found a good deal.
07:54That was the offseason.
07:56You didn't spend money on your bullpen.
07:58You didn't upgrade in other areas.
08:00You did nothing to generate excitement.
08:02Like, we're a week into the season.
08:04Is there excitement about the Nats?
08:06I love the Nats.
08:07I'm over there all the time.
08:08I was there last night.
08:09I'll be there tomorrow.
08:11I've been at five games already.
08:13There's Dodgers fans and 7,000 of us over there last night in the cold.
08:17People just aren't that excited about it.
08:19They're not.
08:20You didn't give them a reason to be excited.
08:22But that's the part I don't get is, oh, well, I hope he doesn't buy the Nats.
08:28Are you a Nats fan?
08:31For what reason?
08:32We also talk about the fact that they have not paid or kept any of their own.
08:36Guess what?
08:37Alex Ovechkin, 20 seasons with the Washington Capitals.
08:40A 13-year record contract.
08:42A five-year contract on the back end of that at the end of his career.
08:45Nicholas Backstrom, a 10-year contract.
08:48TJ Oshie, a massive eight-year contract.
08:50They have paid their own.
08:52John Carlson, eight-year, $64 million, was one of the biggest contracts for defensemen, if not the biggest at that time.
08:58They have taken care of their guys.
09:00They have set the market.
09:01You know, Leonce has talked yesterday about the commitment they like making to their players.
09:05That's been one of the big bugaboos.
09:08Is it perfect?
09:09I'm not trying to sell you that this is the greatest situation in the world.
09:14If some, you know, Jeff Bezos-like billionaire was going to outspend Steve Cohen, is waiting in the wings to come buy this thing, then I want them too.
09:23I want the guy that's going to have the $600 million payroll and compete with the Dodgers for Shohei and the Mets for Soto.
09:31Yeah, let's do that.
09:32But that guy ain't walking through the door.
09:33That's not realistic.
09:34It doesn't seem to be.
09:35There's no one that wants to buy this team right now, basically other than Rubenstein, who's already got his team, the Orioles, and he's checked out, and now Ted Leonsis.
09:43And again, if that's the realistic scenario, which is all we know so far, is one person has declared, again, on our show and with the previous offer, that he has tried to buy them and would buy them if he was allowed to make an offer on them.
09:56If that's the choice, it's a binary, it's pretty easy to me.
09:58And I'm not the world's biggest Ted Leonsis cheerleader when it comes to his ownership.
10:03I think criticisms of him with the Wizards over years are justified.
10:07I just don't think he understood the sport.
10:10If he would have read his own ownership manifesto about how to build a winner, he would have done things a lot differently.
10:15But that's a small gripe.
10:17It's all relative here.
10:19You're talking about an engaged owner that at least has a philosophy and a plan versus whatever this is for the Nationals.
10:26To me, it's obvious.
10:27Like, I'm still hoping for the White Knight.
10:29I'm hoping for someone to come riding in and my Steve Cohen, but I don't know where that guy is.
10:34If he's out there, hear my voice, I'm available.