Thursday, October 9, 2008

Preds Filing Claims Del Biaggio Cost Team Milions

The Tennessean's Brad Schrade is monitoring the bankruptcy proceedings for William "Boots" Del Biaggio ((pictured, thanks yahoo sports- he's the one on the left)) for the home team and his latest piece in the paper details the tack that the ownership group is taking in all of this...

To wit... The "he's costing us money" approach...

From the article... ahem... quote...
"The local owners claim in their filing that the value of the team purchased in December for a reported $193 million has been diminished by 15 percent. And the owners also claim they are stuck with high-interest debt and a loan in cross-default because of Del Biaggio's activities."

Couple of interesting points Schrade raises through interviews with John Vrooman, a Vanderbilt University sports economist and Marc Ganis, President of SportsCorp, Ltd. Both think the Preds are stretching things a bit... but they kinda have to...

Vrooman is questioning the idea that Del Biaggio actually is at fault for costing the Preds lost revenue in sponsorships, ticket revenue, and the like. Ganis thinks the filing is a way to strengthen their position in the attempt to get the 27-percent stake Del Biaggio had before he ended up in court.

The US$193-million is also being questioned by Schrade since The Tennessean obtained confidential documents over the summer that had the franchise's value at US$176-million after price adjustments. But the court papers filed by the owners in the Del Biaggio case list their value, after self-imposed, value-added loss, to yield a purchase price of US$180-million.

Don't you all love new math...?
More from bankruptcy court as we know more...

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