Tribune Company Mulls Selling Cubs Package in Parts

The Chicago Cubs, baseball's perennial losers, actually reside in first place with two weeks left in baseball's regular season. That has fans dreaming - with heavy doses of trepidation - if this could be the year the woebegone franchise reaches the World Series for the first time since Harry Truman lived in the White House.

But even bigger contests are ahead away from the baseball diamond. Tribune Co. which owns the Cubs, historic Wrigley Field and a share of Comcast SportsNet, a regional cable TV network in Chicago, said earlier this year it would sell the Cubs after this season as part of its privatization deal with Chicago real estate mogul Sam Zell.

Now the company is considering whether it might get more money by selling
the pieces separately, according to the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times.

Photo of Wrigley Field by Rob Tringali/SportsChrome

A key consideration would be the limit that maneuver would place on baseball Commissioner Bud Selig's influence over the deal because Major League Baseball's authority extends only to the team, the newspaper said. The commissioner has been accused of directing previous franchise sales toward bidders he favors, even when higher offers are out there, the Times said.

Estimates of the Cubs' value, plus Wrigley Field and 25 percent of Comcast SportsNet have reached $1 billion and beyond.

Major League Baseball has a clear interest in approving sales only to buyers with whom the owners are comfortable -- not necessarily the highest bidders. The transfer of any franchise requires the approval of 23 of the 30 team owners.

An even bigger question still to be answered if what a successful October run for the Cubs - they last actually won the World Series 99 years ago - would mean for the sale process. Marketing a World Series champion from Chicago's Northside truly would be a once-in-a-lifetime - not to mention once-in-a-century - spectacle.