Sport set another ownership record this week. In twelve days it starts cutting players.

The most expensive week in the history of team sport

Bob Iger and Josh Kushner agreed to buy control of the Los Angeles Lakers at a 12.5 billion dollar valuation [1]. It is the highest price ever attached to a professional sports team [1]. ESPN first reported the deal on Wednesday [2].

The record it broke was ten months old, and belonged to the same club. Mark Walter’s 10 billion dollar purchase from the Buss family closed on 30 October 2025, ending 46 years of family ownership [2]. Walter has now sold his interest less than a year after buying it [1].

“Like anything else, it’s worth what someone is willing to pay,” said Mark Cuban, who bought the Dallas Mavericks in 2000 for 285 million dollars [3]. He sold a majority stake in 2023 at a valuation near 3.5 billion dollars [3].

Two days after the Lakers deal, Liverpool’s owner Fenway Sports Group agreed to sell about 30 per cent of the club for 1.65 billion pounds [4]. That values the whole club at 5.5 billion pounds [4], or just over 7 billion dollars [5]. It is a record valuation for a stake in a football club, topping Jim Ratcliffe’s 2024 Manchester United deal at roughly 5.8 billion dollars [5].

The buyers are a consortium called 1892 Holdings, led by Amit Bhatia and backed by the Mittal family trusts, Jeff Bezos through K5 Sports, and Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin [5]. FSG keeps majority ownership and day-to-day control [5]. It bought Liverpool in 2010 for 300 million pounds [5].

Baseball joined in the same week. Apollo Sports Capital put 2.6 billion dollars into the parent company of the New York Yankees [6]. That values the team at close to 10 billion dollars, according to two people briefed on the deal [6]. Under league rules Apollo’s stake cannot exceed 15 per cent [6]. The Steinbrenner family keeps control [6]. This is happening as owners and players head toward a lockout that could threaten the 2027 season [6].

And the floor keeps rising. Sportico’s annual valuations put the average NFL team at 9.34 billion dollars, up 31 per cent in a year and 141 per cent in five [7]. The Dallas Cowboys lead at 15.5 billion dollars [7]. The least valuable club, Cincinnati, is worth 7.4 billion dollars [7]. Only six sports franchises anywhere outside the NFL are worth more than that [7].

The other end of the same market

On 30 August, every NFL club has to cut its roster to 53 players [8]. That deadline is the reason American sport spends August publishing lists of who will be released [8].

Those lists are unsentimental. The Athletic’s Bills projection walks through position by position and marks players “Cut” [9]. Green Bay’s projection names three tight ends released outright [10]. It then asks whether the club can sneak two receivers through to the practice squad [10]. That is a small reserve group which trains with the team on far lower pay.

The same week, the Cleveland Cavaliers traded Dennis Schroder and cash to the Charlotte Hornets for Tre Mann [11]. Cleveland sent money along with the player to get the salary off its books and stay under a spending threshold called the second apron [11]. Charlotte would be Schroder’s twelfth franchise in a career approaching 14 years [12].

Indiana waived guard Ethan Thompson on 14 August to open a two-way contract slot, a hybrid deal that splits a season between the NBA and its feeder league [13]. Thompson signed a two-year deal with KK Partizan in Europe instead [13].

Even abundance reads the same way. Chicago’s Cubs, 20 games above .500, are dealing with what their manager Craig Counsell called a good problem: too many healthy pitchers and not enough places to put them [14]. “It’s certainly better than the alternative,” Counsell said [14].

What clubs actually pay for

The prices at the margins are small and specific. Dallas signed the veteran pass rusher Von Miller on a reported one-year deal worth 5.5 million dollars [15]. That is less than a thousandth of the club’s estimated value [7].

Sunderland are promoted and in Europe for the first time in 53 years. They agreed 25.6 million pounds for the 20-year-old Toulouse left-back Dayann Methalie, 23.9 million up front and 1.7 million in add-ons [16]. Before that, their only completed signing of the window was the Belgium right-back Thomas Meunier, on a free transfer [16].

Free transfers are the ordinary currency further down. The BBC’s League One previews list club after club whose main summer business was a player arriving on a free [20].

Who pays for the shirt

Premier League clubs voted to ban gambling companies from the front of their shirts, closing a door that opened 20 years ago [17]. For the past two seasons, 11 of the 20 clubs carried betting branding [17]. Eight needed a new sponsor this summer, and Nottingham Forest, Sunderland and Chelsea have not found one [17].

Finance firms now sponsor five clubs and technology firms four [17]. Kieran Maguire, professor of football finance at the University of Liverpool, put the scale of the change plainly [17]. Premier League commercial revenue has risen by nearly 4,000 per cent, from 58 million pounds to 2.4 billion pounds in 2024-25 [17].

The money is not spread evenly. Maguire estimates Manchester United’s shirt deal with Snapdragon at about 60 million pounds a year [17]. A newly promoted club, he said, may struggle to get more than 5 or 6 million [17].

The leagues that cannot keep up

The National Women’s Soccer League shows the squeeze in fast-forward. Angel City and San Diego Wave paid roughly 2 to 5 million dollars to join a few years ago [18]. Bay FC paid 53 million dollars in 2024, Denver 110 million in early 2025, Atlanta 165 million later that year, and Columbus a record 205 million in May [18].

Racing Louisville, an existing club, is now seeking outside investment, and relocation is not off the table [18]. A league can price its own founding members out.

The under-covered story: the television money has stopped moving

For all the record sale prices, the biggest revenue line in American sport is currently frozen. Roger Goodell wanted to rewrite the NFL’s media contracts before this season [19]. Fox’s Lachlan Murdoch told investors his company would make no amendments to a deal that runs through the 2029 season [19].

That is not weakness on either side. Fox pays 2.3 billion dollars a year, the NFL’s second-priciest contract, and NFL games generate over 1.3 billion dollars of Fox’s annual advertising revenue [19]. Both sides are simply waiting for the opt-out clause after 2029-30 [19].

Buyers are paying today’s record prices against a media renewal that has not happened yet.

And the football starts on Friday

Arsenal, champions in May after a 22-year wait, beat Manchester City in the Community Shield [21]. Martin Odegaard made it 3-0 [21]. The Premier League season opens on Friday with Arsenal against Coventry City [22].