Breaking News: AOL Dumps McDavid and more

[coachx]

Just read it on AJC.com. McDavid's rep said the deal was supposed to be closed today and a news conference tommorrow but said AOL unexpectedly nixed the deal at the last second.

Coud be the finger pointing game. Interesting to see AOL's response in Tuesday's paper.

Also insidehoops.com is reporting David Aldrige spoke with Billy Knight by phone while in Sweden scouting and asked about the JT situation. Knight told Aldrige that the Hawks would indeed match the Jazz offer sheet to retain JT.

Finally some good news . Can the front office now do their job and field a 12 man team ?

[Guest]

It's a lose/lose situation.

On one hand.... McDavid doesn't have the money..... On the

other hand AOL is cheap. IT really doesn't matter either

way.

[dj_me]

What a waste of an off-season!

[flava]

[Guest]

Chalk another one up for Diesel.

This was a wasted offseason. Why wait til now and

cancel the deal? Why not do it earlier in the summer?

[Lascar78]

http://www.ajc.com/sports/content/sports/0...15teamsale.html

AOL Time Warner has decided not to sell the Hawks, Thrashers and Philips Arena operating rights to Texas businessman David McDavid, according to Stephen Dieb, McDavid's business partner.

''We are shocked,'' Dieb said from Dallas, adding that a Turner Broadcasting executive informed a McDavid representative of the news this morning. ''We were expecting to come in today and close the deal tomorrow. We were led to believe on Friday that there would be a press conference announcing our deal on Tuesday.

''Until this morning, we thought it was done,'' Dieb said.

Dieb said Turner executive Jim McCaffrey informed sports agent Lonnie Cooper, who has been representing McDavid, at a 7:30 a.m. meeting that the company had decided to ''go in a diffferent direction'' with the sale of the teams. Dieb said McDavid's group took that to mean AOL plans to sell the teams to someone else.

McDavid signed a letter of intent to buy the teams on April 30 and has been negotiating to complete the deal ever since. A key obstacle was believed to be the 1997 Philips Arena bond deal in which Turner Broadcasting put up the Hawks franchise as collateral.

Turner Broadcasting officials were unavailable for comment this morning.

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unbelievable. obviously mcdavid had the money as they thought the deal was already done. why aol would waste all this time only to back out once it's done is beyond me. well I guess we're stuck with the AOL morons for a while longer. let's just hope a new buyer will come up soon

[Guest]

I feel MJ's presence near by.....

[Diesel]

It's simple. McDavid wanted too much out of the deal. I wouldn't be surprised if he fooled AOL into taking the debt from the Phil and that was what he was planning on closing Friday...

However, AOL is not stupid. They know that they can get better buyers if they can reduce cost.

I wonder how much Terry's contract played in the whole matter?

If Terry is resigned....And if Knight can trade Nazr for ending contract... (Nazr/1st (lottery protected 3 yrs) sounds Sweet).

Then Knight has single handedly, gotten the Hawks out of DEBT to the league and has made them earners over the next three years. That would make Atlanta a possibility for making big profits over the next three.

Also, I wouldn't be surprised if Turner pops up as a new buyer!

He wouldn't have to make a deal with the City.

[drzachary]

Yes, let's hope for MJ.

I'm still not sure where any source says anything about McDavid not having enough cash.

Looks like AOL screwed the pooch on this one.

[Guest]

Yeah right.... Like MJ done alot of good for the Wizards

young players. Say no to glory hog MJ.

[Diesel]

[censored] that Hotlanta....

We need MJ like a baby needs a diaper. We need an owner who will grab the national attention. As long as we got a GM and a Coach, the damage that MJ could do to the team is really low. I think if you take everything into consideration, MJ actually helped the Wiz. Big time. They would just be getting out of debt right now. And they would have never gone to the lottery.

All said. I believe that Turner will be the new owner

[Guest]

Once MJ owns a team it's all about him and not the

team.

Why would Turner want the team? He never took care

of them before.

[emeans]

Now I am mad as H*&^. We have wasted an entire off-season dealing with this mess and now they decide to nix the deal. AOL has screwed this team up big time.

However on the bright side, I personally didn't get a good feeling about ownership going to McDavid. I can't quite put my finger on it but he just didn't seem to be the right person for ownership. Plus I would like to have an exclusive NBA team ownership, not NHL also.

Arthur Blank set a standard and I want someone to come in a set that same standard with the Hawks. Do you really think McDavid was that man???? In my eyes I didn't think so.

So basically what I am saying was we were screwed anyway it went. Darn if you do...darn if you dont.

[JaHawk10]

"All said. I believe that Turner will be the new owner"

Nah I don't like that idea. I really would like to see someone like Magic J buy this franchise. He really could sell the team to the state of GA and would bring a lot of fan interest to the games. No more Ted, please. He only came to a game once every 5 years. I don't want an owner like that...

J

[JaHawk10]

"Arthur Blank set a standard and I want someone to come in a set that same standard with the Hawks. Do you really think McDavid was that man???? In my eyes I didn't think so."

Agree 110% I didn't get a good vibe from McD either. This team needs an owner who'll be fully committed to the team. Not splitting his interests between 2 franchises. We've already been thru that before. I wouldn't mind seeing a local product buy the Hawks. Someone from ATL or at least GA. Never could fully picture the Texas hick, McDavid, all of a sudden becoming the Hawks #1 Fan. Never could...

J

[Inside_Man]

couple thoughts -

AOL is deep in debt. they need a cash buyer, not a loaner.

yeah, an arthur blank type isn't going to buy the hawks because blank is smart enough to know that an nba team is not a good investment now. the players are paid too much and ticket prices are too high, and only a couple teams with superstars have a chance to win it all.

here's the Sunnyside - JT can now save face (though he doesn't need to) He can say that his badmouthing of the Hawks was about the new owner, and he's happy to come back and play for AOL.

[johnnyde]

I was talking to a friend of mine who works in the DC/Maryland area. He says "I just found out that the partners of my company own a significant portion of the atlanta hawks, atlanta thrashers, and phillips arena as of TOMORROW?" I asked if he meant the McDavid group and he said no, that the guys from his company negotiated the past 2 days with AOL and won. Apparently these are guys that he talks too every day also.

[Diesel]

I don't know. I think Turner can spend a portion of his billions, buy the Hawks, Braves, and Phil. Then he would let Kasten run it. I think this was a group that also had a bid in before. However, I think AOL didn't want to be stuck holding Hockey. I think this would be more to Turner's liking because even though the Braves are overspenders, they do make money. This also means that eventually, the Hawks would get no real love.

[CHORO44]

I'm glad the deal fell through as it might pave the way for more basketball only owners.

I wish the Hawks and Warriors would switch locations so I can at least pay to see my team play more than twice a year. At the rate both franchises are going it's pretty equal.

On a side note AOL should have just sold McDavid the Thrashers.

I'd like to see Nique and Jordan buy the Hawks.

[Lascar78]

I agree. Yes, he would temporarily generate alot of interest in atlanta, but he has shown nothing but bad moves as an owner. The wizards were bad when he was an owner and not playing, they'll be bad this year. He drafted kwame who still could be a bust (his contract will be up before we find out), traded rip for stack which was a bad move when you consider their ages. He favors UNC people too much and is too self centered. We could REALLY use a high profile owner, but MJ's not the man for the job.

unfortunately I wouldnt be surprised if he did buy them

anyone think arthur blank is interested? probably not, I don't know how much cash he has