The NBA no longer has any Black owners in the league. Media Take Out learned that yesterday – the birthday of legendary hip hop artist and activist Tupac Shakur, Michael Jordan officially sold his majority ownership in the Charlotte Hornets to a group of men – none of whom are Black.
When Michael first purchased the Charlotte Hornets in 2010, one of the main reasons he was granted to franchise, was to have Black ownership in the league, Media Take Out learned.
According to reports, Michael Jordan finalized a deal to sell the majority share of the Charlotte Hornets, the franchise announced Friday, leaving the 30-team NBA without any Black majority ownership.
Jordan is selling to a group led by Gabe Plotkin and Rick Schnall, the Hornets said. Plotkin has been a minority stakeholder in the Hornets since 2019. Schnall has been a minority owner of the Atlanta Hawks since 2015 and is in the process of selling his investment in that team.
It’s not clear how long the process of selling will take to be finalized by the NBA’s Board of Governors. Jordan plans to keep a minority stake in the Hornets, the team he bought in 2010 for about $275 million from Bob Johnson, an African American businessman.
Jordan’s decision to sell ends his 13-year run overseeing the organization, and the 20th year where the NBA had at least one Black owner.
“In the same way that it’s wonderful that one of our greatest, Michael Jordan, could become the principal governor of a team, he has the absolute right to sell at the same time,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this month at the NBA Finals. “Values have gone up a lot since he bought that team, so that is his decision.”
In that same news conference at the Finals, Silver said the Board of Governors are focused on diversity in ownership groups.
“I would love to have better representation in terms of principal governors,” Silver said. “It’s a marketplace. It’s something that if we were expanding that the league would be in a position to focus directly on that, but in individual team transactions, the market takes us where we are.”
