“I coulda been a contender.” – Marlon Brando in “On The Waterfront”
Don’t blame me. I tried to buy a sizable chunk of the Rockies’ ownership 12 years ago.
This story hasn’t been revealed before, but it’s apropos now, and the statute of limitations has run out.
Charlie Monfort and I were talking at a restaurant in LoDo in 1995 – I liked him then and still like him, although Charlie doesn’t care much for me anymore – when he whined that owning a Major League Baseball franchise was not an exceptionally sound financial investment.
I asked Charlie how much money he had tied up in the Rockies. “The most of anyone – $22.5 million.”
I said: “I will show up at your office tomorrow morning with a check for $45 million. Doubling your money should be a good return.”
Of course, I didn’t have $45. But if he accepted, I would call two wealthy businessmen in Denver who did have more than enough cash and find out if they would purchase the Monforts’ share or, better yet, give me a loan (with my pretty face as collateral). The Rockies had a new ballpark and a bright future, and I knew as much about owning a professional sports franchise as Charlie Monfort.
“No,” Monfort said. “I want to own the controlling interest, win the World Series and someday leave the franchise to my children.”
“OK,” I said. “But don’t hand me that ‘bad investment’ line ever again.”
Charlie Monfort had a major role in bailing out the Rockies. He was an original investor when practically nobody else in Colorado was willing to ante up for a potential expansion franchise. As the Drugstore Cowboys from Ohio got into serious legal and monetary trouble, and as Oren Benton filed bankruptcy, and as Jerry McMorris, the real Father of the Rockies, experienced financial problems – his national trucking company went broke – Charlie, joined by his brother Dick Monfort, secured additional ownership interest.
There are no public disclosures about the ownership percentages, but it is known that the limited partners include: Molson Coors Brewing Co. (which also has park naming rights), Fox Sports Rocky Mountain, the Denver Newspaper Agency, and four other individuals or companies. All of the above add up to less than 50 percent of the ownership.
After forcing out McMorris as CEO and buying out his remaining shares in 2005, the Monforts are majority owners and control the general partnership. Charlie is the chairman and CEO, Dick the vice chairman. In 1998 McMorris was quoted as saying he and Charlie Monfort owned 85 percent of the general partnership.
Last month Forbes Magazine stated that the value of the Rockies is $317 million, up 6 percent from the previous year. The Rox were ranked 22nd among 30 teams, with the two Florida franchises, Tampa Bay ($267 million) and the Florida Marlins ($244), at the bottom.
Forbes claims the Rockies, in 2006, had $28 million in debt, $151 million in revenue and $23.9 million in operating income (earnings before taxes). The figures could be wrong, as the ownership would assert if it were willing to speak on the matter, but they could be close. The Rockies’ 2007 payroll is about $55 million.
It should be noted that Coors Brewing, in a financial statement filed in 2004, reported that owners received no income or cash distributions in 2001, 2002 and 2003, and that the company signed a $2.1 million promissory note to the Rockies in July 2003, to be repaid in 20 years. The franchise, according to the statement, did not show a profit in those three seasons.
If the $317 million figure is to be believed, the franchise has more than tripled in value from the expansion fee of $95 million.
Based on all the information, the Monforts have done very well financially. I wish Charlie would have sold his shares to me.
I wouldn’t have traded Dante Bichette and Vinny Castilla; I wouldn’t have let Andres Galarraga go; I would have signed A-Rod and not Mike Hampton; I surely wouldn’t have hired Dan O’Dowd and Clint Hurdle (and I wouldn’t have had to extend their contracts); I wouldn’t have guaranteed a six-year plan; and I wouldn’t have traded for all those slugs on past and current teams. I would have lowered ticket prices, and I would have listened to fans’ complaints.
And I would have gotten the Rockies to at least one World Series.
If not, I would have fired myself and sold the team.
Staff writer Woody Paige can be reached at 303-954-1095 or wpaige@denverpost.com.
