Alibaba co-founder purchases full Nets ownership for record 2.35B

The Brooklyn Nets are going to be under new ownership once again as founder of the site Alibaba Joseph Tsai  is poised to purchase the team.

The inkling by Tsai to purchase the team is  not anything new, Tsai purchased a 49-percent share of the Nets from current owner Mikhail Prokhorov to the tune of $1 billion in 2017.

Now, with Tsai looking to purchase the remaining 51-percent of the team for $1.3 billion, the total price Tsai will have paid for the Nets will be a whopping $2.3 billion.

If this deal ends up going through the $2.3 billion will be the most ever paid for an American professional sports team.

This historic figure comes at a time where values for professional sporting teams are skyrocketing. Eight teams in the NBA are valued at over $1 billion.

Earlier this summer, Forbes valued the Nets at $2.3 billion, which makes them the sixth-most valuable team in the National Basketball Association.

According to the stipulations of the agreement when Tsai purchased 49-percent stake of the Nets in 2017, he reserved the right to purchase the remaining 51 percent before the 2021-2022 season.

For one reason or another, Tsai had decided to exercise his option two years early and add the Nets to his portfolio.

Tsai is purchasing what should be one of the most interesting teams in basketball over the next handful of years. Coming off a summer that saw the Nets sign the likes of Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, and DeAndre Jordan, in addition to a young core from last season, the Nets look to be a threat in the league for years to come.

Prokhorov purchased the Nets for under $400 million in 2009, and his imminent departure as team owner will be met with a sense of joy from Nets fans everywhere.

Prokhorov’s ten-year ownership stint will not be remembered positively in the annals of NBA history. 

Prokhorov only presided over three winning seasons during his stewardship, and the Nets had the third-worst record in the league over the past decade at 300-504.

Also, the Nets only were only able to win one playoff series under Prokhorov, which was in 2014 when they upended the Raptors in seven.

The Prokhorov tenure was rife with dysfunction from the sidelines all the way up to the front office. With signings of aging veterans like Gerald Wallace, Paul Pierce, and Kevin Garnett in addition to five coaches there are not many positive things to remember from Prokhorov’s time.

With the big news of the Brooklyn Nets being purchased by an individual that is excitied to do so, Nets fans hope to see the dysfunction of the last decade washed away as they ride the coattails of their dynamic duo of Durant and Irving to NBA supremacy for years to come.