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Brady HendersonESPN
SEATTLE — Jody Allen, the de facto owner of the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers, said in a statement Tuesday that the teams are not currently for sale but eventually will be.
Allen’s statement comes on the heels of last month’s report from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski that Nike founder Phil Knight and Los Angeles Dodgers part-owner Alan Smolinsky made an unsolicited offer of more than $2 billion to buy the Blazers. Jody Allen has been the trustee of the Paul G. Allen Trust since her brother, the Microsoft co-founder, died in 2018.
“As chair of both the Portland Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks, my long-term focus is building championship teams that our communities are proud of,” Allen’s statement read. “Like my brother Paul, I trust and expect our leaders and coaches to build winning teams that deliver results on and off the court and field.
“As we’ve stated before, neither of the teams is for sale and there are no sales discussions happening.
“A time will come when that changes given Paul’s plans to dedicate the vast majority of his wealth to philanthropy, but estates of this size and complexity can take 10 to 20 years to wind down. There is no pre-ordained timeline by which the teams must be sold.
“Until then, my focus — and that of our teams — is on winning.”
In a statement last month, a Blazers spokesperson confirmed the offer by Knight and stated the team “remains not for sale.” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said last month of the possibility of Allen selling the Seahawks, “She’s never entertained that thought at all. I haven’t heard her say that at all.”
But Allen’s statement marks the first official acknowledgment that the Seahawks are not for sale while making it clear that the trust plans to eventually sell both teams in accordance with Paul Allen’s wishes.
A clause in Paul Allen’s agreement to purchase the Seahawks in 1997 could make it unlikely that the team is sold within the next 22 months. According to the Sports Business Journal, a sale before May 2024 would entitle the state of Washington to 10% of the gross proceeds.
Last summer, Forbes ranked the Seahawks as the NFL’s 12th most valuable franchise at an estimated $3.5 billion. The Denver Broncos have since reached an agreement to be sold for $4.65 billion. The Broncos were 10th on Forbes’ 2021 list at an estimated $3.75 billion.