{"id":328514,"date":"2025-12-03T19:01:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T19:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/328514\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T19:01:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T19:01:13","slug":"new-celtics-owner-almost-didnt-win-bid-to-buy-team-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/328514\/","title":{"rendered":"New Celtics owner almost didn\u2019t win bid to buy team (report)"},"content":{"rendered":"

When news broke Bill Chisholm<\/a> was set to buy the Celtics for a then-record $6.1 billion, it thrust him into the spotlight<\/a>. But it turns out, he almost didn\u2019t end up landing his childhood team.<\/p>\n

Per The Athletic\u2019s Mike Vorkunov<\/a>, four ownership groups placed bids for the Celtics \u201cwith the clear instructions that all that mattered was the highest number.\u201d Chisholm\u2019s $6.1 billion price tag won in the end, but it only outbid second place by less than $100 million in the blind auction, per Vorkunov.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unlike any other investment or anything really,\u201d Chisholm told Vorkunov. \u201cTruly once in a lifetime thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chisholm was one of four finalists<\/a> along with former Celtics co-owner Stephen Pagliuca, Phillies minority owner Stan Middleman and the Friedkin Group. All the finalists got to meet with key Celtics leadership, including Brad Stevens, team president Rich Gotham and head coach Joe Mazzulla.<\/p>\n

Chisholm\u2019s $6.1 billion offer was just higher than the second-place bidder, believed to be Middleman, who was at more than $6 billion. Pagliuca, who was considered a favorite during the process, offered $5.5 billion for the Celtics, per Vorkunov.<\/p>\n

News broke that Chisholm was the new Celtics owner back in March. The NBA Board of Governors approved the sale in August to Chisholm\u2019s ownership group. Former governor Wyc Grousbeck is also part of the group and has been at Celtics games throughout the season.<\/p>\n

Chisholm has also been at numerous games at TD Garden this year, sitting courtside near the C\u2019s bench. He\u2019s a Georgetown native and grew up at a Celtics fan, so he said there was a thrill to purchasing his favorite team.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe adrenaline rush almost knocked me out,\u201d Chisholm said. \u201cI don\u2019t even like to think of if I hadn\u2019t won.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When news broke Bill Chisholm was set to buy the Celtics for a then-record $6.1 billion, it thrust…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328515,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-328514","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-nba","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328514"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328514\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}