There's news on the "for sale" front for the St. Louis Rams. The Post-Dispatch is reporting that three serious bidders have emerged, and the current owners, Chip Rosenbloom and his sister Lucia Rodriguez, will make a decision to sell their share, 60 percent, of the team or hang on to it before the draft in April, probably. There's nothing hard and fast about the deadline; it's mostly about letting the team get on with life and out of for sale purgatory.
The only known bidder is St. Louis Blues owner Dave Checketts' group. Checketts has a stated desire to keep the team in St. Louis, something that will factor heavily into selecting a buyer. One of the bids, the article says, is for the full 100 percent ownership stake. That puts Stan Kroenke in play, who owns 40 percent of the team. Kroenke has to give the nod before a sale can be completed, and that could happen as soon as this week when the Rams leadership meets for their annual state of the team pow wow.
At one point in time, I thought for sure that Kroenke would be a buyer, but now I'm wondering if won't be looking to sell all or part of his share of the team. Why? In addition to his stake in the Rams and the NBA and NHL franchises he owns in Denver, Kroenke also owns part of a little professional soccer (football) team called Arsenal, part of the English Premier League and the third most valuable sports franchise in the world. There's talk that Kroenke wants to buy a controlling interest in Arsenal, for which he'd surely have to sell some of his U.S. owned teams to complete.
Who knows who will buy the Rams, if they end up being sold. What I do know is that it won't matter who owns the team if they don't start winning games and becoming a more profitable franchise. Fortunately, we seem to be headed in that direction thanks to the overhaul of the front office and coaching staff by Chip Rosenbloom. This offseason was already a crucial one for the next stage of the team, and with the ownership situation hanging overhead the offseason stakes just got a lot higher.