An investment group led by former Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has purchased a minority stake in the Athletics, betting big on the franchise’s upcoming relocation to Las Vegas. The deal was announced Thursday by Harbinger Sports Group, an Atlanta-based firm that Cuban serves as general partner and president alongside founder and chief investment officer Rashaun Williams, who also holds a minority ownership position with the Atlanta Falcons. The financial terms were not disclosed, and the exact percentage of the team acquired remains unclear.
Cuban, who still maintains a minority interest in the Mavericks after selling his controlling stake to the Adelson family in late 2023, framed the investment in straightforward terms. “We are minority investors looking to make our investors a lot of money,” he said. The group has raised more than $460 million in less than six months, according to its news release, and the Athletics purchase represents Harbinger’s first official investment as part of what it described as a broader long-term strategy centered on the Las Vegas sports market.
A’s majority owner John Fisher is currently overseeing construction of a $2 billion domed stadium on the Las Vegas Strip that will seat roughly 33,000 fans and is expected to open in time for the 2028 season. The team praised the new investors in a statement, noting that their collective experience across sports, media, and entertainment makes them a valuable addition as the franchise works to establish itself permanently in Southern Nevada after years of uncertainty following its departure from Oakland.
Harbinger pointed to the dramatic rise in valuations of Las Vegas’ other major professional franchises — the NFL’s Raiders, who relocated from Oakland in 2020, and the NHL’s Golden Knights, who began play as an expansion team in 2017 — as evidence that the city has fundamentally altered the economics of professional sports. Williams called Las Vegas one of the greatest sports investment opportunities of this generation and suggested the next decade of sports ownership will look dramatically different from the last, with his firm positioning itself at the center of that transformation.