NBA Approves Joshua Harris’ Purchase Of Philadelphia 76ers

It’s hard to think of better news for Sixers fans given that discussing the team and NBA lockout were off limits because of the ongoing labor negotiations. Chief executive officer Adam Aron had the details about the new ticket prices, via CSN Philly:

“I’m announcing today that going forward, we are slashing – and I mean slashing – ticket prices on individual game tickets on just under 9,000 seats at the Wells Fargo Center for each and every Sixers home game,” Aron said. “Indeed on thousands of seats each night, our ticket prices will be cut by 50 percent or more. This is not a sale or a promotion. These are our new ticket prices.”

To be clear, these cuts are for individual tickets, not season tickets. Aron said tickets in the lower bowl of the arena will go for as low as $29 – last season the cheapest lower bowl ticket was $54. That’s a 46 percent decrease. What’s more, a center court ticket in the eighth row of the mezzanine bowl will cost $20, down from $45 last season – a 56 percent cut.The Sixers ranked 25th in the NBA in home attendance last season. But lower ticket prices could do as much to boost attendance as quality basketball for a promising young team that snuck into the playoffs last season under the direction of first-year head coach Doug Collins.

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2. Will Smith, Philadelphia 76ers. (Incidentally, DJ Jazzy Jeff attends Sixers games when he’s in town.)

Harris has remained out of the public eye up until now, though a press conference is expected soon. Harris’ group has said it will remain tenants of the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia (owned by Comcast-Spectator) and will remain a partner of Comcast Sports Philly, its local broadcaster.

Kate Fagan of the Philadelphia Inquirer reports that Comcast bought the team for $130 million in 1996. Adjusting for inflation, Comcast earned a 57 percent return on that initial investment. However, the team has reportedly been one of the franchises losing money in recent years.

For more on the Sixers, visit Liberty Ballers and SB Nation Philly.

According to the Inquirer’s Kate Fagan, a 90 percent share of the the team was sold to Harris and company for $280 million, a bit less than they’d been valued by Forbes. Comcast-Spectacor and Ed Harris, the team’s previous majority owners, will hang on to a 10 percent slice.

In a statement, Harris had this to say:

The price of the sale remains unclear, according to Berger. Comcast will retain ownership over the Philadelphia Flyers and the Wells Fargo Center.

The 76ers were put up for sale in early June, and Harris immediately emerged as the potential buyer. He is worth over $1.5 billion. The Comcast Spectator group had owned the 76ers since 1996, having purchased the team from Harold Katz then.

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Sources indicate that Levien actually advised against picking Rubio due to contract issues in Spain, and sources also say that the Maloofs (who own the Kings) OKed the Rubio workout. Regardless, Petrie pushed a front office reorganization that involved promoting longtime assistant GM Wayne Cooper over Levien, and elevating scout Mike Petrie -- the GM’s son -- to assistant GM. Months later, when the business and marketing side of the Kings underwent a shift, Levien saw a senior VP added to his title, reportedly making Petrie smolder.

“I can confirm that we are in discussions about the future of the team, but these discussions are confidential and we cannot talk about the details. At some point, we may have something more to say about these discussions, but we will not be making any comments at this point.”

For more on the Sixers, visit Liberty Ballers and SB Nation Philly.

Henry Abbott broke the news first at ESPN.com. According to Abbott, the prospective buyer is a group led by a man named Joshua Harris, a 46 year-old New York-based business man said to be worth around $1.5 billion. For now, the price of the sale is still unknown.

The 76ers have belonged to Comcast Spectator, the same group that owns the Flyers and the arena that houses both teams, the Wells Fargo Center, for the past 15 years. Ed Snider has been the face of that ownership group throughout that span, and nothing suggested any of that would be changing. Until today, that is.