It seems that David Rubenstein has written another book. That prompts a basic question - where did he find the time?
It takes a few pages of "Inside the Owner's Box" to list Rubenstein's accomplishments. At the top of the list, at least in terms of impact, is that he is the cofounder and co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, one of the world's biggest investment firms. It is said that the organization manages something like $477 billion in assets, which would seem to be a big task.
From there, Rubenstein works on the boards of several organizations, and is a member of many more. He has made many philanthropic gifts to help maintain some national treasures, such as the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial, the Library of Congress, and Mount Vernon. He hosts some television shows that run on Bloomberg and C-SPAN, and has written five other books. That's not everything, but you get the idea.
That is probably enough responsibility for anyone, but he added to his list of responsibilities a few years ago when he became the chairman and CEO of the Baltimore Orioles' baseball team. You'd think he was working on a clock that has 29 hours in a day.
Somehow he now has squeezed in the time to write another book, although "Inside the Owner's Box" sounds like a relatively easy project as these things go.
Rubenstein starts out by reviewing the process that led him to taking over the Orioles. The team was about to come on the market, and Rubenstein thought he had a chance of making a purchase work. He had some connections to the Baltimore area, and he certainly had the financial means to make an impact. It took some time, but Rubenstein thought he could help the community by purchasing the team. Such actions are complicated, but eventually everything worked out and the sale was completed. From there, the book moves on to what day-to-day life for a pro sports owner is like.
Rubenstein quickly discovered that he'd have to be a relatively active participant in the team's fortunes, even though he had virtually nothing to do with the on-field product. He also found out that the procedures he followed in the business world, designed to minimize risk in many cases, didn't apply to a baseball team. A lot of work can go down the drain because of a bad hop on a grounder or a fluke injury to a player.
With that somewhat covered, Rubenstein switches to the meat of the book - interviews with his peers. Owning a major league team no doubt helps get calls returned from other pro sports owners, and the author talks to 14 people who control teams. You'll recognize some of the names - Jim Crane of the Houston Astros, Robert Kraft of the New England Patriots, Ted Leonsis of the Washington Capitals and Wizards, Jeff Lurie of the Philadelphia Eagles, and Tom Ricketts of the Chicago Cubs. The one sort-of-exception is Rick Hendrick of Hendrick Motorsports, which has four different groups of employees working on NASCAR entries.
How does this all work? Moderately well. For starters, the stories are rather similar. Most of the people interviewed had some interest in sports growing up, but weren't good enough to play the game at a high level. They learned to do other things well, which turned their lives into spectacular financial success stories. I wish I could explain what some of those activities were, but they deal with high finance and aren't easy to boil down to a simple level - especially for a review without an MBA. All of them say that they enjoy the chance at trying to unite a community through sports, and the rewards are great. They also point out that while there's money to be made in pro sports, it comes at the back end when the sale of a franchise is made (values keep going up and up) and not along the way. That takes a different mindset for a businessman to have.
Rubenstein stays away from anything resembling tough questions. We don't hear about the Astros' cheating scandal, or Kraft's personal problems. Therefore, we get the point rather quickly - even though the book goes by quite fast. If there's one happy conclusion to be reached, it's that the cross-section of owners interviewed really seem to care about what's happening to the franchise and the surrounding neighborhood, and aren't in the business just to cash out at the end as values continue to rise.
"Inside the Owner's Box" couldn't have taken long to compile, since it's mostly transcripts of interviews Rubenstein has done in recent years. In other words, this is rather harmless material. There are a few good stories from the subjects, and it might fulfill some curiosity about the responsibilities and demands of owners in today's sports world. Just don't expect much more than that.
Three stars
Learn more about this book from Amazon.com. (As an Amazon affiliate, I earn money from qualifying purchases.)
Be notified of new posts on this site via X.com @WDX2BB.
No comments:
Post a Comment