Phil practicing his pitching form
San Diego native and resident Phil Mickelson has teamed up with one of the five groups trying to buy the Padres from John Moores, the majority owner for the last 18 years, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune:
The second-leading money-winner in professional golf history has joined four of the grandchildren of former Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley and provided the out-of-town partnership with an iconic local investor.
Three years after resisting the ownership overtures of Jeff Moorad, Mickelson says he’s now ready to take a stake in San Diego’s major-league baseball franchise.
“I’ve had the opportunity to invest in other sports franchises, and I’ve turned it down in the past,” Mickelson said Monday morning. “This was a unique opportunity with families that had done this before and know how to do it right and want to get involved in the community.”
Phil, an avid sports fan who enjoys the friendly high stakes bet, is known for his altruistic propensity for giving back to his community and those less fortunate with his myriad of charities — never looking for recognition or benefiting from tax breaks but simply to provide the less fortunate with opportunities that may not have otherwise been available to them.
He can certainly afford to buy a stake in the Padres. It’s estimated he’s earned more than $61 million in each of the past two years.
“I feel it’s a great financial opportunity, yes,” Mickelson said of the Padres. “But what excites me is the financial opportunity and the opportunity to get the community more involved with the Padres. . .
“Growing up, the Padres were my team and still are. I always had a love for the team. But (recently) I just felt disassociated with the organization a little bit as a fan. I just know I didn’t identify with the players or have an emotional connection. Where I want to get involved is I want to get a personal involvement with the players and the community — personal interaction with fans, more community outreach. I want to create an emotional tie with the players and the community.”
That’s Phil for you — giving back and seeking to enrich the lives of other professional athletes.
(Photo by Darren Carroll/Getty Images)
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Ouch the snark is strong in this post…
He’s not going to try and pitch again is he?
Not sure where to start on this sarcastic collection of slams and put downs, I’m sure he deserves it for doing something that from all information (look at the comments section of the stories coming from SD btw, but I’m sure some posters here are from the area and can chime in) appears to be greeted with joy by the community. But here is what we have so far:
- You are accusing him of performing his charitable works for the purposes of self aggrandizement and tax deductions instead of a purity of charity ? But reading Shipnuck’s story, it seems one of his main points was the quiet way in which Phil goes about this stuff. But hey, that’s just his opinion, not yours right ?
- A tax deduction ? really ? Here is how athletes get a nice tax deduction: They create foundations, and then put all sorts of family members on the payroll, as well a incurring operating costs in excess of the actual contributions made to charity. NBA’ers are notorious for this, but my guess is that it is prevalent. But Shipnuck’s story indicates that in fact Phil actually donates the cash to charitable endeavors. It also says that he does not accept outside contributions for his foundation, so he isn’t out there having celeb golf events or concerts (Tiger Jam?) to raise cash from average joes of the world. A little Tax/accounting note for you: If you donate $1 to charity, you only get a % as a deduction, at the end, you are still out more than half of that donation.
- Somehow high stakes wagering is thrown in there as a proclivity of Phil’s. Do you have actual examples of that? How recent is that activity? Because that might DQ him in the eyes of MLB if true. Or are you alluding to 10 year old rumors? Would you care to expose those as true along with proofs?
- Since it doesn’t seem that you understand the player-owner relationship in team sports, I can assure you that the owner’s goal is not to “enrich the lives of other professional athletes”. Their goal is to pay the players as little as possible (relatively, the average Major league salary is over 3.0 million), as numerous labor disputes in MLB have indicated. However what it seems that Phil is focusing on is not what the players get, but what they give to the community and that they are more tied in with the local area. In this free agent era in MLB and other sports, that is difficult to achieve. Apparently, the current SD regime is particularly poor in this regard, which is creating an area for improvement.
So thanks for filling a pretty innocuous story with sarcastic jabs and innuendo.
Phil has always been (and still is) notorious for his gambling. See his regular Tuesday game. Most of the guys on tour are very into it. MLB doesn’t care as long as you’re not betting on sports.
San Diego natives are happy at the idea of ANYONE else owning the team. Many also want Gwynn involved and he’s thrown in his lot with another bidder.
Even if Phil’s group wins the bid, he won’t be the majority owner, or have any say beyond what the majority owner gives him. Essentially he’d be a shareholder.
Also not sure why you think not asking for donations to a foundation is a good thing (not bad either just neutral)? Most of us average joe’s donate to charities.
Asking for donations/raising funds is good if those funds are used for the purpose of the Charity, not to pay organizational costs or salaries for family members. If Stephanie is referring to his on course golf betting with other PGA pros, how is that relevant to potentially being a shareholder with the Padres ? Not at all. She might as well have said “who enjoys big fat burgers from 5 guys”. But she wanted to slam him, and she did.
All charities have some infrastructure costs. That still doesn’t explain why asking others for donation makes the foundation bad
Good: A charity with reasonable overhead and high % to the “mission”.
Bad: A charity with high overheads, inflated costs, especially when the “costs” are back door payments to friends and family of the person establishing the charity. This I would say is doubly bad when soliciting outside contributions that have no knowledge of how much of their money goes to charity.
Bad: Charities established by millionaires and billionaires asking regular Joe Schmoe’s to donate money to help their pet causes. That’s what you are getting at.
Here’s what I get from this story: ” I don’t like Phil. I don’t like Phil. I don’t like Phil. Here’s a rumor about Phil. Here’s a snarky backhanded compliment. Here’s some more innuendo. I don’t like Phil. I don’t like Phil. Another backhanded compliment. I don’t like Phil…. Oh yeah, Phil might do what countless other athletes and celebrities have done and become a minority owner in a sports team he loves. I don’t like Phil ” That pretty much sums it up, right?