Michael Jordan to sell Charlotte Hornets NBA team

Michael Jordan has agreed to sell his majority stake in the NBA’s Charlotte Hornets, the basketball team announced.

Details of the deal have not been disclosed, but ESPN report the Hornets are worth an estimated $3bn (£2bn).

When the sale concludes, it will bring an end to Jordan’s 13-year run as the Hornets’ majority owner.

Jordan, who is currently the only black majority team owner in the NBA, will keep a minority stake after the sale to a group of investors.

The group is led by financiers Gabe Plotkin, a current minority owner, and Rick Schnall, a minority owner of the Atlanta Hawks.

It has been announced, however, that Mr Schnall will sell his ownership in the Hawks.

The investor group also includes North Carolina rapper Jermaine Cole, known as J. Cole, and country music singer Eric Church.

Jordan is a six-time NBA champion and five-time MVP and is widely celebrated as the greatest player in NBA history.

Having paid $275m for a majority stake in the Charlotte Hornets in 2010, he is also the league’s only black majority owner.

Previously, he was a minority owner with the Washington Wizards basketball team.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has spoken of the need for more diversity in the NBA’s highest ranks, where owners are overwhelmingly white men.

In a press conference earlier in June, Mr Silver hinted at the possibility of Jordan joining the NBA’s governing board, according to CBS, the BBC’s US media partner.

Of the four major US sports leagues, there are few owners who are not white: Kim Pegula, an Asian woman and a principle owner of the NFL’s Buffalo Bills; Shad Khan, from Pakistan, owner of the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Arte Moreno, a Mexican American, owns the MLB Los Angeles Angels; and Sheila Johnson, an African American woman who is part-owner of the NHL’s Washington Capitals and NBA’s Washington Wizards.

Source: bbc