Oh come on: this isn't about the how the team operates, it's about extra-Sox activities.
It’s absolutely about how the team operates.
It’s different in the NFL, where they have a pooled-revenue model. It might even be different with the salary cap dynamics in the NBA or the NHL. In MLB, however, resources generated by success on the business side directly contribute to on-field success. Having a team that is a well-run business therefore is, or ought to be, of concern to fans with a serious interest in the game. (It is obviously fine just to enjoy watching, cheering and chatting at the water cooler. That’s not a bad description of how I enjoy hockey.)
The Red Sox illustrate this. In my lifetime, they have been owned by a family who bought in decades before professional sports became big business, by a trust, and by a group of entrepreneurs. The third owner has obviously enjoyed far more on-field success than the first two combined. I do not believe for a second that that’s a coincidence. The introduction of true entrepreneurism might be the single biggest factor in the franchise’s reversal of fortunes. (Does an old-school owner or a staid trustee put Theo Epstein in charge of the baseball operation?)
In the modern age, anyone wealthy enough to buy a pro sports team is going to have outside business interests. If it’s important to you that the owner of the local team makes his real money running a private-equity fund or a box factory or whatever rather than other professional sports ventures, that’s your prerogative. Personally, I’ll take the one who does the best job running the team and isn’t otherwise an embarrassment.
