The Bhathal family already owns two professional sports teams in Portland... and they didn’t outright deny interest in owning a third.
Bill Oram of The Oregonian reports that he asked RAJ Sports - the company led by siblings Lisa Bhathal Merage and Alex Bhathal which owns both the Portland Thorns and Portland’s unnamed WNBA franchise - about their interest in making a bid for the recently-for-sale Portland Trail Blazers franchise. Oram got this in response:
RAJ Sports is aware of the recent developments regarding the Portland Trail Blazers. As a company, we regularly evaluate strategic opportunities across the sports and real estate landscape, and we approach all such considerations with diligence and discretion. At this time, we have nothing further to share.
As the great decapodian sage Zoidberg once said: I’m not hearing a no.
To be clear, a PR statement from a capital investment firm about a potential capital investment does not a new Blazers owner make. However, it would have been easy to say “no comment” or “we are not interested at this time,” and that’s not what their statement said.
The Bhathals’ father, Raj Bhathal, owns a stake in the Sacramento Kings. Oram writes:
Swimwear company founder Raj Bhathal, Lisa and Alex’s father, was part of Vivek Ranadive’s group that bought a majority stake in the Sacramento Kings in 2013 for $348 million. Whatever the Bhathals’ contribution was to that sum it has multiplied nearly tenfold in the years since. Clearly, the family could not have ownership stakes in two NBA teams. But an NBA source with knowledge of the intricacies of ownership matters said there is a process by which the Bhathals could pursue a majority stake in one team while simultaneously unloading a minority stake in another.
The Bhathals, while obscenely wealthy, may not be obscenely wealthy enough to buy an NBA team by themselves. But Oram speculates on who may be able to help them in financial partnership:
No member of the Bhathal family appears on Forbes’ list of billionaires. Nor does Bhathal Merage’s husband, investment capitalist Richard Merage, whose family founded the company that created Hot Pockets. That company was sold to Nestle in 2002 for $2.6 billion. Hot Pockets beget deep pockets. Still, there is a tremendous gap between incredible wealth and NBA ownership wealth. It would likely take partners. Remember, the Bhathals already have a relationship with Columbia Sportswear CEO Tim Boyle, who joined the Thorns as an investor last year. I’m fully into speculation mode now, but Boyle would certainly add some financial heft and credibility to an ownership group.
While there is no timetable on the sale of the Blazers, the statement from the Paul Allen estate suggested a sale is “estimated to continue into the 2025-26 basketball season.”