XM MLB Chat: Leo Hindery, Goldman Sachs among familiar names bidding for Mets share

3/20/11, NY Times: "Over the next week to 10 days, five to eight possible bidders for a minority stake in the Mets will take a first step to making an offer by examining the team’s financial records....

The candidates approved by baseball to look at the Mets’ records — three of whom have personal connections to Goldman Sachs, which has deep ties to the Yankees — include:

¶David Heller, the global co-leader of the securities division at Goldman, whose group includes Marc Spilker, a former senior Goldman executive who is now the president of Apollo Global Management, a large private equity fund. Heller’s group was the first to see the Mets’ records.

¶Steven Starker, a co-founder of BTIG, a global trading firm in which Goldman has a minority ownership. His consortium includes Kenny Dichter, a co-founder of Marquis Jets; Doug Ellin, the creator of the HBO show “Entourage”; and Randy Frankel,

a minority owner of the Tampa Bay Rays.

¶James McCann, the founder of 1-800-Flowers.com, which is a Mets sponsor, and Anthony Scaramucci, a former Goldman executive who runs the hedge fund firm SkyBridge Capital.

¶Marc A. Utay, managing partner at Clarion Capital Partners, a private equity firm, and Leo Hindery, the first chief executive of the YES Network, who is a private media investor. From 2008 to ’09, they mounted an unsuccessful bid for the Chicago Cubs. (Goldman is part-owner of YES.) ...

The files, which let possible buyers assess the team’s financial future, include media contracts; luxury suite agreements, like those that will end after this season at Citi Field; season-ticket renewals; and details of the Mets’ loans. Still, with all the information, sports bankers say that a minority stake is not nearly as attractive as selling the entire team and any of its majority ownership

of the cable network SNY.

The team, Citi Field and SNY are laden with debt. Last November, facing a cash crunch, the team borrowed $25 million from Major League Baseball after reaching the $75 million limit of borrowing from M.L.B.’s industrywide bank credit line."...

"Bidders near first step in Mets deal," NY Times, Richard Sandomir, 3/20/11

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Leo Hindery wanted a White House job but it didn't work out.
2/3/09, "Daschle pushed Hindery for Obama job," Politico

"Tom Daschle backed the patron who paid him a million-dollar salary and supplied him with a free car and driver for a job inside the Obama administration, two Democrats said Monday.

Leo Hindery, whose InterMedia Partners employed the former Senate majority leader, had been mentioned as a

possible secretary of commerce or U.S. trade representative.

"Tom was pushing for him," said one Democratic source.

Obama's aides rejected Daschle's suggestion that a top job go to Hindery, for whose private equity fund Daschle had served as a rainmaker and adviser....

But the news that Daschle did not pay taxes on the imputed income for the car and driver has put the spotlight on Hindery, a blustery, left-leaning mogul with an office in Chrysler Building, a table at the Four Seasons, and a passion for race cars, who has styled himself

as organized labor’s Robert Rubin.

Democratic senators on Monday opened up a new line of defense for Daschle, saying his back-tax problems stemmed from Hindery’s failure to process the proper IRS