Mark Walter reportedly doesn't plan to sell Dodgers, which would allow Shohei Ohtani to hit free agency

When a man sells a central pillar of Los Angeles sports, as Mark Walter just did by shockingly offloading the Los Angeles Lakers for $12.5 billion, it begs the question: What about that other central pillar of Los Angeles sports he owns?

That would be the Los Angeles Dodgers, which Walter and his partners at Guggenheim Baseball Management purchased in 2012. Since then, the Dodgers have grown from a literally bankrupt laughingstock into a powerhouse that has several observers begging for a salary cap.

According to both the Los Angeles Times and The Athletic, Walter has no plans to end that run and sell the Dodgers.

The Times' Bill Shaikin additionally reports that the Lakers sale is "not a sign Walter is interested in dismantling a sports empire" that, in addition to the Dodgers, includes stakes in, among others, the Los Angeles Sparks, Chelsea, Strasbourg, the Cadillac Formula 1 team and the entire Professional Women's Hockey League.

Walter and his partners originally purchased the Dodgers from the McCourt family for $2.15 billion. The team was valued at $7.8 billion in Forbes' most recent round of team valuations.

There is, of course, good reason Dodgers fans shouldn't want Walter to sell, and it's not even their run of success under his control.

Back when Shohei Ohtani shocked the baseball world with his 10-year, $700 million, heavily deferred contract with the Dodgers, a rather interesting clause was reported then confirmed at the two-way star's introductory news conference.

If Walter or Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman leave the club, Ohtani can terminate his deal and enter free agency.

As Ohtani explained in December 2023:

"Everybody has to be on the same page in order to have a winning organization," Ohtani said. "I feel like those two are at the top of it, and they're in control of everything, and I feel almost like I'm having a contract with those two guys. And I feel like, if one of them are gone, and [we'll] not be on the same page, I feel like things might get a little out of control. So I just wanted a safety net."

It is not hyperbolic to say that Ohtani's contract has proven to be the most lucrative player deal in the history of professional sports. For the price of $70 million per year, with $68 million diverted into an interest-accruing escrow account as part of MLB's deferred money rules, the Dodgers have the full attention of Japan, the fourth-largest economy in the world, to say nothing of the built-in financial benefits of employee a person who is historically good at baseball.

You can see this in the litany of Japanese advertisements in Dodger Stadium — ahem Uniqlo Field at Dodger Stadium (named for the Japanese clothing brand paying the Dodgers a reported $25 million per year ) — and you see it in reports that estimate the Dodgers have made $200 million per year off Ohtani alone.

Ohtani hitting free agency now would be an even bigger circus than his first and second go-arounds, as remote as the possibility seems.

One of the supposed benefits of Walter purchasing the Lakers last year was it would allow him to unleash the brain trust that has made the Dodgers the class of MLB on their NBA counterpart.

He was in the process of doing so. There was Farhan Zaidi, the former Dodgers general manager brought back to help oversee Walter's sports portfolio, and there was Friedman, also said to have an advisory role for the Lakers.

Lakers president of baseball operations Lon Rosen — himself a longtime Dodgers chief marketing officer — said in February that in Zaidi and Friedman would provide input for Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka. The Athletic reported Wednesday the duo have since been "very involved in basketball decisions," attended offseason workouts and were involved in interviews with new basketball executives.

It's unclear how the Lakers' sale will affect that set-up in both the short and long term.