The sports world was rocked this past week by accusations that Major League Baseball’s richest team, the Los Angeles Dodgers, were funded primarily by fraud.
Those accusations were false, and based on a prolific misunderstanding of where the team gets most of its revenue, who owns the majority of the organization, as well as how much of their television income comes from cable company Spectrum.
It didn’t matter though, because once accusations were made, baseball fan internet, already consumed by hatred and jealousy of the Dodgers money and success, ran wild. ESPN reporter Jeff Passan was the target of a days-long harassment campaign, demanding he speak out based on fans’ complete and often purposeful misunderstanding.
But for some quick backstory, Mark Walter, the Dodgers’ largest single owner, is currently under investigation for allegedly improperly handling of insurance company investments. Several companies used investor funds to make loans to businesses also under his control. While this is allowed by federal regulators, it’s reportedly alleged that these loans far exceed the typical scale in such cases. Those investments also weren’t properly disclosed to investors, meaning that the fact both businesses were owned or controlled by Walter wasn’t made clear.
Most reports have suggested that there were at least $16 billion in loans that are under investigation. That’s obviously a significant amount of money, which helped lead to the reality-defying outrage.
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This weekend though, Dodgers president and another member of the ownership group, Stan Kasten, addressed it, clearing up several misconceptions and pointing out that the story has little to do with the team.
While many have guessed or stated that Walter would have to sell the Dodgers or his stake in the team, Kasten told the media, and particularly the California Post in response to questions from Dylan Hernandez, that the team is not up for sale and will not be.
“I wanted to make sure everyone understood one thing very clearly: The Dodgers are not being sold,” Kasten said. “They’re not gonna be sold. They’re not for sale. There’s no process that has been started to sell it, period,” he continued. “We are planning only to win. That is what we are always doing. And we are still continuing to do that.”
When questioned about Walter selling the Lakers after just a year in ownership, Kasten said it was a separate situation that has nothing to do with the Dodgers. An answer he said came directly from Walter.
“I just wanted this to be clear, because this question keeps coming up,” Kasten said. “I understand the questions, I do. But as I said to you last time we met, the Lakers thing was what we lawyers call ‘sui generis.’ It was just one of those one-of-a-kind things that really has nothing to do with what’s happening with us.”
“This comes from Mark,” he added. “He’s gung-ho about continuing to try to win.”
While the baseball fan community has been consumed by their righteous crusade that LA’s payroll has been funded by fraud, Kasten said that while not “contending anything about the investigation,” he wanted fans to “know nothing involving the Dodgers is part” of that investigation.
“I’m promising you, when it’s over, you’re going to realize [some things being reported] are being mischaracterized,” he continued. “You don’t have to trust me, but I’m telling you.”
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Again, Kasten is part of the ownership group himself. He works directly with Walter on the day-to-day operations for the Dodgers. He’s reiterating that the investigation has nothing to do with the team, because it doesn’t. Will this matter to anyone? Not likely, because the pitchforks are out, and if there’s one thing the internet excels at, it’s taking pitchforks out and never putting them away, regardless of facts that emerge later on.
But for more context, there are a few other elements to this that are worth highlighting. One of the supposed “controversies” is a reported loan from Delaware Life, a company Walter controls, to Dodgers Tickets LLC that was listed as “unaffiliated,” though the two businesses both involve Walter. A smoking gun, right? The organization is built on fraud. Well, that loan was for $4.1 million. $4.1 million is a rounding error on LA’s balance sheet. As just one example, they spent $4 million this year to buyout Chris Taylor’s contract, who is no longer playing in Major League Baseball. This loan was also already paid off.
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Then there’s the more logical reasoning part of it. If Walter was fraudulently sending money to the Dodgers to enrich himself, why would he then turn around and…spend a huge percentage of it on player payroll?
Estimates in 2025 suggested that the Dodgers spent nearly 75% of their total revenue on payroll, one of the highest such percentages in baseball. So the pitchfork community’s contention is that Walter is running the Dodgers based on fraud and instead of pocketing those profits himself, he’s spending money on players? That makes as little sense as acting as thought the 2020 World Series doesn’t count.
Some of the “controversy” revolves around the Dodgers’ TV deal. But again, LA reportedly has exceeded $1 billion in revenue. Even if their TV deal was cut in half, from $330 to $165 million, they would have reported at least $835 million in revenue. Likely more. Some fans are upset about the fact that some of this income is shielded from revenue sharing. But that again, would take away roughly $55-60 million in income. That’s 5-6%, at best, of the team’s income, that would be redistributed, and would represent an increase of $2 million per team for the other 29 organizations. It’s essentially meaningless.
And in fact, if you apply that loss in revenue to losing say, Kyle Tucker and Edwin Diaz, that would actually have helped the Dodgers this season, given how poorly those free agent signings have played.
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Then there’s the contract deferrals, which are a constant source of misinformation. Shohei Ohtani suggested that structure, not the Dodgers. Had he signed with Toronto or San Francisco, they too would have $680 million in deferred compensation on the books. That money also has to be accounted for, in specific investment accounts, within approximately two years of the salary being earned.
The reality of the Dodgers’ dominance is that they are a wealthy organization located in the country’s second-largest television market, with a massive, dedicated fan base that can support the highest ticket prices in baseball. Their track record of regular season success and commitment to winning convinced Shohei Ohtani, the game’s biggest star, to choose them. He increased their revenue exponentially through even higher attendance, a massive new influx of Japanese corporate advertising and merchandise sales. They then reinvested that revenue into signing more players. Their front office is staffed with some of the best and brightest minds in the industry and their player development group is second to none.
That is the foundation of a sustained winning culture, which helps explain why the Mets, despite matching LA’s spending, employing deferrals and awarding Juan Soto the largest contract in sports history, are on course to miss the playoffs for the second straight season and have yet to advance beyond the NLCS under owner Steve Cohen. It also helps explain why the Yankees have not won a World Series since 2009 and, in that same span, have accumulated fewer World Series victories than the Cleveland Guardians, to say nothing of the Royals, who claimed a championship in 2015.
Again, none of this matters to those who have made up their minds, but maybe it’s worth waiting to see if Kasten’s right. He probably is.
