Lone Ranger: Ray Davis’ Rangers captured their first World Series title in franchise history.
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The billionaire energy mogul led the team to its first MLB title in franchise history.
As billionaire Texas Rangers owner Ray Davis stood in front of the baseball world and accepted the team’s first World Series trophy in its 52-year history, it was likely the first time many fans had ever seen him smile. Or seen him period. The 81-year-old energy mogul hardly interacts with the news media, but ending a drought that dates back to the franchise’s days as the Washington Senators in the 1960s and early 1970s was clearly a cause for celebration.
A World Series title was hardly a foregone conclusion on Opening Day back in March. The Rangers were 50-to-1 longshots, improving to only 16-to-1 when the regular season ended, according to Sports Betting Dime. But a white-hot October, including a stunning ninth inning comeback in Game 1 of the Fall Classic, bestowed baseball immortality on Davis and the Rangers.
“I can’t tell you what it means to the city of Arlington, the Dallas Fort-Worth metroplex. We’re just thrilled to death,” Davis told MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred after the game. “Thank you for all of your support, for your patience.”
Pursuing a championship hasn’t come cheap, of course, and Davis—who is worth an estimated $2.8 billion—hasn’t hesitated to open his checkbook. Since 2013, according to Spotrac, the Rangers have committed more than $1.3 billion to free agents, with roughly $830 million coming in the last two off-seasons alone, including $325 million to Corey Seager, $175 million to Marcus Semien and $185 million to Jacob deGrom. Offsetting some of that cost is the fact that the Rangers have rapidly appreciated since his group paid $593 million for the club in 2010. Forbes estimates the franchise is now worth $2.23 billion, and that mark could soon be even higher: In May, one of the Rangers’ minority partners was reportedly looking to offload their 10% stake at a $3 billion valuation.
“This has turned into a prolific investment for him,” says Martin Conway, a professor at the Georgetown University Sports Management Institute who worked in the Rangers organization under a different ownership group. “The franchise was really a hidden value in sports for a lot of reasons.”
Tex Flex: The Rangers opened the season as a 50-1 long shot to win the World Series.
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Even though the Rangers have clearly increased Davis’ wealth, the team didn’t make him rich. In 1993, after he had started investing in the natural gas business, he partnered with Kelcy Warren and Ben H. Cook to buy a controlling 37% stake in bankrupt oil company Endevco (later renamed Cornerstone Natural Gas) for $3 million. The trio flipped it to El Paso three years later for $115 million, netting each of them $13 million.
Soon after, Davis and his partners founded a natural gas distributor and pipeline company called Energy Transfer. The company struggled early and then Cook passed away. But in the early 2000s it claimed several major victories by acquiring the Oasis pipeline in two transactions for roughly $350 million, merging with Heritage Propane, which came with a $300 million cash infusion, and buying pipelines from TXU (north of Dallas) and AEP (Houston) for a combined $1.37 billion. Davis served as co-CEO with Warren up until 2007, when he walked away from the daily operations. Energy Transfer has a market cap of $41.4 billion today and moves roughly 30% of America’s oil through its infrastructure. Davis still owns just over 2%.
Not long after walking away from Energy Transfer, the Rangers came up for sale. The team had endured a period of financial chaos under former owner and private equity investor Tom Hicks, eventually filing for bankruptcy protection in 2010. Baseball had long been in Davis’ blood. He played at LeTourneau College in Longview, Texas in the mid-1960s and spent many hot days in the outfield bleachers of Arlington Stadium, watching the Rangers, in the 1970s.
Warren, who shared season tickets with Davis in the 1990s, encouraged him to think about buying the team. “Managing investments? That’s pretty boring stuff,” Warren told the Dallas Morning News with a laugh in 2015, referencing Davis’ move to run diversified investment company Avatar after leaving Energy Transfer.
With fellow oil magnate Bob Simpson jumping in as co-lead investor and Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan and businessman Chuck Greenberg fronting the group, Davis purchased the Rangers for $593 million in 2010. His group wasn’t the only one vying for the franchise, fending off a bid from Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban and future Houston Astros owner Jim Crane. The Rangers won the American League pennant in each of their first two seasons under the new ownership group, losing in the World Series both times.
As an owner, Davis has generally operated behind the scenes. He has reportedly stuck to keeping an eye on team finances and non-player personnel matters, entrusting the baseball decisions to executives like Ryan, Jon Daniels and currently Chris Young. Davis has intervened on occasion, personally visiting with Cy Young Award winner Cliff Lee, who the Rangers tried to sign before the 2010 season, as well as former National League Manager of the Year Bruce Bochy, who came out of retirement this year to become the team’s skipper and won his fourth World Series title. He’s also built a positive reputation among his peers in ownership, having served on MLB’s Executive, Labor and Competition Committees. “I have a very high regard for Ray,” says Ken Kendrick, the billionaire owner of the Diamondbacks.
Cooperstown Calling: Rangers owner Ray Davis helped lure Bruce Bochy out of retirement to manage the team.
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Even without winning the World Series, Davis has transformed the franchise off the field. In addition to quelling Rangers’ financial woes, he moved the team into the $1.25 billion Globe Life Field in 2020, a key piece of Arlington’s rapidly growing entertainment district. The complex also includes the Dallas Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium, two Six Flags Amusement Parks, the National Medal of Honor Museum and Choctaw Stadium, the club’s previous home that has since been converted to a multi-purpose sport an entertainment venue.
It’s all part of a strategy that Davis laid out in a rare interview with the Dallas Morning News eight years ago. “I’ve always envisioned this as a legacy asset,” he explained. “If this were a flip, we would have already traded away a lot of our young prospects to make us look that much better. But if you look down the road two, three, four, five years, that’s where your lifeblood comes from.”
And if you build it right and look a little farther, sometimes a World Series title is waiting for you. “I’m a man of faith and I’ve had the hope that we would hold up that trophy one day,” Davis said following the game. “We always had that vision. We never gave up that hope, and here we are.”
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Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/justinbirnbaum/2023/11/01/texas-rangers-owner-ray-davis-world-series-champion-28-billion-fortune/