Giants’ Magowan: Timing Is Only Surprise in Dodger Sale

Peter O’Malley’s decision to sell the Dodgers might have shocked the sports world, but Peter Magowan, owner of the San Francisco Giants, said Tuesday he had heard O’Malley talk informally about it for several years.

“I was only surprised by the timing,” Magowan said, adding he believes estate planning, as O’Malley noted, is the primary reason for the move--compounded by the complexities of family ownership amid rising costs.

“The ownership of a sports team has become a high-risk business, and all of Peter’s assets are tied up in the Dodgers,” Magowan said. “In the Giants’ situation, we have a partnership in which the burden on any one person is not as great. There is a diversity of risk.”

Magowan called O’Malley a credit to baseball and a pioneer in promotions, marketing and global expansion, “which is the direction baseball needs to go.”

O’Malley also led the 11th-hour fight that kept the Giants from moving to Tampa-St. Petersburg in December 1992, allowing Magowan and partners to buy the team from Robert Lurie and keep it in San Francisco.